Days 3&4 Getting around St. Petersburg and environs

Two days now on the Viking Helgi. We're tied up in St. Petersburg using the boat as a floating hotel. Great to be able to unload your bags, have a good sleep every night and  know where your next meal is coming from. Over the past 2 days we've become quite familiar with the Romanov family history and great wealth expressed in palaces and collections. Surprised at the family violence (wives offing husbands, children exiled, children killed by parents), total extravagance of the ruling families, beautiful and ambitious constructions, the wealth of history / collections / buildings retained through the Soviet era, and our ability to walk through places where recent history has unfolded.
Also surprised how relatively young St. Petersburg is actually - the first university was established around the same time as for Canterbury University in Christchurch, New Zealand.

Anyway to keep the story moving here is a small collection of pictures showcasing things we've seen over the past few days. I struggle getting the editing of this blog working easily on the phone, so just a few notes here to make sense of what follows.

The battleship Aurora was the cruiser from which a blank shot was fired towards the Winter Palace in the 1917 revolutionary uprising signalling commencement of hostilities. The  revolution originated in St. Petersburg, but was surprisingly light in actual fighting. Few it seems were out to defend the Czar. Not hard to understand when the total extravagance of their living is considered. We've been through the palaces of Catherine the Great, typically titled "Hermitage" in various forms. And here we have seen treasures, art and ballet. The Russian Federation have done a wonderful job of preserving and accessibly presenting things they way they were right back to the 1800's. Palaces were designed to demonstrate power, prestige and wealth to all who came to visit. Entrances were grand, collections from all over the world, things made just for pleasure, places created to hide secrets. We saw 3 halls of huge carved vases and furniture made from Lapis Lazuli imported from Afghanistan. Normally you would see items of jewellery made from this stone - having furniture made from it was designed to shock onlookers into understanding just how wealthy their hosts were. Fully clockwork Pheasants made from gold that took many years to assemble, (now) highly collectible art used as wallpaper - not even bothering with frames, (real) golden burnished domes.

It was interesting the Revolution did not destroy all this, but preserved it, utilising the spaces for science and arts, providing housing, and has since been routinely subsidised for restoration and maintenance by successive governments with much reverting to museums and general public displays.

We've also enjoyed a visit to the palaces of Catherine I in the township of Pushkin (celebrated Russian poet who redeveloped/popularised the Russian language into its current form and died rather romantically in a duel over his beautiful wife), the ballet, a Cossack dance evening, and as they say - much, much more. This is a wonderful place and worth a visit.

Anyway - here are the pictures. Enjoy !!