This year I finally had an opportunity to fulfill my wish of celebrating the New Year's Eve abroad. The Independent Student Association organised a trip to Sankt Petersburg for that occasion, the second largest city in Russia, the 4th largest in Europe and definitely one of the most beautiful and pompous. We were expecting a severe winter, a snowy wonderland and freezing temperatures but it was between -2 and 2 degrees and no snow. Bad luck.
Petersburg has a very european atmosphere, with some similarities to Paris or Vienna. No wonder since it is located at the coastline of the Baltic Sea and used to be the crucial trading point between Russia and Europe. Its central part lies deeper into the land, on the Neva River.
It is a relatively young city, being established in 1611 by Swedish colonists. But then later in this century it was raided by Russians led by Peter The Great in order to gain access to the Baltic Sea with a better port. The swedish people were captured, a new fortess raised and this was the beginning of Sankt Petersburg as we know it today. The swedish settlement was not very advanced, so the new metropolis was designed and raised nearly from scratch. It went so well, that Peter moved the capital from Moscow to Petersburg in 1704. The russians were willing to create a similar city to the European ones and actually hired numerous architects from France and Italy. For that reason the central part of Petersburg has many baroque-styled buildings. During the reign of the Tsars most of the cities landmarks were built, and nearly half of them are palaces. You know, every Tsar and his close subjects needed their own mansion.
Everything chanced in 1917 with the Communist Revolution, that actually broke out in Sankt Petersburg. The system changed, and so did the name of the city - Leningrad. It wasn't just one revolution, during the wars the city went through raids, sieges, strikes. Too much to describe in detail. In 1991 during the first presidential elections in Russia a referendum was also held to choose the final name of the city. Sankt Petersburg it was.
So, it's another one with a vibrant history. Our hostel was located close to Nevsky Prospekt, one of the longest streets of Petersburg that leads straight to the Winter Palace. Half of my photos was taken on it becase we had to walk along basically every time that we headed downtown, and it was so bursting with life it would be a sin not to shoot.
It is important to remember that traditional russian celebrations are happening according to a different calendar than ours. When we arrived it was still before christmas! So, everything was decorated in lights, people dressed as Santas (or Father Frost) on the streets and soon and so forth.
The first full day we had a guided bus-tour. First, we were dropped of on the northern bank of Neva, where we had a postcard view on our key attractions - Hermitage museum located in the Winter Palace and Peter and Paul Fortress (which I will describe in detail later on).
Ah, yes. The bridges.
The thing with the bridges is that at night some of them are opened to allow the ships swim through. It's quite famous, specially during the white nights We actually made a whole expedition to reach the riverside at 1 a.m. in order to see this spectacular opening, but we did not check that it only happens during the warm months.
We visited the Peter and Paul Fortress. It is situated on a seperate island on Neva, but closer to the northern side. This citadel was the first settlement of Peter the Great after taking over, founded in 1703. It remained a key location in the following years, even during the soviet times it served as a prison.
On the island there are several noteable buildings, starting from the Peter and Paul Cathedral. It's golden spire is one of the key landmarks towering over the city. The cathedral is the burial site of all Tsars of Russia. The interiors are also bursting with golden ornaments (however, as an architecture student I was super amused to notice that some of the marble pillasters were... painted. Regular paint on plaster. How sneaky!)
Next we stopped by a Russian Cruiser "Aurora". Dating to 1900 it now serves as a museum.
Next, the Smolny Cathedral Church. By that time of the tour we were soaking wet and absolutely not listening to our tour guide. Now I regret that we didn't have the chance to get inside, that might have been interesting.
The last point of the guided tour was the Cathedral of Saint Isaac, the most dashing church in the city. Actually, it is the fourth church raised in this exact spot and it took 40 years to build. In form it is resembling Villa la Rotonda by Andrea Palladio with its cross layout and a dome in the middle.
However, the interiors are fully-orthodox glistening with gold and different pices of artwork, including painings and mosaics. This is a must-visit.
Now, back on the streets during daytime. I saw quite fascinating phenomenons, particularily with street entertainers dressed up animals or XVIII century royalty.
See this fancy building? This is a metro station that was nearest our hostel and I think this is the nicest metro station exterior I have seen so far. Obviously, the building used to have a different purpose before, and converting it to a metro station blows my mind in a way.
On Nevsky Prospekt we spotted one absolutely beautiful building in the style of Art-Noveau. It used to be a department store, I think. We peaked inside and it looked as impressive.
The most important square is right in front of Hermitage Museum. It was this kind of place that is packed with tourists at daytime regardless of the season.
Petersburg is sometimes called The Venice of the North because of its numerous canals.
I have bad luck for renovations. The coolest church that I wanted to see really badly had its top dome in a spectacular white scaffolding. Oh well.
This is the Church of the Savior on Blood in a typical orthodox form, with colourful domes and detailing of mosaics and brick. We came too late to get inside as well, so at leas we walked around and along the canal that connects it with Nevsky Prospekt.
In large cities of most post-USRR countries Metro Stations are something that's really worth looking into. It's not your generic tube station, trust me. Some of them have neo-classical entries, some not. Metro in Sankt Petersburg, just like the one in Kiev, is really deep underground, the escalators are dashing with a surprisingly fast pace but the journey down still lasts a few minutes. Admiraleyskaya station is the 3rd deepest station in the World.
Here's just a quick glance on how it looks like, on our way to Bregovaya station, the last stop that's by the Baltic seaside.
After satisfying ourselves with the view of the sea, we took a metro station tour on the red line. Red line is the one with the most impressive platforms, so we jumped from one station to another. The stations that we visited were Tekhnologicheskiy Institut, Narvskaya (with communistic decor at its strongest), Kirovsky Zavod (with Lenin's statue standing casually at the end of the platform) and Avtovo (the most dashing one with marble and ornamental collumns.
Just before our departure we have scheduled a visit to the Hermitage museum. LIke I mentioned, it is located the Winter Palace, the former residence of the Tsars. It is one of the biggest museums in the world and one of the busiest ones, some sources state that it's the second largest after Louvre. In order to get in we had to stand in a very long queue an hour before the official opning.
It was around 9 a.m. and since the sun rose at 10 a.m. we could admire the spectacle of the morning light while waiting.
The collections are of many different types, from ancient egypt, through siberian middle-ages to impressionist paintings. It was literally impossible to do the whole thing, so we chose a few collections that interested us the most. Even though we entered the museum very early, the crowds got denser with every second.
I think I admired the palace interiors more than the artworks themselves. Some galleries were situated in rooms with windows, and the morning light lurking in looked exceptionally pretty.
0 komentarze