Journey to St. Petersburg

On the way to St. Petersburg we stopped at a historic town called Veliky Novgorod.  Not many people have heard of this town.  It's about an 8-hour train ride from Moscow.  We took an overnight train.  The train left Moscow train station at 10pm.  We left the hotel at about 9pm and took a 30-minute taxi ride to the train station.  There are 3 train stations clustered together in Moscow - one for domestic, one to Central Asian countries, and one to big international cities like Beijing, etc.

We paid an extra half-day of room charge so that we can stay in our rooms until 9 pm that evening.  I've never done that before but apparently, this is a common practice.  I don't know if American hotels allow you to do that.  I've never tried.

We were booked into a compartment that sleeps four people, two bunk beds on each side.  There were three of us:  our tour leader Vasily, Victoria (from Australia) and I.  Another Russian man was the 4th person in the compartment.  As expected, the compartment is tight but the bed is comfortable.  Sheets and a blanket are provided.  Usually I cannot sleep on a train but I took my usual concoction of melatonin and a sleep-aid and soon enough I was asleep.  I guess I slept so soundly that I was snoring throughout the night, someone told me.  Perhaps the clickety-clack of the train soothed me to sleep.  The train is fairly modern so it was not overly noisy.  The toilet is a modern type, which means you are not flushing your waste onto the tracks.  I was expecting one of the vintage trains, like the ones I traveled on in other Eastern European countries in 2011.  When you flush the toilet in those trains, you can see the tracks.  Heaven forbids if you drop something into the toilet.

Vasily and Victoria in the train compartment

We arrived in Veliky Novgorod at about 6am and took a taxi to the hotel.  We had a nice buffet breakfast, then set out for a tour of the city.  It was raining but we had to brave it because it was going to rain all day.  Vasily, our tour leader, is a licensed tour guide in St. Petersburg.  This is his eighth trip of the year for this Tucan Tour - Moscow to St. Petersburg.  He is very knowledgeable on Russian history.  He was our tour guide for this town.  Instead of trying to repeat what he said, I'm going to refer you to this description of Veliky Novgorod and its history in Wikipedia.  Below are some pictures that I shot during our walk through the town.

Inside St. Sophia's Cathedral.  A service is going on at the other end.

Approaching the gate to the Kremlin

The Kremlin is a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Information about the Kremlin

The Millennium of Russia Monument with St. Sophia Cathedral in the background

Bells from the cathedral.  Someone is ringing them.

Inscription on the door of the cathedral

A close-up look

Overlooking the Volkhov River.  A tired tourist is resting on its banks.

The Cathedral of the Transfiguration

Hanseatic Fountain

We finished the tour in about 3 hours.  After that it rained all day and I was just not motivated to walk around the city in the rain.  Instead I took a nice nap (naps are always nice when it's cold and raining), then continue to update my blog.  In the evening we went to a nearby restaurant for dinner.  The food was excellent and cheap.  At today's exchange rate of US$1 to about 58 Russian Rubles, everything is cheap in Russia.  Only a few years ago the exchange rate was US$1 to about 30+ Russian Rubles.

We spent 1 night in this town and stayed at the Hotel Volkhov.  After breakfast in the morning, we took a taxi to the bus station to continue our journey to St. Petersburg.