day 96, st petersburg

Woke up this morning having slept pretty long but feeling a wee rough. I got told by the hostel people that I needed to move rooms which wasn’t a problem, so after waiting for a shower, cleaning my teeth and moving rooms it were 11 in the morning. I went out for a walk and spent half hour looking for the supermarket which was 3 minutes walk away, turned out I walked past it 4 times, damn Cyrillic. After getting some apples and water went for a walk in st Petersburg. After getting about 4 minutes away from the hostel I was bloody knackered and read my book on this bench in the glorious sunshine in front of this massive statue thing, which was cracking. While there the aussie elderly couple who I sat next to on the plane said hello, which was a bit of a happy coincidence considering the size and busy-ness of the city. After that I ran into a Russian girl who I met at the hostel, and she offered to show me around a bit, which was very nice of her. We went for a walk down the street, past this massive church which was incredible, and inside it was equally so. It was amazing to walk up and down st Petersburg streets and see all these fantastic buildings in the grandeur. From there we went to the winter palace, before heading up across the bridge onto paul and peter’s fortress, along the water, then through the park past the war memorial and back to the hostel. There we met Kim and Hollie, 2 sisters from Cambridge who are doing the vodka train, and we went for another walk around before heading back to the hostel for 5 for the departure meeting. Our honcho man was called Nazim, a cool Russian with a hair do reminiscent of sideshow bob if he had it cut a little bit, and after filling in our details and a few details we headed off for dinner together. All together there are 14 people on my trip, bryan this Irish dude, hollie and Kim, the 2 from Cambridge, bridget from Utrecht, seb and nicky, only from bloody Southampton, jake, an aussie from perth who’s lived in London for 4 years, Andrew a kiwi who’s also lived in London, rashine and lucas, a couple from zurich, kelly a pilot from oz and scott and ellie a couple from nz who lived in brighton for the last few years and on their way back. Everyone is really nice and cool, most doing more travelling onward from the train or going back to good jobs or uni degrees. After our meal (I had the borsch which was lovely, a beetroot, carrot and beef soup followed by the beef stroganoff as recommended by Nazim) with a pint before going for a little walk then back to the hostel for another departure meeting. After that we went to the pub where we had a couple of drinks and a chat, we met 2 brits who were in the pub staying at our hostel, Lawrence and ollie who are in Russia for a mates wedding, then back to the hostel to write this and bed! Tomorrow getting up in morning to have another look around then want to see the bridges rise in the early hours of the morning, too tired at the moment. It’s proper good to get back into the swing of things!