Day 4
Trip Start
May 30, 2006
1
3
78
Trip End
May 31, 2007
Moscow,
Russia
Friday, June 2, 2006
The last few days have seen us doing the touristy thing... (well, yesterday, today hasn't really started in that respect). We hit out early doors yesterday and 'took a walk along the moskva to Gorky park' which was the equivelent of Regents park, but with a fun park in the middle that hadn't been maintained since 1972. Accross from there was a huge art gallery with sculpture garden
a convent
. This was really pleasent, despite the overgrown grass covering a lot of the exhibits. The mix of concrete and steel is still a huge thing in the art over here and it works really well. All the statues in the park were overshadowed by the enormous monumtent to peter the great that stands in the Moskva. It must be 150 feet high and is simply awe inspiring. You'll get the idea once i get the pics up!From there we took a metro to a convent in the eastern suburbs. It was so much more relaxed in comparison ti the rest of moscow that we had so far encountered: bustling, dirty, noisy, which to me isn't fun. This place was so tranquil with a pond/lake thingy set in a lovely green park. Its now on the world heritage preservation list and currently being restored. The bits that had been done looked great, but i quite liked the decodence of the old stuff, it seemed much more real and natural.
Having grabbed a bite to eat, we jumped on yet another metro up to the outer north area to the VDKNh, a monument to the achievements of the soviet people. It's a huge great place, apparently 200 hecteres. I don't really know what that means in old money, but it's a huge park with expo halls, fountains and general ornate wonderment. Only problem is that all the ehibitions seem to have gone the distance and now house market stalls of various design touting their goods at which ever unlucky tourist (us) happened to wander through
me and hel at st.basils
. It's a shame, because what was so obviously once a fantastic area of design and creativity has been somewhat tainted by tacky capitalism.. is that ironic? i'm not sure.We went back to our little appartment, where we rested up. I crashed out and as i woke up, sean the canadian who we took vodka drinking the previous night had returned, so decided that a midnight trip to the kremlin was in order. Now this is how i imagined moscow to be, a sleepng giant, with st.basils lit up for all to see. words can't really describe how magnificent it all looked. we took another walk along the moscva and found the metro had closed which meant either a taxi or an hours walk... taxi prevailed and we were able to haggle a driver down to take us home.
Well, we just bought our ticket to st.petersburg which leaves at 2am in the morning. Helen, as i type is organising the accomodation, so touch wood (tap tap) we might have somewhere to go when we arrive!
Today is going to be the Kremlin, we've left it until last, as it is likely to be the highlight, but i can't see st.basils in the dark being beaten anytime soon!
Take care
Mike
