OUR GOOD BYE DINNER AT THE LEO TOLSTOY WAS REALLY SPECIAL
The night of May 7 we had a very special dinner; the ship’s chef did her best to show her dining room like one in the Tsars ‘palace. Her food was exceptionally presented and deliciously nutritive and included a green salad, fresh and exquisite salmon from the Russian Northern Rivers with delicious upper class caviar, all accompanied by the bet Russian wine. Afterwards, there was a deliciously sweet desert. It was a great farewell dining party, just to make this an unforgettable journey in the Leo Tolstoy. We promised to our young and beautiful waitresses as well as to our not less young and good looking waiters, that we were not going to forget them, and we shall not!
ST PETERSBURG, THE ROYAL, THE BEAUTIFUL, THE VENICE OF THE NORTH
May 8, 2011
ST PETERSBURG THE BEAUTIFULL, THE GREAT, THE JEWEL OF HUMAN KIND
After the rescue by the Russian Navy’s big Icebreaker ship on the night of May 6, we continued our way toward St Petersburg on the ice cold but not frozen waters of the Ladoga Lake, the largest sweet water lake in the whole European continent, and, finally, on Sunday May 8th, at nine in the morning, we arrived in our destination. We were all ready to disembark, we were anxious to see the City of the Emperors. The night before we had packed everything and by 10:30 AM, there were over three hundred bags sitting in front of the four large and modern buses that would take us to our hotel. It was a shiny day with no trace of a cloud in the sky, with a temperature of about 70 degrees which was the prelude of what was coming for the next four and a half days that we would spend in this famous city. It had been only two days while sailing on the Volga River Ways when my friends Celso and Carol had bet two bottles of Champaign with me about the weather. Influenced by the weather forecasters they bet that we would have a rainy and cold weather whereas my bet was for a sunny and warm weather. Evidently I had won. They have not paid the bet so far, but I know they will, sometime in the very near future.
It was pure and absolute good luck, something that has always accompanied us, wherever Fanny I had gone around the world.
VIEW OF ST PETERSBURG FROM THE NEVA RIVER AS WE CAME IN FROM LAKE LADOGA
From our vessel’s deck we could see an impressive and modern bridge over the Neva River as well as a series of brick colored, modern and large apartment buildings in the outskirts of the city.
MODERN APARTMENT BUILDINGS IN ST PETERSBURG AS SEEN FROM THE DOCK
Not far From the dock where we disembarked, four modern and large buses were waiting to take all of us (156 passengers) to our hotel, the five-star Radisson Royal Hotel located right on the main avenue of St Petersburg, at 49 Nevskiy Prospect.
Upon our arrival, four young and good looking Russian girls wearing the blue and white uniforms of the hotel were waiting for us with glasses full of blistering champaign, which we happily drank while delivering our passports to the front desk. Some of us obliged to the second and even the third glass of that delicious champaign. In a matter of minutes, we were given the card-keys to our rooms and we were in our way to our hotel accommodations for the next four days.
NEVSKIY PROSPECT, PREPARED TO CELEBRATE VICTORY DAY ON MAY 10
As our buses approached the hotel entering Nevskiy Prospect, we could see that the whole avenue was decorated with all kinds of banners and garlands, because in two days the city would be celebrating, just as much as the whole country of Russia, what Russians call THE VICTORY DAY, that is the day when Germany signed the unconditional surrender to the Soviet Military which had taken over Berlin, two days after Hitler committed suicide, once he saw he had no way out alive of his madness that caused almost six years of war and the lives of almost 60 million people.
Russians celebrate their victory on May 10, even though the Germans’ surrender was signed in Berlin on May 9, at eleven O’clock, because in Russia it was already May 10 due to the two hour difference with Moscow time.
One hour after our arrival, the same buses that brought us to the hotel, were waiting for us to take a city tour, a prologue of what was going to be one of the most exciting tours we have ever had in our lives. It was just like the tip of the iceberg. The buses took us down Nevskiy Prospect passing by the bridges crossing the Neva River canals, some of which are , per se, the real master pieces of architecture and sculpture that have made St Petersburg one of the most beautiful cities on earth. We passed by the Hermitage Museum and stopped right in front of it, as we passed a bridge over the Neva River, so we could admire and take photos of the immense buildings’ complex where the Winter Palace (the palace where the Tsars lived) is the largest and most important of the museum’s buildings complex.
