Crowne Plaza World Trade Ctr Moscow

... simple trip to the hotel led us to relax for a few hours and then head into Moscow to visit Red Square and St Basils Cathedral. This ornate colourful structure glitters in the sun and I think is the best feature of the Square.

The next day we decided on a trip into the Kremlin area , where we saw some amazing cathedrals, the Kremlin and the outside of the Armoury Chamber. On one square lie in date order the Assumption, Annunciation and Archangel Cathedrals. These ...

... up 8 flights of stairs in a delapidated 19th Century Building. Luckily the exterior was deceptive!
We settled into our entirely male dorm (half of whom were sleeping at 6pm-suffering, as we later discovered, from Moscow Sleeping Sickness), before eating out at the exquisitely named 'Moo Moo'.

Back at the Hostel, we didn't have a particularly restful night, as one of our male dorm companions clearly had trouble digesting Russian cuisine. Yummy.

On day 1, we were ...

... of Lenin, to the left is GYM, a huge super shopping area, and behind is historical musuem and other random buildings. So I wandered around and played tourist checking out the exteriors and then shopped for a while. Found a bunch of movies with Russian and english audio, so figured I'd try em out to help learn some more.

I then had a treat of some McDonalds and got some night time photos. Finally wandered back to my hotel. Sleepy Cameron

... of a noise fest in their 3 minutes The crowd going ballistic at Norway's performance...it was a clear favourite from the beginning. More mediocre hosting. An even worse warm-up act. And another great night of entertainment. Now we just had to find somewhere to see the final. Friday was wet and cold again which made for more miserable attempts at sightseeing. Walked around hoping to see nice parks etc. but just met rude people and couldn't make the most of our time ...

... covered in mosaics. Amazing. We split from the group and Lisa managed to get her purse nicked... just the start of her spectacular run of bad luck which ranges from getting splashed to ordering really naff apple juice. She is just not a lucky lady! Had dinner at a traditional canteen, buffet style place, as we have every day since actualy. The hermitage the next day was beautiful, especially the throne room ...

... We took the metro to its furthest point and then got the bus from there. The bus was meant to take 20-40min, but actually ended up taking about 80mins. Then, as if the day had not been long enough, we crossed some time zones on our way to Poland and the day was lengthened by another 2 hours!! Don't you just hate that? Finally at 10.55pm Polish time, we arrived in Krakow, and very sensibly got a taxi to our hotel for a long recovery sleep.

... average temperature in Moscow so far was around 32 degrees (and 30 from 10am till 11pm) it was a shock. It was so big that I couldn't see the other side of the street. carzy! Of course I had to get caught in it! I was trying to make it good to Anna, so I went to our rendezvous point regardless. Well, she wasn't there... Anyway, I am sure next time we will arrange something indoors - just in case the world turns up side down and we get washed away again. Anyway ...

... work in London, and although he's being paid 20 grand for whatever scam he was part of (i have my suspicions..I'm thinking Rent-boy), he has turned up with no money to pay his rent. Sveta (our translater and saviour) has given him until Friday. And then I presume it's a one way ticket to the Gulag. Oh, and everyone else's flats have lost hot water, except ours...Ahahahahahaha. I may be laughing on the other side of my face soon. (what does that phrase even mean...) Until next time....xx

... heart of Russia and therefore off-limits. However, our most intimidating brush with the law came when we were stopped by two grey-clad guards asking to see our registration documents. We had passports and immigration cards on us but not the hotel registration documents they required... because we hadn't been issued them. We were informed by the pasty-faced policeman that we had broken the law, would have to accompany him ...

... of about 5 buildings which the Russians refer to as blocs. These blocs are quite large complexes and spaced over 1-2 city blocks. After checking in with main reception in bloc 3 we were sent across the street to bloc 5 where we would be staying. We also asked about our train tickets which were supposed to be delivered and an airport transfer for Nita the next morning. You would think we asked for the secret plans for the ...