St. Petersburg, a story itself...!
After horrible 9 hours in bus without sleep we arrived St. Petersburg. Even though we went there in April it was quite cold. First we searched our hostel, that was not easy to find. Then we decided to make a sightseeing-tour by ourself, but some seconds after we entered the metro the problems started. We were pushed in the metro by one man, another man grabbed the wallet and run away. So there were us two and the man who pushed us - we decided to beat him. The situation was so surreal like nearly no situation ever in my life before: There was the russian man who was shouting that he did not have the wallet and us who were beating him. Someone in the metro (which was quite crowded) pushed the emergency stop, some Russians helped us to beat and to hold the man who wanted to take refuge; some wanted to pull him out of the metro (the doors were open), some helped us to keep him inside. Fortunately we were not bad injured (I don´t know and care about the russian man), then a policeman came. Hm, good luck, you could think - WRONG, then the problems started. We went with him and one robber who was left to a small police station, the robber was arrested in a cell, but the policeman did not want to see his ID-card or any other documents and the robber was allowed to call some people with his mobilephone. The policeman (alternatively a person I searched in the metro station which spoke english and translated for us) told us that he was hungry and that he had a headache and that we should leave. First of all I thought that is a bad joke and asked myself where is the hidden camera. I told him that we would not leave without the wallet with the documents AND the money. I told him that it should not be a problem because he had arrested one of the robber. After one hour I told him I will call the German Embassy, hereupon he told me that we could have back the wallet with all documents, but not the money (approximately 300 €uro). After two more hours negotiating (like a bad joke we had to negotiate with the policeman if we get back OUR money...) we got back 200 €uro. When we left we saw that the second robber came to the policestation and some minutes later both robber left, I am sure that the policeman shared the money with them...! Bad first impression of St. Petersburg, but the rest of our stay there was really nice.
We visited Eremitage, made a trip to Puschkin to visit Zarskoje Zelo (AMBER ROOM), visited Kasana-cathedral and walked along Nevsky Prospekt many times. We were told before that St. Petersburg is quite expensive, but that was not our experience. And of course I ate many times pancakes with caviar salmon caviar). More thumbnails ...
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St. Petersburg Hotels
