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St. Petersburg
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St Petersburg, Russia, August 23 (Day 1)
We arrived at the dock in St Petersburg at about 6:45am (having also lost
another hour) to find Oceania's Nautica, a Regent ship, Holland America's
Eurodam, the P&O Arcadia (which we last saw in Venice in the Spring), and the
Aida already docked. It was raining with very low clouds. We had a quick
breakfast in the cabin and proceeded to get together our visas (obtained by
Oceania) and passports, etc. We were scheduled to meet in the Marina Lounge at
8am to get called for our excursion (8 hours long) and it was absolutely pouring
when we finally got off the ship. The disembarkation process was slowed
considerably by the lines at Passport Control. Our first view of Russians was an
unsmiling, non-speaking encounter with various functionaries. Our bus finally
left at 9:20. The 1 hour drive to the Catherine Palace (Catherine the Great's
Summer Palace) continued rainy. We were to tour the palace for about 1 1/2
hours. Unfortunately, we lost one couple right off the bus. The guide called
everyone trying to find them and they finally met us as we left the palace. They
said that we walked too fast for them – no one reads the tour descriptions of
how much walking is necessary and whether it is over rough ground or involves
steps, etc., so people sometimes sign up for totally inappropriate excursions.
There were huge crowds at the palace, with all the cruise ships. There were even
4 more smaller cruise ships actually docked on the River Neva in the center of
the city (Seabourn, Fred Nelson, etc.) We had to check jackets, umbrellas, large
bags and had to wear booties over our shoes for the tour. The women in the coat
check rooms were as unsmiling and unpleasant as passport control had been. The
Catherine Palace is in a 10-year restoration phase. The Nazis used it as a
barracks for 28 months and then burned it down and nothing happened during the
Communist period, so they are using photos and trying to reconstruct the
splendor of the period of Russian royalty. There is an unbelievable amount of
real gold gilt decoration and thousands of mirrors and parquet and inlaid
floors. The world famous Amber Room, which was disappointing to many, was
completely reconstructed at an unbelievable cost. Bottom line, it was an
overwhelming place.
We walked through the gardens and rejoined the bus for a drive into the City Center, where we had a "typical" lunch of thin greasy soup, salad, stroganoff and cake with champagne and vodka. We sat with a young couple from Frankfurt who had found the cruise on the Internet and were enjoying themselves – she is a government librarian and he teaches computer sciences at the university. After lunch, we went to the Peter and Paul Cathedral, a Russian Orthodox church where the tombs of all the czars and a family tomb for Nicolas II and family are located. Then we drove to the Savior of Spilled Blood Cathedral which is famous for all the "onion domes." We stopped for photos but did not go inside. Thursday is apparently a big day for weddings in St. Petersburg. The couple, with a small party, go to the Wedding Palace for the official ceremony and then they ride around the city in limos with balloons and teddy bears on them taking pictures, and then finally meet all their friends for a party at a restaurant.
The rain had slowed down and we headed back to the ship for a reverse of the passport control procedure, although the lines were slightly shorter and faster as we were not all there at the same time. Many passengers had signed up for an evening event as we were in port overnight so changed and went to the ballet or a concert. We watched them leave the ship in the rain all dressed up. One excursion per day works for us so we relaxed and then headed to dinner at Polo, the steak house. As we sat by the window up on the top deck we could see that it was pouring again. Our servers were new to us, Jeffrey and Gilbert from the Philippines. We talked to a couple from Brentwood who sat next to us. They said they were Regent cruise fans (Regent and Oceania are owned by the same company) and liked free excursions and free house wines and booze. We have looked at Regent, so asked them what they thought the difference was and they agreed with us that it was a minimum of $10-12,000 more. We can't figure out how you can drink or tour that much. We will stick with Oceania.
