Touring - On Our Own Today...

Today we decided to do some touring on our own.  We started the morning out by taking the subway, which was pretty easy and straight-forward to use.  The only bad part about the subway was when I went to get more tokens, as I spoke in English, the lady behind the window looked at me like this....  and she looked like this too...  NO JOKE!!

She was not very pleasant about helping a crazy American!  :-)  Nonetheless, we exchanged the necessary rubles and tokens and I was on my merry way.  Next time, Subway-token-lady, we will have a better exchange in broken-Russ-lish!  :-)

So, anyhow, we went to Nevesky Prospect, which is along the same lines as the Magnificent Mile in Chicago, but longer, busier, more restaurants (cafes), and more specialty-type shops.  We also walked around to some of the sights we didn't see yesterday.  Again, the best way is probably just to tell the story in pics... so here we go again!

On our way down to the subway trains ... these are some of the deepest, if not THE deepest, subways in the world.

Waiting for the train to take us to Nevesky Prospect

After arriving we decided to go back by the Church of Spilled Blood... a short walk from Nevesky.  Here is another facade we really hadn't seen yesterday.

From there, we went to the Summer Garden.  This is a restored garden on the grounds of Peter the Great's Summer Palace. It was really impressive, which is hard to capture in pics.  But lots of sculptures and lots of fountains.

This is one of the more ornate gardens on the grounds with a large fountain in far background... closer detail of fountain below

Fountain detail

Fountain for different direction

This was the Summer Palace of Peter the Great.  It is currently being restored.

At the door.  I knocked to inquire about rent or purchase, but no one answered! :-)

Kazanskiy Cathedral.  Dedicated in 1837.  Closed/reopened in 1932 during Soviet times as "Museum of the History of Religion and Atheism".  It was returned to the Orthodox Catholic Church and services resumed in 1992.

Lunch time ... Leslie had Bellini's and honey with Jasmine tea.

I had a bowl of cold soup... it was supposed to be that way :-) ... made with meat, beef-vinegar broth, and vegetables.  I know it sounds pretty weird, but was actually pretty good!

There was an international exhibition going on in one of the parks called the United Buddy Bears.  It was started in Germany and has toured several countries (but nowhere in the US yet).  Most of the countries of the world designed a Bear and they were all over the park... surrounding the fountain, lining the pathways, etc.  It was neat to see.

Can you guess what country this is representing?!  Go USA!!  Leslie went up for a pic and this little ham joined her!  He was quite the poser! :-)

The Kunstkamera (or Chamber of Curiosities).  Built by Peter the Great to display  some of the peculiar anthropology and ethnology he obtained during his travels ... shrunken heads, "giants", two-headed babies, etc, etc.
As we went by it yesterday, our guide noted that, at that time of Peter the Great, no one wanted to visit it because of its "scary" and macabre collection, so they used to offer a free drink of Vodka to all who would attend to prep their palette for the sights.  According to our guide, they don't offer that same custom anymore.  :-)

St. Isaac's Cathedral with the Bronze Horseman Statue in foreground (closer details below)

The Bronze Horseman.  Commissioned by Catherine the Great to commemorate her father, Peter the Great.  Dedicated in 1782.  It is built on what is known as the Thunder Stone, claimed to the be largest stone ever moved by man ... weighing in at more than 1,500 tons before carving

St. Isaac's Cathedral.  Our guide yesterday told us this is considered the heaviest building in Russia as all the columns (and there are lots of them) are each made out of singles pieces of solid granite.  We went up to the colonnade, the area just below the large dome.  It was 240(+) steps up a spiral staircase, but it gave a 360 degree walk of the city of St. Petersburg. Despite the climb, it was quite an impressive view. 

View of the City square from the colonnade

Just one shot of the inside of the Cathedral.  Again, just too hard to capture the enormity of these buildings... all the mosaics, frescos, columns, stained glass, etc, etc.  It is almost overwhelming to all the senses all at once.

Stained glass window in St. Isaac's Cathedral.  Hard to tell from this pic, but this window was probably around 30feet tall.

From there we started back towards the subway and did a bit of shopping. It was probably only about 30 minutes after leaving St. Isaac's Cathedral that it just started to pour down rain.  We were really blessed as the forecast had been for rain (70-80% chance) all day long.  Minus a few short, pop-up showers, it was a beautiful day.  However, this hard pouring rain didn't show any signs of letting up, so we decided it was time to make our way back to the hotel.  End of the day... another very fun day at that.  :-)