Mark on the Move

To Kazakhstan by Train – Very Nice, High Five!

Mark Mayo — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 22:29:17 +0000

The train going into Kazakhstan was pretty similar to those in Russia – with the platzkart and kupe cabins. I’d opted for the kupe again, given that I hoped there’d be a powerpoint for me to use. I was missing my Kindle, annoyed I’d not been able to find a replacement.

Train going the other way, from Aktobe to Atyrau

Although I was in a kupe cabin of four beds, I was sharing only with a Russian / Kazakh woman, Victoria, who spoke a few words of English. She lived in Aktau and had been visiting family in Astrakhan. As the trip was 42 hours long and included two nights, it didn’t matter that we spoke little of each others’ language – you could spend five minutes trying to figure out how to explain one word to the other – time becomes irrelevant. An engineer with one of the Aktau oil companies, she had many stories about how things had changed from Soviet Union times. Back then every trip the company sent her on would be flying – it was that cheap, these days the train was the only sensible way to go. Of course half way into a 42 hour trip, your view on what is “sensible” changes somewhat.

One of the cargo trains we pass

Although there were the occasional stops, and I tend to shutdown eating-wise on journeys like this, she insisted despite my protests this wasn’t to be and kept making me share her teas, food, and some oddities – chocolate-covered cheese. This worked out very well for me.

Desert rainbow!

At the Kazakhstan border I got a good long grilling in broken English, where I’d come from and so on. Was I really travelling through Kazakhstan on my own? A tourist? What were my plans afterwards? He then called it in, saying that it was the first time he’d seen a New Zealand passport, so had to figure out what to do. All cleared, he shook my hand and welcomed me to Kazakhstan, and I swallowed the temptation to quote Borat with “Very nice, high five!” (aside: Borat’s accent is not even close to accurate Kazakh). This was now country number 58 for me!

The oncoming storm systems

It started to rain shortly after entering Kazakhstan – just light rain, with a storm visible in the distance, lightning included. The landscape opened up to wide, bare, flat plains, with tussocks of grass. A spectacular rainbow passed us, and half an hour later, another. Before long, Victoria exclaimed and pointed out the window – there was the first of many camels to be seen. Some ambling in trains out in the semi-desert, others in backyards in the villages we passed by.

Temple on the steppe

There was a four hour stop in Atyrau, but being at 6am I opted instead to stay on the train and nap while the train shunted back and forth 50 or so times. Victoria came back on with lots of shopping, she seemed pleased with her haul.

The second night, at Beyneu around midnight we stopped and a lot of new passengers boarded. We gained a couple in our carriage, more eastern-looking Kazakhs, also bound for Aktau. They had a ton of luggage, and chatted quite a bit to Victoria – and I gathered some of it was about me, as I’d pick up a bit here and there. Mr “Nova Zelandya” was becoming a common curiosity.

Camels in the desert

Victoria pointed out the vehicle roads near the track. “Very dangerous – barely a road”. I thought of Danny on his scooter. At least he’d made it through there already.

The line itself must be really popular, and I couldn’t work out why we stopped many, many times along the way, often in the middle of nowhere. This was one of the reasons it takes so long. Eventually I decided that it was stopping at small shunting stations, as for the most part it seemed to be one track, and doing this would allow trains in the other direction to pass.

Villages on the steppe

Finally around 9am, almost perfectly to time again, we pulled into Aktau – or rather the small town nearby – Mangestau. Saying goodbye to the others, I followed the mass of people heading for the fence, jumped it and engaged in the horde of taxi drivers, eager to see my first Kazakh city, and to find the Caspian Sea!

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Astrakhan – Two Sides to a City

Mark Mayo — Fri, 26 Aug 2011 05:26:53 +0000

I arrived early in Astrakhan and hopped out into the mess of taxi drivers triple parked outside the station. I tried communicating with a few of them the name of my hotel, but to no avail – before finding one finally who reckoned he knew the street I said. Or gestured. Probably.

On the tracks at Astrakhan

A port on the Volga river, very close to the Caspian Sea – Astrakhan has had a key position in history, and traded hands many times – from the Golden Horde, to Ivan the Terrible, the Cossacks and the Russians. Now a city of 500,000 – it has a varied ‘style’ (which I’ll get to) and the most hyped tourist thing about it is that you can get a 10 day cruise up the Volga to Moscow – something I’d love to do one day!

