Peterhof; Peter the Great's Summer Palace

After the storm the previous night, we awake to a fine day.  Now, Peter the Great built his Summer Palace, Peterhof, as a response to the French palace at Versailles; he was determined to make this its equal.  It cost more lives than Versailles did to construct, but it is truly magnificent and helped put St Petersburg firmly on the map of the great European courts.  We saved our visit there for our last day in town and decided to take the hydrofoil boat out there.  As we travel out of the mouth of the Neva river we can see Alisha’s apartment building and the foreshore in front of it.  It seems strange to see this view from the other side now. 

The shadows of the now scattering clouds cover blue and green stretches of the calm sea; forming glistening marbled patterns that stretch to the horizon.  As we draw close to the dock we have our first glimpse of the canal cutting through the gently sloping land that leads up towards the palace itself; with the central group of fountains visible in the distance.  The canal was originally the place where the Tsar’s boat would be manoeuvred and secured when visiting the palace grounds.  I can imagine the sheer spectacle this would have made for visiting dignitaries almost three hundred years ago and appreciate its grand style.  The Grand Cascade draws you in and up the paths either side of the central canal, beckoning with fingers of water sprays and sunlight.

The centrepiece now is the statue of Samson wrestling a lion that was added long after Peter’s death.  The water jet from this fountain is the highest in the park, pushing water high above the magnificent statue and into the blue sky above.  The multiple waterfall cascades and rows of golden statues of women become shrouded in the mist of water sprays from the numerous fountain jets.  Rainbows form and fade constantly in the mottled sunlight from the dappled clouds hanging in the sky.  As you walk near and past the cascade, the rainbows jump from place to place as thought they’re playing in the water.  The whole spectacle is apparently powered only by the water cascading down the hill from the upper gardens, there are no water towers or pumps to be seen or heard anywhere.  I feel immediately calm and relaxed here, even surrounded by throngs of people, families surging in different directions; you can’t help but feel peace in the Summer Palace water gardens.

We drift through them for hours, there are so many different areas with different types of gardens and fountains nestled within them.  From ordered hedges housing golden statues from Greek mythology to the Grand Cascade directly in front of the palace; the place is a wonder of landscaping.  In a central grove, surrounded and shaded by tall, broad leafed trees, is a strange artificial tree with fountains and sprays of water spreading in all directions.  In front of it, a bench seat is placed such that anyone sitting there, or standing nearby, will be showered with short bursts of water as part of a cycle.  Children run back and forward in front of it risking a sudden dousing.  Each time someone gets caught, laughter fills the air as everyone shares the moment of surprise and shock.  It’s another warm, sunny day in Russia and the cooling effect of the water sprays filling the air leave us all in the mood to frolic.

The trick fountain frolics

I had wanted to see the pyramid fountain since I’d heard of it from a friend who visited these gardens.  It doesn’t take me long to find the track to the small grove that houses it.  We pass by a huge statue of Peter mounted on a rectangular base about two and a half metres high.  It’s surrounded by a crowd of people trying to flick coins up onto the small flat surface of the base near his feet.  If the coin rests on the statue somewhere, you make a wish.  This proves to be no mean feat, as I try a number of times with all the coins in my pocket.  I only succeed once.  I think the real winners are the small children swarming around near the base, recovering fallen coins and trying to land one on the statue themselves.  I’m sure we paid for their ice-creams that day.  I could see myself bringing my family here on just such a day to wander and play around without a care in the world. 

We continue down a long pathway with a row of tall trees either side that meet in the middle to provide a welcome mottled shade from the early afternoon sun.  I pause to try and get a photograph capturing the pathway stretching into the distance, when I notice there seems to something more than simple daylight at the end of this green tunnel.  As I move down the path, it slowly reveals to me that the daylight at the end is moving.  As I cover the last thirty metres or so, it resolves into a beautiful pyramid made only of white, bubbling water.  Water pipes laid in concentric squares are pumping water at different pressures to create the effect.  I want to approach and feel my hands play into the streams of water, but fencing and severe signs suggest this isn’t a good idea.  I decide the view is enough and drift slowly back to the seashore.

The three of us sit down for a beer and discuss if we’re going to make it to the upper gardens and inside the great palace itself.  None of us really care by now, it’s the fountains and garden that drew us here and walking inside any building seems somehow a poor second option.  We climb the stairs past the dragon fountain when Don notices an empty statue base.  He thrusts his camera towards me then scales it like a spidermonkey to stand on top looking particularly regal.  We laugh at Don exercising his inner dictator and then turn to admire the view of the open gardens below. 

