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August 20, 2006
Pictures at an Exhibition (I)
I never got around to putting up pictures from St. Petersburg - here are a few, and I'll try to put up more - especially on days when I have nothing better to blog!
This first group of pictures was taken on the morning after I arrived, I took a short walk up Nevsky Prospect at about 9:30 am.
The Beloselsky palace was a block and a half from the Radisson towards the center of the city. It is now a cultural center and tourist office.
The Fontanka is nominatively a river, but functions more as a canal, one of the waterways that ring the city.
The Armenian Church on Nevsky Prospect.
The Cathedral of Our Lady of Kazan.
A typical Petersburg street, 3rd Sovietskaya Ulitsa. This was where the Youth Hostel is, and where Peter's Walking Tours begin. I recommend their tours highly, but take a more conventional overview tour first. The tours are different every day according to the group and the guide, but Dmitri (who was very friendly, knowledgeable and helpful) did one that concentrated on offbeat sites, at the expense of some of the major monuments in the center. The rest of the pictures are from the tour.
An offbeat site. The Museum of Nonconformist Art.
Above the entry to the museum. All you need is love.
The underground passage to get to the museum courtyard.
Pushkin, the soul of the city. This is a statue of him in a small park near the Museum of Noncomformist Art. Legend has it that he is looking at the balcony of the woman who funded the statue. Our group was also accosted by a pair of drunk men here.
This isn't a famous building, but a fine surviving example of the Beaux Arts style in Petersburg. It's near Vladimirsky Station.
Most tourist attractions in the center were in excellent upkeep, but the buildings that weren't could be in disrepair - also because the municipality was responsible for a building's facade, but the owners for the interior.
St. Vladimir's Cathedral.
Ground Zero. The Academy of Russian Ballet, A.Y. Vaganova.
A view of the Fontanka from the Vaganova Academy.
The Academy is on Master Builder Rossi Street, named after Carlo Rossi. The street is ten times as long as its buildings are tall, and it is perfectly symmetrical. You can see where Petipa would get his inspiration for the corps de ballet. The Alexandrinsky theater is at the end of the street.
Another ornate building near the Alexandrinsky.
I did not take photographs for a while, but we went to the Ploschad Ostrovkovo in front of the Alexandrinsky to see the statue of Catherine the Great and her advisors. And we were accosted by a pair of drunk men. Across the street we visited the ornate Beaux Arts Yeliseevsky Gastronom, one of the most famed food shops in St. Petersburg. And we were accosted by a pair of drunk men. This never happened while I was alone. Probably a group is more visible.
From there, we walked on Karavannaya Ulitsa past the stables and towards the statue of Peter the Great and the Engineers (Mikhailovsky) Castle, from there into the Mikhailovsky gardens and past the Russian Museum.
We ended at the Church of the Spilled Blood, built on the spot where Alexander II was assassinated.
Posted by Leigh Witchel at August 20, 2006 10:44 PM
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