Day 11 of our trip. It has been long (we can hardly remember Vilnius) and short (is it almost over already?).
Early bag pick-up as today was another travel day. We got to the train station at 8:15 for our 9:00 to Moscow. Once again, airline-style clad "flight" attendants greeted and served us. Zoom in for a closer look.)
The 4 hour ride went by quickly as the train only made 2 stops and averaged about 100 mph over the 400 miles.
Once we arrived it was, of course, time to eat again. Our bus took us to a restaurant which was covered with all kinds of art: tiles, paintings, colored banners. After we ate, Erich told us that he had a surprise. The restaurant is owned by the artist (Zurab Tsereteli) who created all the art work. And it is actually attached to a large enclosed space which is filled with many bronze pieces. Some are Russian figures, both life-size and huge, and there are other more symbolic pieces.
Tsar Nicholas II and family
Us with a rather large Pushkin
You are not allowed to take pix inside, but, honestly, there was not much to see. It was very dark and not highly decorated. A note about Russian Orthodox churches: there are no pews or seats! The worshippers must stand for the entire service! And some holiday services can last 6 hours!! But....they do not just pick their favorite spot and stand there. At various points in the service they move around to different areas. But still standing all the time. That's devotion! (Had we been able to use our camera/phone, we would surely have recorded the beautiful sounds of the boys' choir in rehearsal.)
Our last tour stop of the day was for what our new city guide Natalya called, our "Moscow orientation". We went to the area of the Kremlin and Red Square and St. Basil's Church.
The Kremlin, she told us, is the original walled city that was built in the mid-1300s. "Kremlin" actually means "fortress". Today, the area inside houses the main government offices, including the President's.
Just outside is the most famous "onion dome" church in the world, St. Basil's Cathedral, actually named the Cathedral of Vasily the Blessed, but officially recognized as the Cathedral of the Intercession of the Most Holy Theotokos on the Moat! Let's just go with Basil.
This is actually the view from our hotel room!
There are 9 domes, reflecting the 9 wars that Ivan IV (Ivan the Terrible) won to capture and secure this area. The legend goes that after it was built, good old Ivan had the architect blinded so that he could not build another one as beautiful. Ahhh....it's good to be the Tsar!
GO CUBS!!!!!
Just adjacent to the church is Red Square. Unfortunately, we have no photos as much of it is currently covered by a temporary huge seating area and stage in preparation for an annual music festival that starts next weekend. But here are some internet photos that give you an idea of what it looks like:
Also, "Red" is somewhat of a misnomer. In Russian, the actual name (word) means "beautiful", but that word is close to the word meaning "red". So somewhere along the way it got mis-translated. And, the paving stones there are not even red!
Natalya then pointed out the GUM (pronounced "goom") Shopping Mall, directly across the street from Red Square. "gum" is actually an acronym standing for (in Russian) "main universal store". This is a huge glass-covered mall. Natalya told us that in the 90s during the transition period "from Communism to what we have now..I don't know what it is", people had to stand in line for hours as goods were in short supply. Now though there is plenty of merchandise in the stores (many Western companies) and plenty of tourists to buy them.
The group then headed to our hotel for free time, so after dropping off our day packs, we headed back out to explore on our own (our hotel is a 5 minute walk from this area) and directly on the Moscow River.
Since we had finished our lunch at 2:30, this became our standard "dinner tonight is just ice cream" meal. Yummy cones from Bosco Café. So we checked out GUM and the large pedestrian market area next to it. Many, many tourists!!!
Then we came upon the Cathedral of the Icon of Our Lady of Kazan (a small church with a long name!). This too is another reconstructed building (original destroyed 1936). Just as we were standing there (even though it was 7:50), the bells began to ring out! And we could see a man in the bell tower pulling the ropes! Here is a video of that mini-concert and that area of Red Square.
Erich had told us that Moscow never sleeps. Well we do, and we were exhausted so we headed back to the hotel. We have a late start on Sunday, so we figured we could finally catch up on our sleep. We were deep in slumber when we found Erich's statement to be true. At about 4:30, we suddenly heard very loud techno pop. We looked out the window and saw a brightly lit party boat cruising past! After it passed, we were still groggy enough to get another 2 hours or so of sleep.
Big day of touring ahead on Sunday with some great food pix imminent!
w&w……………………….
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