 

Apparently the Dragon fountain is in this picture somewhere

 

Someone wearing a jester outfit is playing a violin to bemused children.  Couples walk hand in hand betwixt the tree covered pathways; enmeshed in rays of soft sunlight caught in the gentle mists of the fountain spray.  An old man sits placidly on a bench watching his grandchildren run and play around a fountain.  Occasionally they run to him with news of their adventures and he listens before sending them on their way with a few words.  We move across to the huge open walkway between the great palace and the top of the Great Cascade.  A wedding party poses repeatedly in front of the golden statues, the photographer abuzz trying to capture individuals and the whole group against the majestic background.  A light wind gust carries the spray mist over them and the bride suddenly has tiny droplets of water covering her raised veil, creating jewels that sparkle in the golden sunlight.  I pause to watch other couples spaced around the top of the cascade kissing each other gently as they enjoy the view.

We end up heading back to the dock to catch the last hydrofoil back to the city.  This also gives us one more chance to practice the Russian summer sport of queuing and sweating.  There is one person selling tickets for the hydrofoil from one small wooden ticket box placed near the edge of the jetty.  When we join the queue there are already dozens of people in front of us, but this has no effect on the serving woman.  She seems to enjoy a bit of a chat with every person and moves with the sure speed of a diseased tortoise.  I’m particularly impressed by the way she has to check the roll of tickets every time she picks one to make sure they haven’t turned into something different in the intervening ten seconds.  I see she is a consummate professional of the sport and wonder if there’s any way we can beat her. 

Don volunteering to refill this pond

The boat arrives and we all become more agitated as we know this is our last chance to get on it and we feel sure it will leave just as we reach the front of the queue.  The tension mounts as we check we have enough small change and prepare the right money. I notice a second ticket box with someone inside it waiting.  Nobody is paying them the slightest attention and I wonder if we have a short path to take so we can win the event.  I read the signs on the box repeatedly; they speak of other boat trips, but not of the hydrofoil.  Apparently out here on the dock at Peterhof I can buy a tour of the city canals.  There’s only five more people to go before the fateful moment of our interaction and it seems moments before Lari ends up taking the first ticket.  She strolls off towards the boat as I acquire my own.  I suddenly feel the urge to shove the whole box into the sea, jump on top of it and row the damn thing back to the city using a plank from the roof while this useless creature within struggles and complains the whole way.  I decide the hydrofoil will be quicker, if less satisfying, and follow Lari onboard with Don shortly behind us.  Only another ten people make it on after us and we feel relieved as the boat pulls away; knowing our queuing skills could probably do with more practice.

Everyone takes a picture

 

I decide to head home to attempt to get some sleep in the early evening to make the sleepless night sitting on a train easier to cope with.  Don and Lari stay to explore the city a little more.  Alisha returns with them after ten and they’re looking at what food we have left.  Don waves his hand at the pile of vegetables and meat and tells me to do something clever with it.  The times we’ve shared houses together saw me cooking for him fairly often as I dodged as much of the cleaning duties as was feasibly possible.  I manage to cook up everything in the fridge to create a lightly spiced stir fry dish with noodles.  It is surprisingly good and filling enough to cushion my system for the long night ahead.

Don is trying to copy all his pictures onto Alisha’s computer so she can see what we’ve been up to and how she looks in all of them.  It isn’t working so well and he asks me to figure it out for him.  My ten years working in the IT industry are of some use and I manage to affect the transfer of his pictures. I then attach my camera and copy my own across for her.  I retrieve the scarf my family gave me and get a picture with Alisha wearing it along with her Georgian man hat.  She says she needs a cigarette to complete the picture and lights one instantly to pose again.  Her slow, warm smile glows at me and I give her a huge bear hug to farewell her properly.  As the picture copying process finishes we all leave Alisha the gifts we’ve brought along.  Lari has some scented soaps handmade by a friend of hers back home which form the start of our love package.  I choose a stubbie holder with an Australian aboriginal colour painting on it, a shot glass with Perth’s city skyline on it, a yellow diamond sign warning about emus and also a stuffed kangaroo.  Don adds some koala fridge magnets and some Australia stickers and we present it all to Alisha to thank her again for being so magnificent.  She looks terribly shy, but she likes the crazy array of presents and gives us all another hug.  We make our final farewells and take our luggage out the door in plenty of time to make it to the train station.

Catherine's Palace and a Storm on a Canal Boat

We decide to go and visit Catherine’s Palace, Tsarskoe Selo, and jump a train and a bus in that general direction.  The palace gardens distract us for hours, they are beautifully laid out and filled with interesting diversions.  The pathways lead us through varied garden styles that are all bursting with life in the short Russian summer.  From the tall hedges bounding gravel paths near the front of the palace, to more wild forest near the edges, these gardens are glorious.  We pause by the lake a few times in different places to drink some water and eat ice-cream.

The temperature is in the high twenties and fairly humid as well, so we are all sweating in the sunlight; something none of us expected to feel in Russia.  We stroll down an asphalt walkway near a small stream and Don notices something on the ground.  He looks closer then starts taking pictures.  I crouch down to discover two bees having sex.  The three of us crowd around the strangest pornography show for a minute before continuing our stroll. 