Astrakhan - not looking great

It was 6am and I was tired, so after 20 minutes when the taxi driver came to a pause on a street and asked me where the hotel was, I was unimpressed. It turned out he had roughly the right address, but the hotel was hard to find. After asking some people, I finally remembered I had the phone number, and after giving them a call he headed down what looked like a rubbish tip inside a construction zone driveway, to reveal the Gold Jin (like Genie) hotel.

Ladas, communist-era apartment buildings

They were undergoing a lot of renovations to be fair, and despite speaking no English they seemed quite happy to let me check in early (6.30am now). I crashed into my first proper bed in several nights and had a few hours of sleep.

Astrakhan starting to look pretty nice and clean

Rising, I decided to wander in an attempt to firstly find some food and secondly locate the train station again by foot as I had forgotten to buy my ticket out – after the ‘once per day’ train in Volgograd I was wary of being stuck in an expensive hotel. It was cheap for the town but still far more than a hostel, again none of which existed in the city, as far as I could find online.

Nicer architecture in the city center

After several blocks and an hour wandering down dusty wreckers’ yards and among Soviet-era apartment blocks, I was unimpressed with the city. It was dirty, dusty and depressing, and most importantly despite having found the tracks – Google Maps once again was rather lacking in its description of the city, and as such I didn’t really know which way to follow the tracks to the station. Eventually I gave in and found a cabbie, a young chap who excitedly attempted to practice his English with me and even took a really long roundabout way to extend the conversation. Fortunately he charged me half of my initial ride, so it was fine. I also learned the Russian word for train, after my saying ‘station’ in Russian brought up further questions. Despite the fact that “vaxhal” usually means train station, and “avtovaxhal” means bus station. By now I was accustomed to making a fool of myself and the onomatopoeic “choo-choo” got the desired response. The irony was that the bus and train stations were actually beside each other.

The promenade on the Volga river

I entered the train station after a search by the police, and stared at the board. My Cyrillic was improving but it still took me a while to spot the train I wanted to Aktau, Kazakhstan, for the following day. Finally I borrowed a pen from a stall owner and scribbled down the train times and date that I wanted, and approached the counter, hoping my train ticket buying technique was now honed enough to avoid any confusing questions.

I was out of luck. She understood the date and time, but kept asking “Mangestau”. Thank goodness I’d spoken to a Russian on travel.stackexchange.com the previous day and established that this was the small town and region near Aktau where the end of the line was. However mixed among her other words it took me a few goes to identify this, but eventually got my ticket and the times and everything matched what I expected, so it looked good.

Cyrillic, the daily bane of my trip

I popped into a supermarket just outside, and spent some time wandering the aisles, just looking at what was on offer. It’s the first time I’ve seen frozen vegetables in bins where you just take scoops of the appropriate pile. I was also getting better at identifying some of the words around. It’s funny, but more often that not food items are the best part of any language I know.

From here I walked down the street for a while, figuring I could grab a cab if needed. After a while I came across the river, and finally, this was the Astrakhan I was looking for. To any future travellers – theGold Jin hotel is neither central nor convenient. There are others for similar prices which are in far better locations.

I followed the river around to a few churches, and the waterfront even had a Brighton beach-like promenade, with roller-skaters, couples walking and people just enjoying the fading sun. It’s a really nice part of the town, and it’s disappointing it’s not easy to find from the hotel who firstly spoke zero English (ok fine, it’s Russia) and didn’t have maps, despite their remote location.

The 400 year old Kremlin

One final highlight which I thought was basically a large walled cathedral, I would later find was the old Kremlin, built in the 1580s to 1620s. Although closed, it was nice to walk around and see it and some more of the city.

Eventually I grabbed another cab and headed back to the hotel, tired, but I figured I’d check out in the morning and do some sightseeing until my early-afternoon train to Aktau.

Yes, you try finding your station on this!

