Wow! You have not seen or experienced traffic jams until you have been to Moscow! Absolutely unbelievable – not just once or twice either, most days when we have travelled into the city except today Saturday was a dream run! Otherwise a fabulous city making strides. People are very friendly, helpful & keen to welcome you.
The city is vast – they said 4th largest in the world – some 12 million plus 1-2 million illegal immigrants. City has a long & interesting history – first mentioned in 1,147!! So culturally, architecturally & historically fascinating.
Have been out & about each day from our river boat “River Victoria” docked at Northern River Port – so much to see (while sitting in traffic!) & including:
- The Kremlin – actually 27 walled hectares with palace complex, parliamentary administration building, Presidential office, multi-tiered towers, cathedrals, icons, frescoes, bell towers, tombs, tsar bell & cannon, stunning displays of costumes, jewellery, Faberge eggs, armour & weapons etc etc. I loved the carriages of the 18th century – incredible preservation – including Empress’ “Dr Zhivago” style wooden sleigh – took 3 days to travel from St Petersburg to Moscow using 800 horses in teams of 23 at a time! Woe betide if you step off the payment though – the whistle blows and the arms wave…Part of the Kremlin walls form one side of Red Square.
- Red Square – with the iconic St Basil’s Cathedral (actually 10 cathedrals!), kilometre zero, State Museum, City duma, GUM department store – 3 huge levels & all the brands. Called Red Square because it means beautiful in Russian not because of red Kremlin walls
- Cathedrals & churches – gold domes, icons & distinctive Greek orthodox designs
- Bow Hill War Memorial – includes 6 fantastic dioramas depicting WWII scenes & Victory Memorial
- Vorobyovy Gory – hill with great panorama of Moscow
- The Metro – took a series of rides to see the fabulous station decorations – murals, sculptures and crystal lights. All scrupulously clean – gleaming & no rubbish in sight
- Old Arbat Street & Tverskaya Street, Lenin Avenue
- Novodevichiy Convent (viewed from beautiful park – also here saw Barbara Bushs’ gift to Children of Moscow – brass sculpture – “Ducks in a Row”
- Bolshoi Theatre, Karl Marx statue
- Numerous other statues, some beautiful parks & gardens
- Old vs new Moscow – sculptures, high rises old & new
- Great concert by Russian Folk group using traditional instruments, song and beautiful costumes.
Once again we are being very well looked after – enjoying the river, company, trying to work out the docking hierarchy!
Saturday 27th
Sailed from Moscow city along the Moscow canal to join the Volga River. I don’t quite know what I expected but the scenery is beautiful – extremely treed banks with cycle and walking paths, the domes of churches poking through, little villages & dacha tucked alongside & a marina or two. People are out enjoying the countryside – fishing, picnicking, camping, water-skiing and sailing. It really is stunning. Not crowds but small groups and pairs scattered about. Late evening we negotiated the first of 17 locks – us and another large riverboat – took about 2 hours to complete manoeuvre.
Comments
Comment by Wendy Flint on 2011-08-29 01:04:28 -0700
The photos are awesome. It must feel a bit of a dream at times to be seeing so much that is so different from little NZ, The detail in the historic buildings is amazing. Wonderful to see you having such a great time.
