Have you heard there’s a rumor in St. Petersburg? Part 1

St. Petersburg is gloomy. St. Petersburg is bleak. My underwear got frozen standing here all week. Oh since the revolution, our lives have been so gray. Thank goodness for the gossip that gets us through the day! Hey!

In case you didn’t figure out from these first few lines and the title of this edition of the blog, I am a huge fan of the animated classic Anastasia. Although I’m a Disney girl at heart (Anastasia is not a Disney movie), in our most recent trip I could not help but sing the lyrics of the song I know so well as we walked along the streets of this very city. The first few lines of this song probably paint a pretty accurate picture of what the city is like in the winter or what it was like those days following the revolution, but they were anything but the experience that we had in St. Petersburg. We found ourselves in 80° weather, nothing but sunshine, surrounded by pastel buildings, and beautiful architecture. I count myself very lucky that we got to check off a city that has been on my bucket list for a while. We did not even begin to scratch the surface of all that the city had to offer. I can, however, reflect upon the experiences we did get to have and the places we got to see.

Russia as you probably guessed is not the easiest country to visit. In order to enter, you need to apply for a visa. One thing that is helpful to know is that if you arrive on a cruise ship and go on an organized tour through the boat, you can get around this tricky and time consuming piece of legislative paperwork. That was part of the appeal of choosing a cruise for this area of the world. My mom, dad, Bill and I traveled on the Star Breeze (one of the yachts in the Windstar fleet) all through the Baltic including an overnight stop in St. Petersburg. Unfortunately, with the cruise visa you aren’t able to explore the city on your own outside of the tours. We did however, take two pretty incredible full day tours and lucky for you I am here to share all the details and photos! I actually have so much to share on this city that for your sake (and mine) I’m going to break this blog into two pieces. One for each day of our trip. So let’s get into it!

Day 1

On the morning of our first day we pulled into the harbor of Saint Petersburg bright and early. For those of you that aren’t familiar with the Windstar cruise line, one of the big perks is they have much smaller ships which allows them to pull into smaller ports. This being the case, we were able to dock right down the river from all the main attractions. From the front of the ship you could even see a beautiful Russian orthodox church (Assumption church) complete with the signature gold domes which made for some gorgeous pictures.

After disembarking the ship, our first stop was passport control. I’m not exactly sure what they were looking for but they sure did take a close look at everyone and make sure everything was exactly in order. Thankfully we had no trouble and were able to board the bus without much trouble.

Our first stop for the morning was Catherine’s palace which is about an hour outside the city. This was one of the Summer Palaces for the Russian royal family. As it lies outside of St. Petersburg proper, it was occupied by the Nazis during World War II even though the city of St. Petersburg was never taken by their forces. In the course of the Nazi occupation the palace was completely destroyed and was only restored and open to the public again in the 1960s. Here is a photo of a photo that was displayed in the castle showing the damage done to the palace during World War II.

Before the Nazis were able to occupy the palace, the Russians were smart enough to remove all of the art and hide all of the statues. Interestingly, the statues were actually buried throughout the grounds and never found by the Nazis.

When we walked into Catherine’s palace, we were greeted by an impressive stairway.

The first room that we walked into was the main entry hallway. It is the only room with the original ceiling as it was painted on canvas and could therefore be removed before the occupation. The room is in the Baroque style and actually has real gold leaf in the paint used to decorate the wood moldings.

After this main entry hall we continued to walk through spectacular room after spectacular room.

All of these rooms lead up to the famous Amber room. Unfortunately no photos were allowed in the Amber room so the best I can do is to show you a couple pictures from the Internet.

If you have a look at the second photo, you can see that the panels are actually made up of many pieces of Amber. The darker colored Amber is younger while the more honey colored Amber is older. You’ll also notice red Amber which is much more rare. All of the Amber in these panels comes from the Baltic Sea. This room actually does not contain the original Amber panels however. These were not removed prior to the world war and disappeared over the course of the Nazi occupation. Our guide joked that the panels are likely somewhere in South America hidden from the world but like probably true.

Following our tour of the Palace itself, we had a chance to walk around the grounds which were equally as stunning. Although I will say they were nothing compared to the Peterhoff (again wait for day 2).

After Catherine’s palace it was back on the bus to head into the city of St. Petersburg once more. We stopped for lunch which included Bellinis and beef stroganoff – traditional Russian fare.

With our bellies full it was time to head to the world famous Hermitage. It’s interesting because I actually did not know a whole lot about the Hermitage prior to doing research for St. Petersburg. It is essentially the Louvre of Russia. During the reign of Catherine the Great she accumulated a vast collection of artwork which makes up a large portion of the collection today. There’s so much artwork that, coincidentally, there’s also a branch of the Hermitage Museum in Amsterdam! We made a point of visiting the Amsterdam branch before our trip to St. Petersburg and our guide gave us some interesting insights into how that branch of the Hermitage ended up in Amsterdam. Peter the Great, one of the first Emperors of Russia, actually loved the city of Amsterdam. He spent a great deal of time here. In fact there’s even a dutch ship docked on the river outside of the Hermitage. You may have also noticed in the previous photos the Delft tile work that adorned of the heating units at Catherine’s palace. This love of all things dutch also explains why there is a Dutch wing inside this Russian museum with a large number of Rembrandts on display.

Anyway back to the museum in St. Petersburg. Our tour was on a Monday which is actually the day that the Hermitage is closed. When we booked our tour my dad noticed this fact and actually had to follow up to make sure that this wasn’t an oversight. It was actually the exact opposite. On Mondays although the museum is closed to the public, it is open for private tours. The only caveat is you have to go on a set path but huge plus you get the entire museum essentially to yourself which is pretty incredible. How lucky for us!

When you first walk into the Hermitage (or at least the entrance we went through) you enter in to the Winter Palace. This is the very palace which the Romanoffs were taken from at the start of the revolution. In addition, because St. Petersburg was never taken by the Nazis everything in the winter palace, and in the whole Hermitage for that matter, is original. The decor was reminiscent of Catherine’s palace from which we just came.

After the winter palace you enter into the 3 areas of the Hermitage. As we walked there were several interesting pieces.

The Peacock Clock

The clock was actually a gift to Catherine the Great. It chimes once a week and the peacock spreads it’s feathers as it rings. Unfortunately, we did not see it chime because I am sure that is quite a site to behold.

Danaë

This Rembrandt painting was actually almost destroyed. In the 80’s someone threw acid on the piece. It has since been restore but you can still see traces of the damage.

The Return of the Prodigal Son

Another painting by Rembrandt. If you look closely the hands are actually different sizes which likely means Rembrandt used different models for the painting.

Jasper Vase

The vase is actually three pieces put together. Unlike other vases in the museum which are mosaic this vase is solid stone and weighs over 16 tons!!

After exiting the Hermitage we traveled back to the ship. On the way out we did see a square outside the museum and I will leave you with those photos. Look forward to my post detailing our second day to come soon!