Shush Lari

The pathways divide and merge, leading use through different areas of the extensive gardens.  We walk by a field of waist high grasses with flowering shrubs interspersed along the edge of the path.  It leads down to a tiny stream lined with tall trees shading the water with broad, rich green leaves.  The grass field gives way to an open lake with an island in the middle of it.  It’s possible to take a gondola ride on the lake, or take a punted ferry to the island, but we’re not inspired by either idea.  Apparently the island used to be where Catherine would place musicians such that she could hear them play from anywhere on or around the lake. 

We eventually make it back to the palace and realise we have only covered three quarters of the grounds during our almost three hour visit.  We notice you can get a ride in a horse drawn open cart that would take us through the final sections.  After some negotiations and bartering, the three of us board it and we are transported around the broad pathways near the palace buildings. 

Dear Miss Lari cooling herself in the carriage

It seems the right time to finally venture inside the palace buildings so we join the queue.  We wait for twenty minutes before really noticing that it isn’t moving very much.  I investigate further and discover that in the afternoon, tour groups on buses have priority on the palace buildings and anyone else must hope they have a cancellation or are not fully booked.  We decide we don’t care so much and head back to the city.

Because every palace needs a pyramid

On the way I start telling my erstwhile companions about my plan to get a private boat ride on the canals whilst we drink champagne and live it up a little.  Alisha is happy to help us realise it and Don and Lari think it’d be good to see the city from the boat in any case.  We meet Alisha in the city and hunt along the canals to hire a small boat.  After a couple of options and the best part of an hour it’s on.  Don and I head for a local shop to find champagne and snacks and the girls wait by the river in a small café.

We return half an hour later with bottles of champagne, plastic glasses, cakes, lollies and weird chocolate biscuits.  We jump on board, crack a bottle, give the pilot some and settle in for our journey.  We travel down all three canals and out onto the Neva river again, enjoying the iconic bridges and buildings passing by.  The pilot occasionally turns around to tell Alisha something about buildings we pass and she translates for us.  The history of this amazing city is once more proudly on show and once again I wish I had another lifetime to spend painting it.  We settle for drinking champagne and saluting random people passing by as the day begins to lose the sun’s warmth.

While we have been enjoying this expedition, black clouds have been rolling in and a chill wind springs up.  The pilot hands the girls some blankets and Don and I make use of the warming effects of champagne combined with the chocolate marshmallow biscuits.  As we turn the final corner to head back to the pier the rain starts gently.  It seems only a few moments before very threatening, ominous black clouds churn above us.  By the time we jump off the boat onto the shore it is going through a calm patch and we hurry off into the darkening city.  We only make it to the corner of Nevskiy Prospect when the thunder and lightning break out and a downpour is upon us

Our two babushkas sheltering from the storm

The buildings of St Petersburg are designed more to cope with snow and ice than summer storms, so there is no shelter on the streets anywhere.  We see a Japanese restaurant and charge into the door as thunder and lightning crash around us and the rain reaches the pitch of a tropical storm.  The three of us are at once elated by the run and the power of the storm, yet still cold, wet and miserable as a result of its effect.  We try to acquire some beers while we’re standing inside, but the waiters seem entirely uninterested in serving anyone.  After a healthy banter of comments about genuine Russian service, the storm rolls past us.  As our group returns to the street, Alisha asks me,
“Is that what you wanted?  What you thought about?”
“Yes to the boat trip….it was a lovely piece of decadence on holiday, but the storm was unexpected… but fun anyway.” 
I’ve always liked a good storm, growing up in Darwin and surviving multiple cyclones brings it out in you I think.  We resolve to head for home to get some sleep on our last night in St Petersburg; thinking what a curious farewell the city gave us.

The Fire and Water Ritual

I wake up at some later time to find Don has appeared sleeping on the other side of the bed, clutching a bottle of vodka.  I roll over and go back to sleep.  I manage to stand up around three in the afternoon and shuffle into the kitchen to drink all the bottled water in the house.  I get through two litres and some balance returns to my day.  I figure we’re not going to Gatchina anymore and there are a lot of missed messages on my mobile phone asking where we are.  I go back to sleep and awake to find Don has recovered and is sitting in the kitchen.  He doesn’t know how we got separated either.  Apparently he spent a few hours staring blankly at train station signs written in Russian as he searched for Alisha’s one.  He had also acquired a bottle of vodka with the intention to wake me up to demand I have some so we can keep going and join the group at Gatchina.  He fell asleep on the train and was woken up at the end of the line, then kept jumping out at every station on the way back to see if he’d made it home.  Finally he did and surged into the street to jump on the marshrutka, only to be stopped by the same two policemen who grabbed me.  They must have thought it was Australia day or something as he staggered off.  He fell asleep on the marshrutka and ended up back at the train station once before finally making it to the apartment around eleven.    Apparently Lari opened the door to see him clutching the bottle and he managed one sentence before passing out next to me.
“I’ve just had the most amazing morning.”

