Elbrus Expedition Dispatch

July 29, 2010 – Full day in St. Petersburg and Off on the Train for Moscow

Lina reported to us that it was cooler in St. Petersburg today, 30 degrees C, about 85 F. This is a good thing because the guys put in a very full day with Lina catching some of St. Petersburg’s top attractions. Of course they visited the massive Hermitage museum. It is sometimes said that if you looked for half a minute at everything displayed at the Hermitage, you would spend months before you finished! We are sure that the guys were less ambitious with their time in the Hermitage, but Lina reported that they very much enjoyed going inside the Winter Palace and seeing a sampling of the collections that comprise the Hermitage.

Throughout the day we kept seeing the “Mimi” sticker appearing on the streets of St. Petersburg.

The guys had a typical Russian lunch at one of our favourite restaurants and they also visited the Peter and Paul Fortress on the banks of the Neva River. They also went to the Church on Spilled Blood, which Alexander III had constructed on the site where his father had been assassinated. In the late afternoon, Lina arranged for a speedboat to whisk the guys along the waterways of St. Petersburg. She told us that at the end of the boat trip the captain took his craft up to 80 km per hour!

By 8:00 PM the guys were enjoying saunas back at the Nevsky Palace hotel, freshening up a bit before their overnight train ride to Moscow.

Just before midnight St. Petersburg time, we talked to Vage, the concierge from the Nevsky Palace. He told us that he had helped Jack and Scott into their carriage on the Grand Express midnight train bound for Moscow. We hope the guys are sleeping soundly on the train now. Tomorrow will be a big day in Moscow!