Our last over night train journey was probably the nicest and most comfertable out of them all....and it was only 12 hours!!! We left Moscow station in the evening and arrived in St Petersburg bright and early at 7am, where we were informed that at 10am we were going to be doing a giant walking tour of St Petersburg....exactly what you want after an overnight train journey!!!!!
The walking tour was actually brillant, even though we were all absolutely knackered by the end of it! Our guide took us through all the back streets of St Petersburg, where I saw some of the most amazing street art I had seen so far on the trip. St Petersburg appeared to be alot more "communists" looking than Moscow, which screams capitalists at the top of its lungs. All the apartments have that standard square look about them and the city in some parts did look a lot more run down. However, in saying this, I think I enjoyed walking around St Peterburg alot more than I did Moscow. I think maybe because it was the Russia I imagined while reasearching. Its a little bit new, a little bit old and has a hell of alot of character about it.
The following day we spent the day walking through the Hermitage Museum, which is one of the biggest museums in the world. The buildings itself was amazing to walk around, let alone the 3 million odd displays of art work from all over the world. There is a fact I read somewhere that if you visited the hermitage, and spent just 1 minute looking at every piece of art work, you would be there for over 3 decades. Pretty crazy huh?
The Hermitage building itself used to be a royal residence back in the day, and the ineterior certainly depicted this. Walking through the various halls was quite similar to walking through somewhere like the Sistine Chapel in Rome, just on a much larger scale. Holding artworks from such big wigs like Picasso, Da Vinci, Monet & Van Gough, the Hermitage is somewhere you have to dedicate at least half a day to walking through, even if its just to have a quick peak. Seriously, 5 - 6 hours is a quick peak!
We spent the afternoon walking up and down the massive Nevsky Prospect, the main street (or avenue rather) in St Petersburg. Holding shops for all tastes and budgets aswell as most Restaurants and nightclubs, you can imagine just how busy this place gets. Honestly, you can't walk in a strait line for more than about 30 - 40 seconds before some one comes barging into you.
That evening we had our final tour group meal, and said our goodbyes to everyone. After spending 3 weeks with these 12 people, it was quite sad to finally bid them farewell. However, not being much of a tour group traveller, I was really looking forward to being back out travelling on my own again (in the company of Sophie for the next 3 months!).
The following we checked out of our hotel, and jumped on a night bus to Helsinki, Finland.
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