The beach sunset

The girls have headed into the city to lodge paperwork to get Lari registered in Russia.  Since she’s just arrived, she needs to be registered somewhere and Alisha is able to do this for her.  Alisha actually needs to be registered in St Petersburg herself, so it’s easy for her to fill in the form for Lari at the same time.  All Russian citizens have to register in a city in their own country if they are there for more than three months, which she has been.  Everyone has one passport for moving around inside the country and must apply separately for a passport to actually leave Russia.  The first one is just like the ID cards used in a number of countries as a primary form of personal identification.  In order to get that external passport the individual has to fill in a bunch of forms in their home city that get sent to Moscow and used as doorstops for half a year.  When its life as a doorstop finishes the person is notified and they then must travel to Moscow once or twice to submit more forms and be interviewed, photographed and otherwise tortured by the bureaucracy.  Getting your external passport apparently takes six to eighteen months depending on whether the bureaucrats have already had their hearts and souls removed to feed the demons within the government, or are just working towards it.

Beachside vodka session

That’s only the beginning; however, a Russian citizen wishing to actually leave their country has to submit even more paperwork.  They have to tell their government where they will be staying for every night they’re outside the country – and prove it.  Hotel booking confirmations, formal letters from people they will stay with, every single day must be accounted for; or they don’t leave Russia.  We spoke to one woman in Moscow who used a credit card to book everything online to get the required proof.  Once the government approved her journey, she would then go and cancel everything and do whatever she wanted.  All of this goes to explain why Russian tourists are a limited commodity.  To have the time and money to just acquire the external passport is beyond the ability of most citizens.  Even if they manage to get that, then being able to afford to travel is a luxury largely reserved for residents of Moscow and St Petersburg and the odd wealthy family in other cities.

Even Russians pull faces after drinking vodka shots

On their way back Lari and Alisha have decided that we’ll have a fire on the beach tonight and they bring back the firewood.  Energy levels are low, and the fruit juice they also bring is helping a lot as we wander very slowly down to the beach carrying firewood and paper.  We have no clear idea how we’re going to light it without kindling, but the attempt should be amusing anyway.  After I shuffle around logs and some cardboard for a while, Don notices some hot coals and adds them to the mix.

Don questioning the manliness of the fire

I spend a lot of time fanning it and eventually the pine logs burst into flame.  For about a minute, before needing vigorous fanning again.  We can’t find any kindling, we have nothing to split the logs and it looks increasingly hopeless.  The only answer is to have some more shots of vodka, which we all do a few times.  The sunset is lazy and cloudy and we alternate between water and vodka shots and take increasingly silly photos of ourselves on the foreshore.  I suddenly remember an idea I had back in Australia and lurch down to the water and put my hand deep into it.  I then touch Don and Lari’s foreheads with that hand, leaving a  vertical stripe above and between their eyes.
“We’ve touched the water of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic coast of Russia.  Now we have to swim in the water of Vladivostok at the other end of our journey.”
They both nod lazily.  We finish the drinking water before heading inside to sleep again before the next adventure.

One Night in St Pete's

We find our way to meet Alisha at a Georgian restaurant nearby the Hermitage.  I immediately look for the Bozbashi soup and order it with a shashlik board while encouraging Don and Lari to try the same.  Don spots the vodka on the menu, discovers you can order a bottle for the table and acquires one instantly.  Don pours a shot of vodka for all of us and we suddenly realise this will be our first vodka together in Russia.  So we toast to that, friendship and more vodka.  It isn’t as smooth as the average vodka distilled in Australia, but it is less than half the price at about two hundred roubles (AUD$10) for a half litre bottle.  Alisha reveals she really likes this place and it’s one of her favourite spots in the city.  I mention how much I like Georgian food and she points to the low, soft hat with a narrow peak over her eyes that she’s wearing,
“This is a common style for Georgian men.  I like it”, she tells me with a smile.
“So you’re really a man?” I ask impishly with my eyes widened in shock.
“No!” she explodes, “…but just like a Georgian man.” 

My beautiful Georgian man

With that she looks down and leans back in her seat to place a fresh cigarette slowly, lazily in the corner of her mouth.  Then she slowly lifts her face to look straight into my eyes with a devilish stare from underneath the peak of her hat.  I still call her my beautiful Georgian man.

