Posted: 29/May/2006 at 13:22 | IP Logged

I asked my Russian friend Max about St. Petersburg, and this is what he told me:

Well, St Petersburg is very nice.  Depending on what you want to see you might want to stay either in the centre (more expensive, but closer to things like Winter Palace and Hermitage) or out of town (cheaper and closer to some other attractions, like Pushkino or Petergof.  If you are into art, then you can spend months in Hermitage – this single place has more European collections than any other museum in Europe (or in the world for that matter).  Because of such large number of collections, it is not even possible to display them all at the same time, so whenever you go there, there will be new items to discover from time to time.  The “Russkiy Musej” is smaller, but an interesting one, as its collections dedicated exclusively to Russian Art.

This is where Putin lives, you might want to say hello to him.  He prefers St Petersburg to Moscow. J  There’s always been a lot of rivalry between the two cities.  Try overnight express train or “blue arrow”, or a new TGV fast link.  You will probably catch the season of “white nights” – it does not get dark in St Peterburg at night during this season, usually May/June, when students graduate.  It is lovely, with lights and bridges and lots of happy graduates on the streets.  You will love St Petersburg – it is an imperial designer city, unlike anything else in Europe.