Wednesday - St Petersburg

The lift -don't think anybody services it - we where told it doesn't always work - it stops working in the winter! The door to the apartment building. The apartment building.

Josh playing the piano in the master bedroon Master bedroom Kitchen/Lounge Before the central heating was on - it was freezing, even inside. The 6 flights of stairs we had to walk up to get the the apartment - we walked up the stairs rather than catch the lift, you will see why in the photo above.

After not much sleep we arrived in St Petersburg at 7am - we waited at the station for 30min for our ride to arrive then we had to wait in a cafe for our apartment to be ready at 10.30 - the place was gross!! Check it out! We had the whole place to ourselves at least! It was clean in the bathroom and sheets etc - but so much dust! We went for a walk around the centre adn them came back for a sleep. Josh and I slept most of the afternoon. Mum and Dad went for anotehr walk and mum had her bag pick pocketed! Whilst she was reading a menu someone undid her bag and took out the camera case, luckily the camera was not in the case and all they took is some batteries! They went down the sideway where they saw the men go and found the camera case in the rubbish bin! To finish a turely lazy day we had over priced Pizza Hut for dinner.

Moscow - Tuesday

Lennins Masoleum Church of Christ the Saviour Josh on the lion statues in the church gardens Train Platform - our train is the blue one - these are the carriages Mum's standing in front of the engine bit - check out how old it is - lucky we made it. Today we went our seperate ways in the morning. Josh and I went to Lennins Mausoleum. We where searched and our cameras had to be left in the coat check then we actually saw his embalmed body! Josh and I visited the White and Case Moscow office after lunch then met Mum and Dad at GYM. Inside GYM was this amazing supermarket that sold nice food all seperatly like an the old days! We went in the afternoon to see the cathedral of Christ the Saviour, the origninal church was built 1839 - 1883 to comemorate Russia's vicotry over Napolean. Starlin got rid of all the cathedrals, including this one, and made it into the worlds largest swimming pool, for 50 years! Over 2 years it was re-built and made back into a church for Moscow's 850th Birthday, costing US$350 million. The Frescos inside where beautiful, but again - no photos allowed. In the evening we went for dinner at a local place then caught the night train to St Petersburg. We caught the metro to the train station - with our cases and mum being a first timmer at cases on escalators went to put her case on the escalator in front of her and almost took out undeserving metro riders, until josh intervened. WE made it to the train by dad giving someone a 'golden handshake'. The cabins where cosy to say the least and we arrived in St Petersbug at 7am. The cabins where sleeper cabins and had 4 bunk beds in them - you should have seen the debarcle to get the cases in!

Moscow - Monday

Cathedrals inside the Kremlin

Memorial to the unnamed soilder Gate into the Kremlin Cathedral inside the Kermlin Cathedral and the Bell Tower - in the Kremlin An old Bell, too heavy to be lifted up and hung and when they tried that bit chiped off! - in the Kremlin

This morning we had breakfast at GYM then went on a tour around the Kremlin. The Kremlin has large grounds that we went around and where freezing! It went from 11-2pm. We went down to the foodcourt in the bottom of the underground mall -at the recomendation of mum and dad and paid twice the price for lunch as we did the day prior! We walked down Old Arbat street in the afternoon - pedestrian shopping street and a really traditional coffee at a place called 'starbucks'!!! Ha Ha. This morning on the metro Dad and Josh where suspicious of some men who where jostling them. Josh held on to his wallet to be on the safe side, whilst Dad was pick pocketed!! All they got was papers - a good thing to!