The soup arrives and we all dissolve into foodgasms.  The combination of simplicity with spice provides a continuously memorable combination that always leaves me needing more.  Main course arrives and seems to evaporate somehow, maybe it dissolves in the vodka.  Feeling very full we sit back to let it settle as my phone rumbles to life.  It tells me one group of Couchsurfers are in a café-bar nearby and are inviting us to join them.  We aren’t ready to move for a while and we relax into finishing the vodka.  We three Australians settle the bill, refusing to let Alisha pay for anything.  She’s already helping us so much and we have to find ways to thank her properly for it; dinner is always a good option and she appreciates it with her typical lazy smile.

I'm a star, shining brightly in the night

We wander off to meet the couchsurfers and arrive at the outdoor part of a café bar to discover a German couple with a table of Russian friends.  About half are Couchsurfers and all want to know what three crazy Australians are doing here in St Petersburg.  We go through introductions and order beers as we take turns telling our stories of the Trans-Siberian journey.  When we tell them we will be in Yekaterinburg and Novosibirsk for a week or more each, they all look shocked and ask why.  Don and Lari look at me, since I’d made that decision, and I lean forward conspiratorially, drawing them in closer to the table.
“Because they have cool names”, I announce prophetically. 
There’s a pause before they notice my evil smile and start laughing.
“Whilst that’s quite true, the real reason”, I further explain, “is more to do with the history of Yekaterinburg and the Total Eclipse happening in Novosibirsk”. 
I’m then forced to explain the gentle art of eclipse chasing.

After the beer and vodka, I suddenly feel like a cigarette again.  I have never been a smoker in any continual sense of the word, but suffer with many others the connection between drinking and smoking.  In Russia, almost everyone smokes all the time, so it’s always easy for me to find the odd cigarette to mix with a beer.  Now, since I’m no regular smoker, I much prefer something that tastes good to just anything that’s going.  Anything that can kill you that effectively has every right to taste damn good on the way down.  This is, of course, my justification for my next sentence to the barman,
“I’ll have a packet of those slim menthols, what are they called?”
“Vogue…it is woman cigarette…for woman”, he announces in stilted English and pauses.  Seeing no reaction from me he continues,
”You sure?”
“Yes…I am so deeply in touch with my inner woman that there are actually two lesbians inside me fighting for supremacy over my male side."
Okay, he didn’t understand anything, but Alisha, who is standing next to me, can’t stop laughing for a couple of minutes.  In any case, for the rest of the night everyone decides that hassling me for my menthol cigarettes is pretty funny and my responses would make Julian Clary blush.

It’s now around midnight and we have another decision to make.  Should we stay up and watch the bridges of St Petersburg rise in the early morning?  If we stay in the city, we won’t be able to return to Alisha’s home until after six in the morning when the bridges close again and the trains restart.  It is one of the iconic sights of this city during summer, as traffic grinds to a halt with the spectacle of the sparklingly lit bridges opening to allow a constant stream of boats to pass through the sleeping city.  We can even do tours by land and water to witness this, but we’re thinking more of just finding a neat vantage point to watch it happen for free.  Alisha doesn’t care, she’s used to all night parties from her time in London and is happy to relive the moment here.  Our new friends are divided on the bridge watching, but we decide to stay up all night, maybe catch a few hours sleep in the morning and just keep going through to Gatchina in the morning.  A few of the other Couchsurfers join us in heading back to the river to await the moment.

The city at night is beautiful and we acquire some takeaway beers along the walk and settle in with the growing crowds along the riverside in front of the winter palace.  The bridges, the fortress, even the normal buildings and the Winter Palace are lit by coloured lights; creating a festival atmosphere.  We watch traffic stop on the bridges as the moment approaches and then we watch a line of boats cruising quickly down the river.  The first few are the low tour boats that can safely pass beneath all the bridges, but they are closely followed by freighters making their dash through the city.  We look at the freighters and the closed bridge and wonder if they’re feeling suicidal or something, heading straight for it.  We watch in wonder as a row of six boats passes by in a hurry and begin to wait for the clamour of the collision.  Suddenly Don’s voice rings out,
“It’s already open!”
We all lean out to see where he points and, sure enough, the last joint of the bridge near the shoreline is open.  We’ve missed the fateful moment.

The view is still damn good, but seeing the change would have been perfection.  The only solution is to cross back and join the other group in our first St Petersburg nightclub.  The nightclub is a converted classic building complete with marble staircase and lush, indulgent foyer.  Outside Don has scaled the wall to leave the painting he bought at the Hermitage on one of the huge window sills.  He figures this means it won’t get damaged inside.  I’m watching the group of bemused Russians who watch him do it and place a private one shot of vodka bet that it won’t be there when we come out.  Don and I find some vodka shots, toast St Petersburg and wonder where the night will take us.  All four of us churn through the introductions to the changed group of couchsurfers and friends and exchange short chats in-between the loud music coming from the dancefloor.

