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St Petersburg Travel,
climate:
Best: May-Sept,
especially June for White Nights festival,
though it's crowded then.
Not so good: Nov-March. Winters are long, cold and dark, but...they
do offer a different perspective on life!
Festivals
Guide:
25 Dec- 5 Jan, Russian Winter celebrates with traditional activities
such as music, dance, sleigh rides, folk shows, just outside the
city.
late Feb-early March, Goodbye Russian Winter, as above.
June, the White Nights arts festival is St Pete's liveliest event.
April/May, St Petersburg Music Spring Festival, classical music.
mid Nov, Autumn Rhythms is a jazz festival based in St Pete's clubs.
For
some precise dates or more information see: European
Festivals or Arts
Festivals.
Arts/Culture
Guide:
Museums: The incredible Hermitage - with a building as wonderful
as its contents, the extensive and beautifully housed Russian Museum,
the superb Museum of Decorative Arts, the tasty Russian Vodka Museum
and the Kunstammer, housing Peter the Great's collection of freaks
and monsters..
Classical Music: St Pete has two first-class Philharmonic
orchestras. Book through Maximilian Ticket Agency.
Dance/Opera: The Kirov Ballet can be seen at Mariinsky Theatre in
winter months only - and foreigners pay four times as much as locals,
or see the superb Maly Opera and Ballet at the gorgeous Maly Theatre,
[aka Mussorgsky].
Choral Music: fabulous churches offer sensational sounds, mostly
free. e.g. Preobrazhenski Church 10am and 6pm, or Alexander Nevsky
Monastery at 6pm - with a spooky bonus cemetery hosting Tchaikovsky,
Borodin, Rimsky-Korsakov and Dostoyevsky.
Live Music & Clubs: The city has endless night action of all
sorts in varied styles, constantly morphing into something new,
so just take a walk, ask the concierge or
check the monthly 'Neva News', the bi-weekly 'St Petersburg Times',
or 'Pulse' magazine for event info/listings.
Activities
Guide:
River cruises are an excellent way to appreciate the watery aspect
of the city; boats big and small are available for hire long or
short.
Banyas or Russian bathhouses [saunas] are an interesting cultural
experience, particularly if you enjoy being beaten.
Skating in the winter is free on most canals but in the summer you'll
have to pay at one of the ice palaces.
Short
Trips Guide:
- Peterhof [Petrodvorets], Peter the Great's Grand Palace,
museums and gardens - with spectacular water features is 29km from
the city; travel by bus or hydrofoil.
- Pushkin [Catherine's Palace], a renovated masterpiece
in the baroque style, surrounded by parks, is 25km south of the
St Pete.
- Veliky Novgorod; this charming carpenter's town [UNESCO
World heritage Site] is 186kms [110mls] down the road to Moscow,
3.5 hours by train, bus or car, and well worth a few hours. Most
attractions are religious and/or wooden. Many travellers visit en
route St Pete- Moscow.
Accommodation:
B&Bs are a fine alternative to expensive hotels, more fun less
money and especially useful during festivals - such as White Nights
- when places are difficult to find.
Shopping
Guide:
The usual Russia tourist souvenirs of dolls [inside dolls, inside
dolls], painted boxes, old-fashioned watches and T-shirts are on
offer just about everywhere a tourist might pop up, but paintings
are a more interesting option, from fine street art to sophisticated
works on sale in posh galleries. |
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Why travel to St Petersburg?
This
'Venice of the North' is a splendid metropolis of grand, baroque
buildings laced around with canals and a dynamite joie de vivre.
Colourful, attractive, very walkable and deeply cultured, the city
contains perhaps the world's most spectacular museum - the amazing
Hermitage - among many other offerings.
Summer days are very, very long - in fact night hardly falls at
all around midsummer - so there's plenty of light-time to waft around
the streets in a haze of vodka-fuelled goodwill with your new Russian
chums...and chums there will be, for St Petersburg people are very,
very sociable.
The city is also arty, sophisticated and not especially expensive.
St
Petersburg Pictures
Downside:
- Petty crime is commonplace and police can be, shall we say,
difficult.
- This being an ex-swamp, mosquitoes swarm in the summertime,
so take a strong repellent.
- Springtime thaws lead to vast swords of ice dropping off roofs,
occasionally killing pedestrians.
- There are plenty of crumbling wrecks and pitted pavements amid
the baroque glories.
Sights
Guide:
The famous 4km [2.5mls] Nevsky Prospekt
street is an easy choice for a first St Petersburg walk, starting
at the Admiralty with spectacular interior and city views from nearby
St. Isaac's Cathedral, and taking in
among many other sights the massive, baroque Winter
Palace in equally massive Palace Square [including the Hermitage
Museum]; the sculpted Anichkov bridge;
the Beloselsky Palace and ending at
Alexander Nevsky Monastery.
Along the way is the city's main shopping area.
Also near Nevsky Prospekt is the gorgeous, multicoloured Church
of the Spilled Blood and the Mikhail
Palace/Russian Museum.
The city's oldest building, Peter and Paul
Fortress and Cathedral [particularly the interior], a short
walk across the river, is the next move, along with the Strelka
district on Vasilevsky island and its grand old buildings and great
views.
There are plenty more interesting streets and quirky sights to see
as you travel around St Petersburg, including visitable apartment/
museums of famous Russians such as Rasputin,
Pushkin, Rimsky-Korsakov and Dostoyevsky.
The Yusupov Palace, where Rasputin
was finally terminated, is lavish and worth a trip.
The
Hermitage Museum:
This massive edifice houses nearly three million artifacts which
would require nine years to see, so do some research and choose
your targets carefully, but do include a visit to the amazing
state rooms of the Winter Palace.
Transport
Guide:
The metro system is brilliant, trolley buses and trains a little
complicated, metered taxis OK and sightseeing by motorboat - in
the summertime - excellent.
Internet:
No shortage of W3 in St Pete.
Cuisine
Guide:
Eating in St Petersburg doesn't mean bland and potatoes.
Offerings vary from the best Russian and Georgian cuisine through
all the usual global foodstuffs; even vegetarians can eat green
at the long-running Café Idiot.
Meals can be good value in good local cafés or hugely costly
if you choose upmarket tourist establishments.
Other
north Europe city travel information:
Stockholm
Guide | Copenhagen
Guide
Helsinki
Guide | Prague
Guide
Budapest
Travel | Oslo
Travel
Berlin
Travel | St
Petersburg Links
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