Moscow Saturday 13th Sunday 14th September

Outisde the courtyard which is ontop the underground mall Kremlin at night from accross the river

Inside St Basils GYM - in the red square Resurection Gate and the chapel outside - in the Red square Back of the Museum

Victory Arch Church of the Spilled Blood View from accross the river of the Kremlin Lunch in GYM in old soviet style cafe - look at my big gerkin, well i thought it was but it tasted like a pickled courgette - yuck! St Basils

Red Square Resurection Gate in the Red Square Inside GYM mall The fountain - the middle of GYM mall State University, the building that makes up one of the 7 sisters that are all shaped the same

St Basils Cathedral in Red Square Kazan Cathedral in Red Square National History Museum in Red Square Gate/tower to the Kremlin in the Red Square Josh and I in Red Square, St Basils in the background

Today Josh and I caught an early morning flight to Moscow, it took 2.5hrs and there is a time change of 3 hours. We met Mum and Dad at the hotel as they flew in earlier! From Tallinn - via Finland as I made a mistake organising the flights - but never mind we all arrived and went out for a meal locally before heading to bed to rest up for a day of sightseeing tomorrow.

On Sunday Mum and Dad met up with a friend of Dads and did their own tour of the city so Josh and I went on a bus tour of the city. Let's just start off with the fact that Josh slept through most of the tour as he had a temperature and coming down with a cold! Then we can't forget that the temperature in Moscow was 6 degrees Celcius - and man was it cold!!!

Anyway whilst Josh was still awake we walked in the red square - which was really beautiful and then we saw all sorts of different sights around Moscow city and pretty much - it's all really not very attractive outside of the red square. We went up the road where the old KGB headquarters where and the new Ministry of Defence was and some other thing that the KGB call themselves now, only we where told not to take photos or the police where likely to come onto the bus and take the camera off us! We drove up Sparrow Hill and saw the State University, there are apparently 7 buildings all built in this same shape that where built during Starlin's times - they are called the 7 sisters, all have different things inside them - the uni, a hotel etc. However, when we met with a friend of Josh's for dinner he said that apparently they are all arranged so that rockets could be fired from them in order to protect the city - who know but quite interesting.

After the tour we had lunch in the shopping mall GYM. It used to be the old soviet government shops that where mostly empty of food, but now they are filled with expensive shops and an amazing supermarket that Josh and I really enjoyed buying food from! yummy and of course the mall was nice and warm.

In the afternoon we went inside St Basils Cathedral adn the Kazan Cathedral - this was built in 1993 - on the site of the old one. it's an acitve orthodox Russian church so because it was sunday the bells wehre ringing and ther was singing coming out - which sounded really pretty. We saw the resurrection gate and the Chapel at the gate. We went around the state history museum - which was mostly boring but again nice and warm so no complaints! We also located another shopping mall that is underground - goes down 3 stories. We did a bit of looking but it was worse than Oxford street so after an overpriced coffee we left.

In the evening we met up with a friend of Josh's for dinner and ate at a Ukranian restaurant. I have so far come to the conculusion that they serve really good soup in Russia, i'm not so sure about the other apertifs that we had - they tasted like lard to me - but good fun to try the different food.

Today we also managed to master the metro, well Josh managed to master the metro and get us from place to place according the Russian names - a little more than i was able to manage!

A good but exhausting day. Especially for Josh who now has a fever an full blown cold from being in 6 degrees all day!

Friday 12th September Josh admitted to English Bar

Outside the Law Society The ceremony Josh on his way to the stage Receiving a certificate Josh and his colleagues from work in the library - both NZers as well On Friday, I left work at mid-day and met Josh and his colleague at the Law Society where they where admitted to the Bar. Afterwards we went to the pub for a drink and left to get home before midnight as we had an early flight to Moscow in the morning.

Friday 5th - Sunday 7th September

Pictures from dinner at the O2

Mum and Dad came back to our place on Friday night, but first we met with Rach and Steve and had a nice Thai meal at the O2. (See the pictures). On Saturday we met with Kate and Rex for lunch and had a walk around the National Gallery. Josh and I headed home and the rest continued with more walking tour. In evening we went up to Royal China for dinner with Mum and Dad and had a relatively early night (11pm) as on Sunday we saw them off at the airport to Berlin. Josh and I left them on the tube and went to church and Josh went work to get the things done as we meet them in Russia next Saturday.