Surprise! 6am, and I was awoken to loud knocking on the door. The employees, now suddenly with a grasp of the English language (albeit limited) told me that I’d been there 24 hours and therefore either had to pay or leave. Unimpressed, given that their checkout time was midday, I tried to argue, but was in no position to question when their English vanished again, so I settled on paying and spent the morning on Skype and generally making use of the hotel if I was going to be paying for it. Finally an hour before departure, I grabbed a taxi and headed to the station. After crossing my fingers that the police wouldn’t insist on searching my bags at the entrance, I wandered around for a bit looking for snacks, before picking up some more Pistachios and drinks, and what turned out to be the most pitiful looking scoop of icecream I’d ever seen. But hey, 15 Rubels. The station also had a bird cage down the end with several rather large birds I’d never seen before. Finally the train arrived, and I wandered across the tracks and into the carriage, after yet another confusing discussion with the provodnitsa as I was still unable to work out how they could figure out my cabin room from my ticket. Next stop, Kazakhstan!

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Volgograd to Astrakhan by Train

Mark Mayo — Thu, 11 Aug 2011 01:26:12 +0000

At 7.30pm I was back at the station with some slight rain coming down, and snacks in hand ready to board my train to Astrakhan overnight.

Train tracks at Volgograd

I’d booked a seating class ticket and briefly panicked when I saw what appeared to be several drunken army soldiers waiting for the train, but they seemed to be in a different wagon. I boarded and was quite pleased with getting two seats again and the carriage being only a third full. It was going to be about 11 hours, so this was fine.

The Angel - "Mamayev Kurgan" memorial

As we pulled out of the station I saw up on the hill the angel statue that I’d been searching for. It was pretty big and impressive, and quite the symbol for the city. The train pulls over the Volga river to the east side, and then follows the tracks south to Astrakhan.

After a while some of the soldiers came into our carriage and were being rather loud and drunken, with a few of them taking a look at what I was doing on my laptop and sitting behind me I decided it was time to pack it away. They then started causing a bit of a scene with a passenger at the back, before our wagon’s providnitsa came along and chased the lot of them out, and I ended up sleeping pretty much through until the morning.

Welcome to Astrakhan

Next thing I knew we were pulling in to Astrakhan, my final city in this leg of my Russian trip…

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One Day in Volgograd

Mark Mayo — Wed, 10 Aug 2011 06:59:46 +0000

Volgograd was formerly known as Stalingrad, and was the center of one of the most important and bloodiest battles during World War II. As like many river-side cities it has strategic value, and being on the major river (Volga) between the Caspian Sea and Moscow, perhaps even more so…

Early morning on the Volga River

Having established I had the day in Volgograd, I started walking, picked up a map courtesy of an open wi-fi network, and found that the Volga river was actually pretty close by. I headed down there first, and spent about an hour just sitting in the sun on the banks of the river, a welcome feeling after being couped up in the train for nearly two days. In the river were a couple of small boats fishing, and some fisherman on the banks as well trying for the early morning catch.

Central square in Volgograd

The big ferry terminal building was to my left, and so I wandered along, wondering briefly if I could get a ferry down to Astrakhan. It seemed that it might be possible but I found the ferries even more complicated than buying train tickets, and eventually decided not to bother. Upstairs they had an open coffee shop (which apparently doubled as a strip clup at nights!), and as it came with free wifi I had a Chinese dish (quite the mix of food this place!) for breakfast, and checked email and the like.

Central Volgograd and one of its parks

The rest of the day I spent wandering around town, stopping when my bags became annoyingly heavy, and when a brief flash-storm came rushing through out of nowhere. In the afternoon I came across what appeared for all money to be a Communist Party rally, and again I felt mildly frustrated that I couldn’t understand the langauge – but it was interesting to watch anyway, with the anthem playing as well.

Communist Street

The center of Volgograd doesn’t have much in the way of tourist sights, aside from some statues, the big square, and the usual war and eternal flame memories that seem prevalent throughout ex-Soviet countries. It also has a big angel memorial statue – “Mamayev Kurgan” somewhere in it, and although I’d seen it on a rough tourist map, I walked for ages in the direction of where it should be without any luck, before needing to head back to buy some snacks and catch the train out of time.