Don and I are watching one girl who is easily one of the most natural and sensual dancers either of us has ever seen.  We are both veterans of many music, dance and trance festivals and have seen our share of amazing dancers.  The way this girl moves is at once completely self aware, but without a trace of being self conscious.  She moves as an integral part of the music, not with it or around it.  She also broadcasts a confident sexual awareness that has every man in a ten metre radius absolutely enraptured; and she lives and loves every moment of it. 
“I’m not going to talk to the dancing girl.  I just can’t fall in love again in this country.  Today”, Don says with absolute certainty.
We’re talking about how we can find out where she learned to do that, and meet her, when one of the Germans taps us on the shoulder and says,

“Your friends are outside and can’t get back in”.

 We look at each other and out the door, where they are sitting on the marble staircase looking bored.  Apparently they went outside for a smoke and the bouncers want to charge them entry again.  We elect to have one more vodka and then discuss whether we should stay here and get onto the dancefloor or follow them.  We watch the magical dancer feel her way through another song, which pretty well makes up our minds.  Then I receive a message on my mobile from Lari telling me about the café they’ve moved to.  We decide we will follow the Germans to another club, but will find the girls first and see if they want to come along.

Don scampers up the wall outside, his long hair flying about him as he jumps back to the ground clutching his picture.  We slope through the busy streets to find the girls at another covered gazebo style café drinking coffee.  I order a bottle of champagne and we sit down to enjoy a calm moment in the night.  That bottle is definitely a mistake.  From the point of leaving the café after an hour or so, things are very fuzzy and indistinct.  I make them all stand for a photo pose outside after we leave. It takes me a dozen attempts to get a focussed picture with an autofocus camera.  The sun is already lighting the sky when we decide to separate, or more accurately the girls leave us to head for the train station.  Don and I make a solemn vow to find the second nightclub.  We bid them farewell and march off with arms around each other’s shoulders enjoying the night.  This is the first time we two brothers have been together in the same place at the same time for a long time. We live in cities a few thousand kilometres apart now, so chances to meet are rare and to be savoured.  We both knew extreme intoxication was inevitable, even though we also knew this was a bad idea in a foreign country where we don’t speak the language.

We spend the next half hour lurching up a canal while receiving directions on our mobiles from the German guy.  His girlfriend has gone home now, but he’s still out enjoying further refreshment.  We make it to the construction site he had been trying to get us to find and round the corner to see him standing looking exactly how we felt – muntered.  His face droops and his speech slurs badly as he lets us know he had just been on his way home.  Meeting us changes his mind and he accompanies us back into the club.  It has a beautiful wooden interior spread over a couple of rooms and a balcony through huge French windows.  It has floor standing candelabras that reach above our heads and the bartenders have no problems supplying more vodka to a trio of inveterate troublemakers.  I remember talking to different people who seem amazed that I’m Australian and standing in this club.  I even remember going rounds with Don ordering vodka shots - four at a time.  I also take a moment to buy another round of two shots to pay my private bet about him losing the picture; he still has it under his arm.  The sun is well and truly up by now and streaming in through those windows.  Our German friend leaves us and we last one more round before deciding we had better head for home before real trouble comes our way.

We stagger out of the club around six in the morning to be greeted with an overwhelming sight.  The Cathedral on Spilled Blood, St Petersburg’s answer to St Basil’s cathedral in Moscow, is directly in front of us across the canal.  Its appearance arrives as an invigorating revelation to our sodden brains.  Somehow we had completely failed to notice this incredible building on our way in.  Our cameras come out and we both try to capture the arresting beauty of the colourful onion domes of the cathedral shining in the dawn light.  Which is when the two policemen arrive and ask for our passports.  We comply as best we can, slowly and with long pauses to open money belts, as we explain we’re trying to get to the metro station.  When they discover we’re Australian, they tell us to go home straight away.  We agree completely and stand confused for a minute as they walk off, feeling particularly lucky that they let us go so easily.  We had both heard stories of visitors to Russia spending time in a lockup or spending money to avoid that threat, or both.  Feeling a new urge to return home we make it to a Metro station in record time.
I’m standing on the platform ready to catch the next train when I notice Don is no longer with me.  He is well known for wandering off randomly and at this time of morning I’m fading fast and can’t find him anywhere on the platform.  I decide I’m angling for home and keep my mobile in my hand in case he calls on the way. 

