Russia - Moscow

Hello dear readers, 

I hope you enjoyed that last post on St. Petersburg and that you didn't find the huge amount of photos too tiresome! 

This is the next installment in my spontaneous Russia post series: Moscow. 

So, after a sleepless night, (refer back to the last post for more details of our interesting train journey if needs be!) our train arrived in Moscow at 9am. As you can imagine, we had to get up extra early to pack away what little we'd got out over the night (that was weirdly worded) and prepare to get off the train quickly, which all in all goes against most fundamental teenage beliefs and practises. This is a fail of a photo, where I attempted to get the snowy view from our cabin window (it was exciting because these little compartments were slightly Hogwarts Express-y) but instead only got the silhouette/reflection of the three of us starting out of it. Ah well. 

To my surprise, we all managed to pile out of the train on time and intact. We then walked, lugging our luggage (what a wonderfully delicious phrase!) for what seemed like miles until we got to this restaurant, on one of the longest roads in Moscow - it was a mile long (the longest is something like 27km!) We had a pretty good breakfast, which kept to the trend throughout the trip of us eating mainly carbs - which (sorry, I'm diverting) is actually ok considering we walked about 35.27 miles all together, which is the equivalent of walking from Guildford to London!! How simply riveting (getting my Surrey on now).

Jazzy funky snazzy

My friend got one of the iconic Hard Rock tops for her friend who collects them. There's a little fact for you. #greatblogger

One of the seven sisters - seven identical buildings in Moscow that were built for individual ministry bits. 

There's a pretty cathedral. 

There's a pretty view from the top of said cathedral. 

The big red wall is the outside of the Kremlin. 

St Basil's (prepare yourself for lots of photos of this)

There seems to be a trend in Russia for getting your wedding photos on bridges, and this random bridge at the top of a shopping centre was no exception.

Me awkwardly posing, looking like Michelin man (it was cold) outside aforementioned cathedral.

You'd think that the inside of St Basil's would be tall and enormous, but it's actually split into 9 small chapels. Ivan the terrible had it built, and when he asked the craftsmen if they could ever make something more beautiful, and they naturally replied, well yes if you want, the tsar naturally had them all blinded so that that wouldn't be possible. Think that's where the 'terrible' bit pops into his personality...

 

Our legendary, forever-talking guide in the middle there

The beautiful  view from the front steps of our hotel that night 

And from our window (photo copyright Helen's photography)

A modern art museum and sculpture garden we went to. 

There was this really striking sculpture, which I think represents the faces of those killed in the purges. 

I think this was Trotsky

A modern history museum we went to after lunch, where our ever-talkative guide went on for forever, bless him, even though he was only supposed to be translating from a non-English-speaking expert, who in the end didn't actually say a word! 

A map that made me very angry, mainly because of the Africa bit. I know it's supposed to be sardonic humour, but I really don't find that kind of thing funny. 

Our huge metropolis of a hotel 

Moscow by night 

The actual Swan Lake lake

Us being blurry swans 

Red star by night 

St Basil's why do you do this to me 

 

The aforementioned shopping centre looks amazing at night 

The next day, we went inside the Kremlin and it was amazing. Sorry, I don't have many photos of it as my phone was running out of memory constantly.. 

But here's one! 

So, I do hope you enjoyed seeing those snippets of our trip - it was an amazing experience, and I wanted to share it with you as much as I possibly could. 

There are more photos, but they're mostly selfies, and I didn't think you'd all take much interest in them! I did take all the photos with my phone, if you're wondering. 

Whilst we were in Russia, our teachers wrote a blog too about what we did. So if you're interested, here's the link: 

http://ghsfromrussiawithlove.wordpress.com

Thanks for reading, be lovely to one another, many hugs from 

The (very) happy blogger xxxxxxx

Ps: I'm especially (that autocorrected to 'wax prickly' on my phone hehe) happy because I just watched catching fire again and caught up with Made in Chelsea. I should do a post on one of those.. Or both!! We shall see I suppose..