Volgograd and its "Mamayev Kurgan" memorial statue over the Volga river

Volgograd seemed to be ok to visit as a city, but I think it’s more useful as a place to leave from rather than a destination – I’d love to take the week long ferry to Moscow one day…

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The Kazakh Visa and Train from Saint Petersburg to Volgograd

Mark Mayo — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 10:08:15 +0000

After dropping my stuff with the kind staff at Apple Hostel (given I was no longer staying there), I headed off for a coffee while waiting for the consulate to open. Eventually the time came and … actually, I kinda covered this in my post about the visa, so I’ll just quote:

“Monday morning, back from Moscow I was at the consulate at opening time, and not really looking at me the woman took my passport, and 10 minutes later returned with the visa inside. I paused briefly, considering saying something, and decided it wasn’t worth it. I checked the dates, and left, finally, visa achieved!”

Right. It was raining again, and my feet were soaked. The reason being, as is tradition with me – I tend to wait until my shoes are literally falling apart before I buy new ones. It happened in Morocco when I was walking around for days in the wet, and in Ireland when I was there during their flood of ’09. And so I returned to the hostel to ask Irena where the nearest cheap shoe shops would be. Conveniently there were a few nearby, and I eventually found a big mall with mostly designer stuff, but one shop with some cheap-by-Saint-Petersburg-prices shoes. Sneakered up, I exited to find the rain had stopped, of course, but at least I had shoes.

Farmland countryside enroute to Volgograd

I stopped in at the train station to buy my ticket south to Volgograd, and walked around for a while, got some food, and finally returned to get my stuff and head to the station. It was going to be a long trip, and I’d settled on Kupe class for two reasons – 37 hours in a bed slightly too short would be annoying, and secondly it’d mean I’d have power points – a huge plus given I had no English language books on me and odds were I couldn’t really hold a conversation with my cabin mates.

Restaurant carriage on train

I found the train and wandered on, ending up in a cabin with a family – two parents and their kid Maxim. I was to hear his name called in anguish many, many times on this trip – he wasn’t the most obedient of kids, and coupled with his over-protective parents made for a repetitive ‘Maxim…Maxim…Maxim’. Again I seemed to have ‘my’ bunk – I somehow always get given the top right bunk in each group, which suits me – I can hide away on the top bunk if I want to, without feeling guilty about keeping someone from using their ‘seat’ on the bottom bunk.

Small towns enroute

This trip would mean that I’d get two nights on the train, and as such on the second evening I decided it was time to be a tourist — although I’d gotten out regularly and bought snacks in the villages, I decided I was going to use the restaurant car. I wandered down and immediately realised my problem – naturally, the menu was in Cyrillic. The chef, pleased that a tourist was using his services, actually spoke some English and a little Spanish, so between the three languages we managed to translate a few of the items for me, having some delicious soup and some decent chicken, while I watched the villages and fields go by out the big carriage windows.

Farm houses and livestock mostly

The countryside is very different again on this route, compared with the forests of Siberia and the lakes of Murmansk – with more small villages, farmland and open countryside – still rather green.

As we came towards Volgograd in the early morning, the provodnik woke us and we started seeing the Volga river, finally pulling in to the station bright and early. I said goodbye to the family, and headed out to see Volgograd after confirming the only train to Astrakhan, where I next wanted to stay, was at 7.30pm that night, giving me a day in the city.

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A Weekend in Moscow

Mark Mayo — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 09:31:50 +0000

This wasn’t my first trip to Moscow, having been here twice in 2008 on the trip to Siberia for the eclipse with Pascal. As such for me this was more of a ‘I can’t come back to Russia without seeing Moscow’ trip, as well as an excuse to get out of Saint Petersburg for the weekend while waiting on my blasted Kazakhstan visa.

Red Square in summer

Moscow is 860 years old, and full of reminders of its imperial and Soviet past. For me it’s always conjured up images of Red Square and the Kremlin, of James Bond movies and Soviet troops marching by. And that’s totally all it is.

