St. Petersburg, Russia

Next, an overnight in St. Petersburg, Russia.  Immigration into Russia is a very serious matter.  Americans are not allowed outside without an organized tour or a Russian Visa.  The Destination Services people kept repeating over and over and over that everyone needed to have their documents in order and follow all instructions or you'll go to the back of the line and miss your tour.  They put it in writing in at least four places.  The Cruise Director made announcements.  So, of course, some folks never read or heard any of the directions.

St. Petersburg is a collection of things that don't seem to go together.  There are the beautiful golden onion-domed churches with falling-down warehouses next door.  An incredible roadway system that passes Soviet-area apartment blocks.  A new landmark tower belonging to GazProm sits prominently at the shoreline and there are no other skyscraper-type buildings.  And everyone seems so serious.  Lots of officials in uniforms standing around doing, well, maybe something but it looks like nothing.  Our guide said that she could tell how long a policeman had been on the force by his size.  The fatter and more "successful" he was, the longer he'd been there.  We passed one motor policeman and she commented that he looked like he'd only had the job for about a year.  Stockholm and Helsinki bustled and Stockholm especially had a kind of a "vibe".  St. Petersburg seemed to lack that spark. 

That being said, we did go to Catherine's Palace and here it is!

Beautiful details inside, all in gold:

And back outside near the gardens:

For more information, this website gives it a thorough going-over:  http://eng.tzar.ru/museums/palaces/c_atherine

A lot of people went to evening tours like the ballet, so the ship had to feed them before they left.  They had a special buffet, and that restaurant was absolutely smashed.  Douglas, the restaurant manager, said they fed over 200 people in a little over an hour.  The main dining room, later, was so quiet, it was amazing.  There probably weren't 30 people in there. We loved it.  The wait staff hated it.  Time was going to slow for them.

On our second day, we got a real treat at breakfast.  Our favorite waiter from the World Cruise, I Gede, was back onboard!  He walked right over to us and said he saw the tomato juice but where was the Tabasco?  Gordon had it stashed in his pocket.

That day, we took a "highlights" tour which mostly visited the cathedrals.  The Peter and Paul Cathedral is very plain on the outside but inside is amazing.

It contains the tomb of Peter the Great:

And the remains of the murdered Romanov family, headed by Nicolas II:

We also stopped for photos of Spilled Blood Cathedral.  The blood was spilled by Alexander II who was fatally wounded on this spot by political dissidents in 1881:

We also stopped at St. Isaac's Cathedral, which is really huge but not awfully photogenic.  Oh, and it was Navy Weekend in town, so the fleet was in:

Then we were on our way to Estonia and Germany.