I lurch out of Alisha’s train station and onto the open square in front of it that leads to the marshrutka waiting zone when two policemen bail me up.  I’m unable to actually walk standing straight up at this point and I’m leaning heavily to one side, which is seriously hurting my lower back as I try to straighten up.  I’m guessing this is what alerted the wise detectives to my condition.  They stand evenly either side of me, both facing me on an angle, and demand my passport.  I’m feeling a lot less confident than the previous encounter; I’ve lost Don and probably used up my luck in dealing with the Russian authorities.  The pair of them are looking particularly severe as I pass it to them, wondering what I would need to be allowed to continue my reckless rampage.
“You’re Australian?” The first man exclaims to me in Russian, a broad smile covering his face.
“Yes, I’m an Australian man”, I manage to reply in Russian. 
It sounded good to me at the time and he seems to understand.  He passes my passport to his friend and both of them are now smiling broadly at me.  It occurs to me how much of a typical Australian yobbo I’m being.  My inner lesbians have utterly deserted me in disgust.  Here I am in a very foreign country on a trip I’ve been planning for a couple of years and it’s only taken two weeks to land myself fiendishly drunk in a discussion with some police officers about the situation.  I suppose I must be grinning like an idiot back at them by now and I have no idea what to do next.  They also don’t say anything I can understand.  I decide they must want something from me and enter a strange charade of emptying my pockets and handing stuff to them.  Each guy looks at it, passes it to their friend and then passes it back to me.  I can remember seeing the huge smile on the face of one of them as he opens my wallet and shows me the roubles left inside it, before handing it back to me again.  They ask me where I’m going and I point at the marshrutka queue and struggle to remember how to say “123” in Russian.  I settle at pointing at the one I need and say,

“That one”, repeatedly, in Russian. 
They step out of my way, hand me my passport and tell me to go home straight away.  Not believing my luck, I do exactly that and arrive at the apartment just half an hour after Lari and Alisha.  I tell them about the policemen, much to Alisha’s amazement and Lari’s horror, before I have another cold shower and pass out.

The Russian National Sport: Qualifying Round at the Hermitage

The river side of the Winter Palace and Hermitage: The correct side to enter from.

Nobody gets out of bed until around eleven, it’s a rainy day and that helps us all enjoy the extra sleep.  We decided that the Hermitage would be the place to visit today, but now we will only have a few hours to explore something that friends have advised me to spend a few days visiting.  The Hermitage is the truly amazing and extensive art gallery and museum that resides in two adjoining buildings; the old Winter Palace and the Hermitage itself.  The three of us head for the city whilst Alisha makes for work to try and finish something off before meeting us for dinner.  The journey into the city doesn’t take long and we find ourselves approaching the Winter Palace filled with anticipation of the experience.

I’m staring at the strangest statue atop an enormous column in the middle of Palace Square.  It’s an angel carrying an enormous cross, but it appears to have no head.  Who would build a headless angel memorial? What significance that could possibly have?  I’ve never heard of this before in any kind of icon   Maybe it’s some saint who got beheaded while….ummm…carrying a huge cross.  Okay, maybe not.  Maybe it’s some Russian Orthodox symbolism at work, who needs a head when you’ve got faith?  I’m almost disappointed when we move past it walking towards the Hermitage entrance and the head appears, bowed deeply.  Apparently this forty-seven metre tall, six hundred tonne monolith was the largest free standing monument in the world for some time and probably still is the largest one carved from stone.  It was placed there after the Napoleonic wars as a ‘gift’ from the Russian people to the Tsar Alexander I.  More recently this square also heralded the start of the 1917 revolution.  The storming of the Winter Palace marked the first of ‘Seven Days that Changed the World’ as the famous book puts it.  However, there’s no reminder of that history standing here in Palace square.  The huge mobs of hungry Russian peasants and workers are replaced with throngs of tourists and locals surging around the Hermitage entrance.  A few young people have set up easels and are painting the square from different views while another couple are dressed as Peter the Great and his wife to hustle tourists for the photo opportunity.  We move to join the queue of people buying tickets.

If you arrive on a sleigh, you skip the queue.

Russia has long been known for its sporting prowess, but there are some sports that have been overlooked by the outside world for too long.  It’s time to cast a light on the true Russian national sport; queuing.  They love it, they’re bloody good at it and they take every opportunity to practice a little.  I think if three Russians stand in a line, more will join instinctively to have a chance to receive whatever is at the end of it.  I think Australia had better start funding our athletes before this quiet sport takes over the world by storm.  The queue here is about three or four people wide and moving very slowly as each small group passes into the building and the ticket office inside.  After about forty minutes of training to make the first Australian entry to the Russian national sporting festival, we finally make it to the door.  Having waited another few minutes to actually pass through the hallowed gateway, we’re inside the building with just ten more metres to reach the end of the event at the two ticket windows.

I then notice another ‘Kassa’ sign that suggests if I leave the queue and venture ten metres in a different direction, there are two separate ticket offices.  I ponder this for a while.  Why would everyone queue only for the two visible ones?  Why was no-one else even walking over to check the validity of this sign?  Surely the other two windows would be closed in line with the well established Russian principles of customer service:
1.    There cannot be enough people serving.  There can be enough serving windows, but they should be largely closed.
2.    The transaction process must be difficult and should preferably involve some form to be filled in with a pen.
3.    There must be insatiable demand for any service provided combined with a complete lack of desire on the part of the workers to perform the service.
I’m with Don and Lari, so I take the crazy leap of faith and walk around the corner expecting confirmation of the principles.  I find two perfectly operational ticket windows with just a few people waiting at each one.  I read the signs to see if these are special purpose windows, I was already familiar with that trick of Russian service by now.  They will place a decoy window with someone doing nothing behind it.  You can only do one thing at this window, but whatever that one thing is, it will not be what you want and they will be unable to do anything else under any circumstances.  However, that isn’t true here; they are absolutely identical to the other windows in every way.  Well, except for one small detail; they lack the hundred and fifty odd people waiting to use them.