No really, in the 20 years since the end of the Soviet regime, Moscow has changed a lot. Whether for the better for tourists is debateable – sure, it’s more accessible and arguably safer, but now McDonalds is all over the place, Starbucks appears twice on the famous Arbat street, and the prices are higher than almost any other European city. Fortunately, however, the sights haven’t been altered, and you can stroll happily around Red Square and get a shot in front of St Basil’s Cathedral without any hassle (unless there’s a pre-Olympics parade on and you have to bribe your way in as we may or may not have needed to do in 2008). The Kremlin has a steady stream of tourists going in and out, and even “President Putin” is on stand-by to greet the many visitors outside the Russian History Museum. And of course since the Kremlin gets blown up in the next Mission Impossible film (oops, sorry, spoilers), it was best to see it again now

"President Putin" comes to greet the crowds

I started walking from the hostel thinking I’d go to a metro station, but ended up walking all the way to the Red Square. It was mostly downhill when hilly, and you get to see a lot more of Moscow this way. I walked past a street with Moscow’s first international food festival – which was unbelievably tempting, but I decided I could get international food, well, obviously – in other countries, and I should press onwards towards Red Square.

St Basil's Cathedral, and me

To change things up a bit, I decided to do something we didn’t do last time – actually go into St Basil’s Cathedral. I’m not sure why we didn’t, but to be fair, it’s not the most interesting inside – the exterior is more impressive. Built in 1555-61, it now contains a museum within. The initial downstairs chamber is impressive, with colour everywhere and all sorts of mosaics, and then you follow what used to be a secret staircase up into the actual cathedral, made up of several mini chapels. Each one is different, some very basic, others with interesting ceilings or the occasional painting, but otherwise fairly sparse. I thought it was worth it though, for completeness.

Alongside the Red Square is a large shopping center – ‘Gum’ (although when you only partially know Cyrillic it looks like ‘Gym’, and as such I kept hearing Homer Simpson quoting ‘What’s a Gym?’ in my head). I went inside, and it’s quite spectacular inside, with ‘trees’ blossoming downstairs, and brand after brand stores everywhere. There’s something almost amusing about essentially pure capitalism in a building right on Red Square.

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One of the

The Metro - spectacular underground

Back at the hostel I really wasn’t feeling too great, and despite some people starting to make a night of it, I headed to bed.

Next day, I caught the metro to the station to buy my return ticket. With much difficulty I explained that I was after cheap tickets, ideally seating, and the woman seemed to be struggling although determined to meet my hopes. Seeing disappointment when she mentioned the price (it was double what I’d paid initially) she hunted more, ad nd then lit up – if I was prepared to go to a different station to leave, she could sell me cheap seat tickets again. I had no problem with that, I still had to return to the hostel to get my stuff in the evening.

Palace interior - no wait, it's the Metro!

Ticket sorted, I headed out on the metro to Smolenskaya station, the closest stop to where we stayed last time – on the insanely touristy Arbat street. But first, the metro. With no zones, each journey costing 28 Rubels (55p), regular trains and being absoultely spotless, it’s something to behold. Like Saint Petersburg, it’s deep down, has music playing in some stations, and has chandeliers, art and statues in various stations, with wide platforms and spacious halls. Last time I found it really difficult to get around, with us needing to check with the staff quite often, but perhaps that was just inexperience and worry about the Cyrillic, as this time I easily found my way around, and popped out at Smolenskaya, recognising the street immediately.

Riverside view of Kremlin Wall

Walking down from the station to Arbat street, you pass what is still the only walk-through McDonald’s I’ve seen in my life, and like last time it had a policeman outside. Turning left, I was once again on Old Arbat Street. A random hodge-podge of tourist cafes, souvenir shops and several street vendors, it looked nicer this time – last time they were doing a lot of construction and renovation on the street.

Cathedral of Christ the Savior - Largest Orthodox Cathedral

Walking through this, I followed my way around and down a few more blocks, until I reached the river on the far side of the Kremlin from Red Square. Wanting to do the walk along the wall, if only at river-height, I continued along this way – a nice walk with the sun starting to come out a bit, until eventually you turn the corner and are presented again with a promenade up to Red Square (and I was presented with a hideously gigantic Transformers 3 billboard to the right).

I crossed under the street and headed to the hostel where Danny had stayed. It was a few blocks away but once again it was nice to walk down different streets and in each under-road passage it gave me more opportunity to look for naff-naffs. Finally after following the directions past a couple of churches, getting very lost as the directions weren’t quite right and I didn’t have Moscow maps on my phone, I finally located it. Unfortunately the staff who knew about Danny’s expected package that I was going to pick-up informed me that it still hadn’t arrived. He’d just have to hope no malaria-infested mosquitos bit him in Kyrgyzstan…

Trinity Church in Serebryaniki Street

I headed back to the nearest metro, and back up to the hostel to get my stuff, before spending an hour in a coffee shop getting some grub, before heading to the station for my train back to Saint Petersburg.

