Am in St. Petersburg at the moment. Survived the nightmare process of getting visa and journey here (via Prague for some beers with George). Just heading off to the marvellous Hermitage Art Museum. Apparently they have 3 million exhibits! Of which, thankfully, only 5-10% are on show at any one time. Still, that's a whole lotta art. They have 30,000 coins and medals on display. I can't wait. On the other hand, they do have lots of French 19-20C stuff that they nicked from the Nazis during the war, which was first displayed about 10 years ago in a "Hidden Treasures" exhibition, now part of the general collection.
This is the Church of our Saviour on Spilled Blood:
Central St. Peterburg is beautiful, I have to say. There was clearly an extremely opulent age here, I believe mainly during the reign of Catherine the Great (okay, I'll read the history bit in my LP sooner or later!). Hotel is strange, seems to be run exclusively by women, so it's very clean but the internet connection is a bit dodgy (hehe)! More updates later..
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