Two hours later we were brought back to the hotel to take a break and get ready to attend a show by the Royal Ballet of St. Petersburg, presenting the Tchaikovsky’s classic ballet composition “Swan Lake”, something we were all looking forward to see at the Bolshoi Theater in Moscow but were unable to, because the theatre was closed for refurbishing. In a way, our dreams came true in St Petersburg, watching this wonderful work of ballet art featured by some of the more outstanding figures of the worldwide famous Russian Ballet.
A GREAT VIEW OF ONE OF THE CANALS IN ST PETERSBURG
In our way back to the hotel we were able to see and take photos of many of the architectural wonders of this city, among them, the Church of the Savior on the Spilled Blood, the cathedrals of Our Lady of Kasan, St Isaac and St. Peter and Paul, all of them built during the late XVII and early XVIII centuries, along with the most important sites of the city of the Tsars.
ST ISAAC CATHEDRAL WITH 50 LBS OF GOLD IN ITS DOME
CATHEDRAL AND FORT OF ST PETER AND PAUL, THE FIRTS BUILDINGS IN ST PETERSBURG
The history of the City Of St. Petersburg starts in 1703, when Peter the Great decides to build it as the Russian window to the Western World, of which Russia and Russians had been essentially separated geographically and culturally. Ever since, the city became the capital of the Russian Empire and remained so for more than 200 years until the Bolshevik revolution returned the Russian government to Moscow.
St. Petersburg is the second largest city in Russia with a population of over 4.8 million, with a metropolitan area population of over 6 million. The city is located at the mouth of the Neva River into the Golf of Helsinki, at the North Eastern end of the Baltic Sea, right in front of Finland and not far from the North Pole. Throughout its history, the city has had several names; St. Petersburg (1703-914); Petrograd (1914-1924); Leningrad (1924-1991), and again St, Petersburg since 1991, after a plebiscite when its population massively voted to return to its original name.
In the construction of the city participated many famous French, German and Russian architects which had given to Russia and the world, one of the most splendid, harmonious and beautiful urban centers of the world, so much so, that the United Nations had given to its historical area the title of “Legacy of the Human Kind”. St. Petersburg is home to the Hermitage Museum, one of the largest and most complete cultural and artistic centers of its kind in the world, keeping around three million works of art inside its walls.
The speed at which the city was built and the extremely hard climatic conditions under which hundreds of thousands of people worked in its construction, caused the death of about 50% of all the workers, most of whom were servants forcefully brought in from far away places from all over the Russian Empire.
ST PETERSBURG, THE VENICE OF THE NORTH AT ITS BEST
Since the construction of the city started in war times, the first Building to be constructed was a military fort in the Zaiachiy island on the right bank of the Neva River and can still be seen From across the Hermitage Museum. The Neva River connects the Ladoga Lake with the Baltic Sea, whereas, this Nordic Sea is connected through the Volga River Waterways, a cyclopean project built in Soviet times, to the Caspian Sea in South Eastern Europe, in front of Turkey.
The ecological damage and the loss of lives caused by the Volga River waterways were enormous and have never been sufficiently quantified. The Soviet Press never disclosed things that would damage the image of the “government of the proletariat”.
PETER THE GREAT THE CREATOR OF ST PETERSBURG (1678-1732)
The tsar Peter the Great gave to the construction of St. Petersburg a vertiginous rhythm thanks to the volume of human and financial resources that were placed under his control. Monumental palaces were built, as well as cathedrals and churches, many of which testify to the great power the Orthodox Church had in the government and the history of Russia. One of them is the Kasan Cathedral, with its semicircle Roman like frontal columns which, located in the most famous avenue of the city, the Nevskiy Prospect (where our hotel was located), made it possible that this Avenue be considered as one of the greatest avenues of the world. The Cathedral of St Isaac, not far away from Nevskiy Prospect, and also featuring a Roman-like front, has about 220 pounds of pure gold in its dome.