The train ride was actually platzkart this time, and as such I probably got a better sleep, but really I was more concerned with how my visa would turn out. I arrived back into Saint Petersburg early morning, and headed towards Apple Hostel to dump my stuff, and wait for the consulate to open…..

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Saint Petersburg to Moscow by Train

Mark Mayo — Wed, 03 Aug 2011 01:35:48 +0000

Still fuming a little from the Kazakh Consulate, I headed to Moskovsky station to buy a ticket to Moscow. The staff at the hostel had been helpful and written down what I wanted in Russian, although I felt this was a little like cheating, but hey, I still handed over the note after standing in the queue for 30 or so minutes.

Arriving in Moscow after overnight train

It was the absolute cheapest, in seating class – not even platzkart, and as such would cost me about 10 pounds for an overnight (10 hours) trip to Moscow. You can go faster on the express trains, but this meant essentially free night’s accommodation and I could nap on the train.

I went back to the hostel for a few hours before the trip, then got some food at the station and hopped aboard as it starte to rain a bit. I was really down the back of the train, in a huge open carriage with rows and rows of seats. Found my spot down the back and settled in.

Throughout the night the train stopped and started, and some people came and went but aside from the two opposite me who made a little noise initially, it was pretty quiet and I actually got woken by them as we pulled into Moscow mid-morning. The seats were actually really comfortable and for the most part, everyone had two seats to themselves. As an extra benefit if you’d tried, some of the seats even had power points.

I hunted around initially to find the metro, then headed underground, memories of 2008 flooding back as I saw the metro map and started recognising stations. I had some rough directions to Chocolate Hostel (good name!), and with a bit of wifi and my notes, it wasn’t too long before I’d found the unassuming, unlabelled building with the hostel inside.

Chocolate Hostel is not huge, and is one of the more expensive hostels in Moscow, but it’s very nice, has breakfast until 12 (smart, they realise travellers often need a sleep in), and has great facilities.

I checked in, sorted my bed, had a shower and the like, and headed out to rediscover Moscow!

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If I return to Saint Petersburg… (mini-post)

Mark Mayo — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 01:56:59 +0000

If I were to return to Saint Petersburg, and I’d like to believe I will one day, there are a few things I’d like to do which I didn’t see in my time there.

The Quadriga, overlooking Palace Square and the Hermitage

– The Ballet. I’d considered seeing Swan Lake, having seen Black Swan earlier in the year I’d predicted every ballet company in the world would be doing a performance of this – and seeing it in Saint Petersburg would be simply amazing. Unfortunately the few nights it was on always seemd to clash with trips to Moscow, Sting concerts or something else.

– Pushkin – a city 25km south of Saint Petersburg, it’s meant to have beautiful palaces and parks – most famously the Catherine Palace (for Tsarina Catherine I).

– Oreshek fortress – at the mouth of the Neva river, there’s a big medieval fortress on Orekhovy Island. Pictures look pretty fantastic.

– Peter the Great’s Cabin – when planning and building the city, his men built this wooden cabin in days for him, and it’s still sitting preserved near the banks of the Neva. Annoyingly I walked quite close to it one day without realising it was there(!).

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Kazakhstan Consulate – the Elusive Visa Saga

Mark Mayo — Mon, 01 Aug 2011 00:49:18 +0000

One of the biggest problems about travelling through Central Asia is visas. Actually, some might say the BIGGEST issue is visas. I’d encountered some problems already. This was frustrating, as after the initial attempt to find the embassy on the Friday, I couldn’t go on the Monday, thanks to Russia Day and a public holiday.