This is when I notice that people entering from the river side are just strolling up to these windows, joining the very short queue and getting tickets very quickly.  Filled with rage at my own stupidity in succumbing to the herd mentality, I quickly apprise my friends of the situation and we skip around the corner to get our tickets in less than two minutes.  I now understand that waiting for the train tickets to be delivered yesterday was simply another aspect of the Russian training program for this new event.  There are also summer and winter variations of the gentle sport of queueing; sweating and freezing.  Myself and my two friends are now, I think, at the top of the amateur league in queuing Russian style; but only in the summer sport.  I’m seeking a government grant to revisit in winter to continue my training; after all, Australians have to be the very best in every sport

These fun preliminaries aside, we ditch our bags and head to join the tour of the diamond exhibition that’s currently open.  This involves an English speaking guide showing us through a special, heavily guarded, part of the Hermitage that holds…..well…. a lot of diamonds.  It comprises a host of bejewelled gifts for the imperial family from a number of countries as well as some of their more expensive personal trinkets.  It includes some paper thin crafted gold jewellery that I’ve never seen equalled before, along with beautifully sculptured metalwork with fine filigree details of grape vines and fruit.  The presents from Iranian royalty are the most exquisitely extravagant.  Swords encrusted with precious gemstones and diamonds, whole outfits threaded with gold and gemstones that are all overwhelming.  The exhibition is truly beautiful and I’m sure inconceivably priceless.

Alexander the Grouse fighting them damn Persians

After exiting from the onslaught of riches, we decide that the best approach to our short time inside the Hermitage will be to try and enjoy every room in the Winter Palace and try to visit as much as we can elsewhere.   This begins an almost timeless afternoon where the three of us separate and rejoin randomly over time.  Don disappears while we’re exploring a room full of white marble statues and Lari and I don’t even notice for three more rooms.  Each room absorbs your attention quietly and divinely.  In one room a finely detailed silver partridge sits in an equally detailed tree inside a metal cage.  Another room has been painted with hundreds of frescoed stories in the style of a similar room in the Vatican.

It was apparently created as a competition piece.  We pose with statues, form a dancing procession on a staircase and duck and weave through the busy throngs of people.  Lari and I find Don somewhere later babbling about a throne room.  We haven’t seen it, so the three of us spend our time looking for it again in-between the corridors and rooms filled with tapestry and paintings, statues and lamplights, crystal, wood, malachite and marble. 

Thrones and fabulous marble staircases feature more than once and it’s during this whirlwind tour I appreciate more and more what my other friends had meant by spending more time.  It’s possible to fly through most of the rooms of the hermitage buildings and the winter palace in the space of a few hours, but there are so many places you could happily stay and savour for days.  This is especially true during summer with natural light playing across the wooden floors, furniture and rooms.  Once again I feel I would have to learn to paint to capture anything of the spirit of this city, I don’t think photographs can ever make it feel the same.

I'm not a pheasant plucker, I'm a pheasant plucker's wife.  I'm only plucking pheasants it's a pheasant plucking life.

A voice announces that the Hermitage is closing while we’re busy making a pass through the galleries of past masters and then more modern offerings.  Perhaps the speed of our visit made me miss things, but the only art on display that really captured me was a wooden sculpture of a woman falling off a chair.  The clash of bodies in motion set into permanent suspension by the wood is an addictive revelation. 
The detail was perfect and you somehow believed that this unfortunate soul had been transformed into wood by an ancient creature with mystical powers.  We are quite lost in the maze of rooms and corridors and end up being herded out by the museum staff, eager to go home themselves.  We finally make it back to the familiar opening rooms near the entrance and enjoy passing by the white marble statues before emerging back into normality

Athena with some hot lesbos action

The atmosphere inside the Hermitage certainly feels like some parallel world, even when you can look out of the windows and see the boats on the Neva and people on the street; it still feels separate.  I wonder if I’ll get a chance to spend more time in there as I retrieve my jacket and we pause by the souvenir shops.  Don ends up buying a framed print of a picture he particularly liked.  It’s a rectangle more than half a metre across and half a metre wide that is sure to become an amusing burden.  He does always tend to live for the moment and relish them as they flow irrevocably past; life without too much concern for the future.  We exit the Hermitage feeling hungry and looking for instant gratification.

I bet she likes to 'Club the Lobster' all night long