St. Isaac's Cathedral

St. Isaac's Cathedral doesn't have an interesting back ground but it's a really amazing building. We were all amazed at the paintings and sculptures and mosaics inside. So much detail.

The Hermitage

The Hermitage is a five building museum with over 3 million artifacts on display and 20 times that in storage. It has paintings and sculptures by Rembrandt, Picasso, Da Vinci, Michelangelo, etc. The main building is Cathrine the Greats Winter Palace. This palace has 1057 rooms and 117 staircases. What do you do what that much space? The building itself is a work of art with amazing paintings and mouldings on the walls and ceilings.

Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood

Of every thing we saw I think this is the one that I loved the most. Alexander II was killed in battle and the people decided to build a church on that site to remember him. It was built between 1833 and 1907. The reason it took so long is because of the mosaic pictures that cover over 75,347 sq feet. During Communism it became a storage building. It took 27 years to restore and opened again in 1997

It amazes me how much detail was in these mosaics.

This is the spot were he was killed

St. Petersburg

After a few days in Moscow we headed to St. Petersburg and spent 7 days there. It's a beautiful city. It use to be a swamp but then Peter the Great came along and built an amazing city there. One draw back to this is.... lots of bugs

Moscow Day

Every year Moscow celebrates the day that it became a city. We happend to be there for the 860 year celebration. They shut down most of the city, including main streets, and had over 14 stages. Each stage always had some sort of performace going on, such as orchestras, singing, dancing etc.

This was the main stag. It looks a little to fancy to be used for only 1 day. They had alot of traditional dancing on this stage.

You can see how many people came out for the celebrations. They were expecting over 3 million people. The building in the back is part of Red Square

Back From Russia

Well our 21 day adventure is over. We really had a lot of fun but we also had some really bad luck. Chris sent his cell phone through the washing machine the night before we left. The airport lost our luggage going there and here. We had problems registering our visas and we didn't get them until 14 days into our trip (you are suppose to have them in 72 hours). It was sunny the week before we got there and the week after but while we were there is was rainy and about 50 degrees. The Bolshoy, Lenin's Tomb, and St. Basil's Church were closed. While we were gone our fish committed suicide by jumping out of his bowl. Other then all that (plus some other things) we really had fun, you can tell by these enthusiastic pictures Chris took of me. Chris took over 500 pictures so as I sort through them I will add some more.

From Russia With Love

Hi everyone. We are starting our third and final week in Russia. It has been alot of fun so far. We spent the first 5 days waiting for our luggage to be found. When it finally arrived we were very glad to get clean clothes. We then spent the next 7 days in St. Petersburg enoying the "Venice of the North." We are now back in Moscow and still have alot to see. So far we've seen the Hermitage, the Kremlin, many churches, millions of mullets and one pickpocket. The best part is that we have yet to eat at a Russian resturant but we have eaten at McDonalds, KFC and Subway. Just like the communists of yore. Chris has decided that he is now a photographer so be prepared to see lots of pictures when we get back.