The well hidden and frustrating Kazakhstan consulate

Finally turning up on the Tuesday, the lady on the desk helpfully assisted in filling out the paperwork, and questioned why I’d brought letters and references, surprised that it would suggest that on their own website. Clearly she didn’t like following the website as it’d also said I could get a double entry – but she was only prepared to offer me a single entry at best. Fine, whatever, how hard could it be to get another one later on (I’ll come back to that in several posts’ time)…

I had to go and make a payment at a special bank nearby. Of course, being Russia, all I had was an address and metro station in Cyrillic. She managed to make it clear that it was two stations away, so off I went, and when exiting the station had to pick a direction and hope – and guessed right, the bank being just around the corner. That was surprisingly easy once they realised what I wanted to do, and within an hour I was back at the consulate, to the surprise of the staff. She took all my papers and told me I could call on Thursday to see. This was a little unsettling as I was now without a passport, but I figured I could stay out of trouble and away from the police for a few days.

(This became more stressful trying to get into and out of the Sting concert later in the week, but I digress)

Come Thursday, the staff at the hostel rang in the morning at 9am on my behalf. We were to call back at 1pm. This was frustrating as I’d hoped to go to the Hermitage. At 1pm they said try at 3. At 3 try at 5. At 5 try at 5.20, and then in an hour. When we called back then there was no answer; they’d gone home for the day. Nice.

The next day we called again in the morning, and were told to call back at 3.30pm. Again we were delayed to 4.30, and finally at 5pm they asked to speak directly to me, and informed me that the consulate was too busy with the economic forum in town to do visas, you know, his actual job. I’m going to assume that they’d left early yesterday to get to the Sting concert on time.

Very frustated, I pointed out that I’d planned on leaving on a train that night to Moscow. After much arguing, she said she could be there for a short time for me to collect my passport, and then I could come back on Monday morning with it when it would ‘definitely’ be ready and would just require pasting it into my passport. I stormed across town to collect it, back to the hostel, and headed to the train station to buy a late night ticket to Moscow. I’ll come back to that. But just as I was about to board the train at around 10.50pm, I received a text message from the consulate. Apparently my visa was ready. I may or may not have punched a nearby wall.

Monday morning, back from Moscow I was at the consulate at opening time, and not really looking at me the woman took my passport, and 10 minutes later returned with the visa inside. I paused briefly, considering saying something, and decided it wasn’t worth it. I checked the dates, and left, finally, visa achieved!

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The Top 8 Sights of Saint Petersburg

Mark Mayo — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 04:42:24 +0000

Saint Petersburg is an amazing European city, with so much to see. In some ways it’s overshadowed by Moscow, but while Moscow has Red Square, St Basil’s and the Kremlin, when it comes to beauty and class, this is the city to see. Here are eight reasons why.

8. The Neva River and its Bridges

Bridges opening at night

Flowing into the Baltic Sea just west of the city, the Neva River is wide and beautiful. A central part of the city, great Soviet-era bridges cross it, and each of these is impressive in its own right, and with Saint Petersburg being nicknamed the ‘Venice of the North’, there are certainly plenty of them. Most also open up Tower Bridge-style twice a night, making a great photo-op – with timetables for these available on Wikitravel.

7. The Russian State Museum

Inside the Russian State Museum

I’d never heard of this, but it was just down the road from my second hostel. One afternoon it was raining and something indoors seemed sensible, so I headed along.

The building’s exterior is impressive in its own right, but inside is where the treat is. Wall after wall of huge art, paintings from centuries ago, different styles, as well as a wing devoted to crafts – pottery, woodwork and clothing from various periods in Russia’s history.

I’m not a huge arts connoisseur but I could appreciate this, even if I didn’t linger too long at most exhibits, I was very impressed by the whole thing, and it’s a very accessible museum, without huge crowds and queues like the Hermitage.

6. The Saint Petersburg Metro System

Can't believe this is the only photo of St Petersburg underground that I have. Ugh.

I know, I know – not a normal tourist sight, but it’s simply surreal after years on the London tube, with statues, frescos, chandeliers and just monsterous stations all deep, very deep below ground. I timed one of the escalators out at nearly two and a half minutes – they’re LONG!

5. Nevsky Prospect and Kazan Cathedral

Kazan Cathedral viewed from just off Nevsky Prospekt

It’s funny, as a tourist in Saint Petersburg, you WILL walk along Nevsky Prospect – it’s the main street in the old district, and although neither the Hermitage or St Isaac’s Cathedral are on it, they are close by, while many others are. And right outside the Nevsky Prospect / Gostiny Dvor metro station exit – the first I came out of in the city, you’re presented with a view of Kazan Cathedral. And it’s big, bold, stately and impressive. I only wandered the grounds, to be fair – but if I return, I now know that inside it’s 69 metres long and 62 metres high and full of sculptures and icons.

