I haven't fallen off a cliff and forgotten my poor little blog.
We did take a driving trip ~ 4000 miles to be exact, and have returned home to find the month of September GONE, and it's practically the middle of October.
I am throwing up a few fall decor items, although I should probably just go right to Christmas at the rate the time is passing.
I do want to post on my cruise still, strictly for my own benefit so I can document a few of the wonderful memories.
We were fortunate on our cruise to spend the night in St. Petersburg. That meant 2 full days to see the sights.
These first few pictures are still from our first day. The afternoon was very dreary and rainy.
We stopped near this building to pay for our tour and snapped a picture of something ~ have no idea what it is. I will have to spend some time searching the web to put a name to this building.
Must be important because it is so BIG!
The Winter Palace, now one of the buildings of the Hermitage Museum.
St. Isaac's Cathedral
We took a river cruise ~ I had no idea that St. Petersburg was filled with canals. In that way it is much like Venice. It was raining for this mini cruise so my pictures are taken from inside the boat.
Again, the Winter Palace on the banks of the Neva River.
On our 2nd day we drove out of the city to see Peterhof.
This is Peter the Great's Summer Palace.
The Grand Cascade Fountain at Peterhof.
We came out the door in the middle and came down all of those steps to look at this fountain which is off.
{I kept thinking, surely we won't have to go back up these stairs ~ ha, yes we did, after walking through a lot of gardens.}
When we came back the fountains were on.
Here they are on ~ wow.
They are incredible.
Peter the Great wanted his guests to come by boat on the Gulf of Finland and come down this long canal to the palace. {that is the Gulf beyond the trees} They would go around the fountain and get out of their boat behind it. Can you imagine the impression he gave his visitors? That's exactly as he wished, as he was the one who wanted to make Russia a European country and he wanted his city to rival the best in Europe.
After lunch we drove back to town to visit the Hermitage Museum.
2 paintings by Leonardo Da Vinci
Madonna and Child
Michaelangelo
Rembrandt
One of my favorites by Rembrandt, The Return of the Prodigal
And of course a favorite ~ Monet.
It was so hot on the 3rd floor, no AC or elevators, so we were tired and hot by the time we got here. I am afraid our guide probably thought we were nuts, as we glanced rather quickly at all of these masterpieces, any one of which we could look at for hours.
But we were so tired and hot.
Van Gogh
On the way back to the boat we stopped to see the inside of St. Isaac's Cathedral. This church too has many mosaics and was just breathtaking.
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