Within the city, hundreds of bridges of artistic architecture connect the sides of many channels flowing from or toward the Neva River and its many branches, adding to the beauty of the city, for which it has been given the name of The Venice of the North.
Our bus stopped right across the Winter Palace, the most important building of the Hermitage Museum, and one of the architectural jewels of the city. The construction of this building started in 1754, during the times of the Tsarina Elizabeth, daughter of Peter the Great, but she died before the construction was over. It was Catherine the Great, her successor, famous, among other things for her 55 lovers, who completed the construction of this palace, and made it her main “love nest” and the official residence of the Russian Tsars until 1919.
Many of the presents given to her (at her request) by her many and famous lovers, are still in exhibit in the Hermitage Museum. One of them is a “one of a kind” clock made of pure gold and weighting more than 50 pounds, which was given to her as a “love present” by the then British Ambassador to Russia, a lord of the London nobility.
50 LBS PURE GOLD CLOCK- A PRESENT TO CATHERINE FROM ONE OF HER LOVERS
CATHERINE THE GREAT, FAMOUS FOR HER GREAT LOVE TO LOVE
The four hours of our tour around the City left us with the sensation of having lived through a very important part of the Russian History, especially the history of St Petersburg and its construction, the history of its creator and the Tsars and Tsarinas which completed Peter’s Grand Dream. We were also left with a profound admiration for those men and women who, over the past two decades, have contributed to the preservation and restoration of this monumental work, and have made it possible for us and many other generations to admire the grandeur of what was done almost four hundred years ago and has been given the title of Legacy of the Human Kind.
SWAN LAKE, TCHAIKOVSKY'S MASTERPIECE AT THE ROYAL BALLET IN ST PETERSBURG
Most of us were tired, but very satisfied for what we had done, seen and heard during this day. We were back at the hotel at about 5PM. Talking about works of art, we had a bit more than two hours to rest and get ready to go watch the life presentation of the greatest Tchaikovsky Ballet Show “The Swan Lake”, performed by The Royal Ballet of St. Petersburg. At 7:30 PM we were sitting in the Theatre where the ballet show would commence at 8PM.
The Swan Lake, tells the story of Prince Sigfrid who falls in love with Odette, a beautiful young lady who has been transformed into a swan by Rothbart, an evil magician. The spell could only be broken by whom she falls in love with, and promises her eternal love. Sigfrid, who is the heir to the throne, mistakenly falls in love with Odile, the daughter of the magician who looks just like Odette, and promises her eternal love, but, timely, the Prince realizes that he has been tricked by the magician, and decides to fight together with Odette until he finally brakes the spell and Odette recovers her humanly personal appearance. This was the classic and famous Russian ballet in it max expression. No photos were allowed into the theatre; however I was able to take a couple of photos (obviously without a flash), which I share with you herewith.
We watched, life, a masterpiece of Russian Classic Ballet, in which the star of the show was Irina Kolesnikova, who played Odette. Her perfect, sometimes slow and sometimes fast but always perfectly artistic movements left in our eyes the impact of ballet taken to the extremes of perfection. More than twenty other ballerinas and two male ballet performers on the stage were not far from the perfection shown by Kolesnikova. This was a night that could only be in our dreams before coming to St. Petersburg, and will remain in our memories for as long as we live.
After the Ballet show was over, we came out of it hungry and tired; we gave the first priority to the former and went looking for a place to eat around the hotel. We found a Chinese Restaurant just across the street, on Nevskiy Prospect. We ordered a variety of meals as shown in their menu, however, neither the quantity nor the quality of the food was to our best taste, however, someone in the group accused me of having eaten more than my share of the food, a sin I can’t deny I committed (without fear of being wrong). Let’s face it!
The day after we were scheduled to visit Pushkin City, a historical place full of Russian history, located only about 30 miles from St. Petersburg, but I will tell you about it in my next chapter.
In my next posting: PUSHKIN CITY AND PETERHOFF
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