4. The Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood

The Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood

If you’d shown me a postcard of this beforehand, I’d swear it was St Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow. I now wonder how many times I’ve thought this, because at first glance they are almost identical. Closer up, you can notice the differences in the designs on the towers, and certainly indoors – this one is built on the spot where Tsar Alexander II was assassinated in 1881 and has one big hall with various chambers leading off it, while St Basil’s has several separate chapels within it – each in its own room.

3. Peter and Paul’s Cathedral and Fortress

Peter and Paul's Cathedral and Fortress from across the river

On the other side of the Neva river from the Hermitage and the rest of the main sights is this fortress. One of the biggest and most impressive in the north, rivalling Suomenlinna in Helsinki is an impressive sight, and centered within is Peter and Paul’s Cathedral – where like St Paul’s or Westminster Abbey in London, has many famous people of years past buried there – including almost all the Romanov Tsars since Peter the Great. Outdoors, it has several large grassy areas and the sunbathers are out in force during summer. A helicopter also runs frequent flights from just behind the fortress for aerial views of Saint Petersburg. Fun fact – standing 10m from the helicopter as it takes off is practically impossible, as is sitting – I was blown over backwards by the force! The fortress is free, but access to the cathedral and others sights cost – but unless you’re really keen, the Cathedral is the main attraction.

2. St Isaac’s Cathedral

St Isaac's Cathedral, artistic

Again, I’d not heard of this before I went to Saint Petersburg. Close to St Paul’s in size as the third highest cupola domed cathedral in the world, the outside is impressive enough. To enter you require two tickets, and you have to exit again inbetween using them (a bit confusing) – one for inside, and one for the collonade around the top outside of the Cathedral – and it’s quite the climb, but completely worth it for the fantastic view of the city.

Inside, it is absolutely incredible. Every single wall is covered in art, floor and ceiling, paintings, gold plating, even the doors are works of art. I expected to spend five minutes having a quick glance around – instead I was inside for close to an hour, trying my best to take it all in.

1. The Hermitage – the top attraction in Saint Petersburg

One of the over 120 rooms of the Hermitage

While St Isaacs is amazing and Peter and Paul’s Cathedral / Fortress is UNESCO Heritage, nothing can compare to the Hermitage. The collection on display features the highlights of the over three million pieces from around the world!

I started on the ground floor where much of the very historic artefacts are, from the corners of the various extents of the Soviet empire over time, meaning you see quite a mix of items that look Chinese in origin, to Persian, to Scandinavian!

This, however, was probably an error as I spent quite a while looking at each item and there are halls and corners and twists and turns. By the time I moved up a floor, I realised I wasn’t going to complete it – I knew that in advance but I didn’t realise just HOW big it is. I asked for a map, and found they were only in Russian, but fortunately they had the highlights as pictures with arrows – perfect! I could follow that – each room had a room number on it, and so I was able to find the Da Vinci painting, the Michaelangelo sculpture, the Monets, the Van Goghs (recognised his style before I read the details, felt quite proud of that one), the Reubens and the Rembrants. It’s so insanely huge that there are two full rooms of Monets – you simply can’t take it all in.

And then, on top of all the amazing artefacts, paintings, sculptures and more is this – remove all of them, and you’d still be left with a gigantic work of art. The building itself has a stylish exterior, with gold trimming, styled windows and magnificent columns. Each room itself is a work of art, with chandeliers, magnificent wood panelling, gold and more – priceless tables, cupboards and dressers.

The throne room, the ballroom (part of this was the Winter Palace once), and the views of the river – the location is quite possibly perfect, and the contents ridiculously incredible. A day is not enough, and nor would a week be. At the same time, there were tour groups doing it in a couple of hours – both good and bad, in the end.

There are several other attractions – St Catherine’s, the Admiralty, Palace Square, and more – even Pushkin or Peterhof just outside the main city. However by the time I’d finished the main attractions the outdoor ones remained and it rained the last few days in St Petersburg, and the Admiralty was undergoing repairs. Therefore, I checked out what I could and when I return, I have more I already want to see – St Petersburg is an amazing city.

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