Mother Russia

The alarm clock started our trip rudely at 3:30 on Boxing Day morning, fortunately the taxi was on time and the roads were quiet and we soon racked up a world record number of fox sightings before 5am on our way to Heathrow.

After a long day of flying we descended into the cloud above St Petersburg, never to see the sun again....well, for five days anyway. We then had to work out how to get to our hotel; fortunately we met a friendly Russian lady on the bus who was very helpful, despite not knowing a word of English and us not even able to understand Russian letters, let alone full words. After some teething issues at the metro gates we found our hotel with relative ease and dealt with some administration issues like visa registration and booking our train for Moscow before a walk to find somewhere for dinner.

We spent the next two days in St Petersburg, and most of the time was spent sightseeing.

Church of Spilled Blood.



The interior walls and ceiling of this church were almost completely covered in mosaic. We went to a lot of cathedrals / churches and most of the were quite similar - huge domed buildings with a lot of artwork, marble floors, usually an awful lot of gold (or wood painted in gold) and no pews, just big open spaces where people wander round and light candles, cross themselves and kiss pictures of Jesus.

The main square in St Petersburg, complete with ice skating rink.





Inside the Hermitage (a huge art museum) was amazing, and warm. We spent most of an afternoon in there and still only saw a fraction of it.





St Petersburg wasn’t as cold as I'd expected, in terms of recorded temperature. It varied between -3 and 2 degrees but the wind chill was rough. It was also quite dirty, there was a thin layer of snow on the ground and this would get covered in a layer of powdery looking black grime. The roads were constantly wet and mucky and all the cars covered in black muck from the road. I did laugh at one old truck with duel wheels that went past, one of the outside wheels was completely wrecked and it didn't look very stable.

The fire in the park was a favorite spot.



Ice swimming in the river anyone? (Yes, that is a river.) We did see someone go in the day before, and I even stole a towel to have a go myself but with a howling wind and driving snow I am not ashamed to say that I chickened out.



Catching pre frozen fish?



The Bronze Horseman



The overnight train from St Petersburg to Moscow was a bit of an experience. we managed to work out which train to get on, and which carriage but had no idea what compartment we were in so slotted into a free one and got kicked out. Eventually we found our correct cabin and moved in with a Russian couple and their 2 year old, who was extremely well behaved but the guy chugged back a beer and smoked a fag and proceed to snore louder than any noise capable of being made by a train. On top of that, we were in the top bunks and roasted, even so we managed to arrive in a reasonable state at 7am after our trip. Fortunately our room was ready at the hotel so we checked in for a much needed shower.

After windy St Petersburg, a calm Moscow at -4 degrees seemed tropical so we shed a couple of layers and ventured out but the wind picked up in the afternoon and we froze again. The local law enforcers didn't help matters when they questioned us about our visas and accused us of not registering our visas. They told us it was extremely illegal and that we'd have to come down to the station and pay a 2,500 ruble fine (about £50). We were pretty annoyed as we were certain that our visas had been registered but we were missing an important slip of paper that proved this. After standing shivering for 10 minutes, going to the station sounded quite appealing, at least we'd be out of the wind but I was called over to be spoken to alone and offered the opportunity to pay the fine on the spot. Fortunately I'd heard of these shenanigans before so called his bluff and told him we'd go to the station, as wouldn't he have to write up a report? After that we were told to go back to the hotel and ensure our visas were registered and didn't have to pay a single kopek, which was a relief but it did shake us up a little. Turns out he was partially right; we did need the slip of paper but couldn't get it as the immigration department was closed.

Statue of Peter the Great



St Basil's cathedral in Red Square



Looking up the river towards the Kremlin



Red Square - St Basils to the left, Lenin's tomb (where you can go in and see him) in the immediate right and the Kremlin walls behind that.



Snow plows waiting for colder weather.



Moscow didn't seem as friendly as St Petersburg, although maybe our impression was distorted by the crooked cop, a jeering man in the markets and a shifty customer at the Metro station with wads of cash doing deals with others in the line. We always had to be on our guard and were warned about pickpockets, in both cities. Nonetheless, the sights were very impressive, the highlight of Moscow was probably The Armory inside the Kremlin which has an incredible stash of gold, silver, diamonds, Faberge eggs and other valuables. (No photos allowed unfortunately.) We wandered around a very rich area of Moscow and even from our short visit it seemed very clear that there was a huge difference between the rich and poor. It is not a place I'd like to be homeless either, although not as bad as the village on the news that lost its heating and regularly gets to -70 degrees.

The Kremlin is home to the biggest bell in the world, which has never been rung so I don't even know if that means it can qualify as a bell.



We managed to sample some of the local food and the highlight was probably the fish soup and the lowlight the random goo and the raw fish in the salad bar. We also gave the vodka a bit of a taste and managed to score a couple of bottles of Ukrainian peppered honey vodka at the airport but had it confiscated at Zurich on the way back as it hadn't come from an EU country which was very disappointing.

As for travel, Londoners will not be surprised to hear that St Petersburg and Moscow both have better underground systems that London - it costs about 23p per ride and we never waited longer than a minute for a train. The St Petersburg metro is the deepest in the world and Moscow was a long way down too. Some of their stations are incredible, the one below is pretty standard but others have won prizes!

A Wintertime Stroll

We took the opportunity to get out of London for the day and did a walk along the river from Leatherhead to Dorking. The river was flooded and some parts of the track were impassable....



but we made it.




Just out of Dorking is England's largest winery (we'd never heard of it), the main building was made out of flint.

Kew Gardens

A relaxing Saturday afternoon wandering round the gardens amongst the leaves.

Fantastic Mr Fox



Pagoda



Kelley and Gabs

Tour de France

Bevan and I took a week off work, packed up his car (the mighty silver bullet) and set off on a tour of France. We had no plans and the only deadlines we had to meet were our ferry crossings. Things didn't start out so well though, I found out the night before that we needed regestration documents, GBP sticker and headlight adjusters for the car but we managed to pick these up before our crossing and were waiting in line with over an hour to spare. However, the silver bullet had other ideas and was reluctant to leave. It was our turn to board and it wouldn't start. We fiddled under the bonnet as all the other cars loaded and as a final desperate act we tried to run start it, fortunately this worked but we weren't allowed on until we had turned off and restarted normally - fortunately this worked as well but as we drove on past a big sign advertising European break down cover its fair to say we were slightly nervous.



The crossing was fairly uneventful, we sailed from Dover to Dunkirk in 2 hours across a very busy Channel, there were boats everywhere. We went exploring round the ship and were escorted of the top floor by someone who didn't believe we hadn't crossed any barriers to get up there.

After a couple of hiccups upon arrival involving a wrong turn that almost took us to Belgium and working out how and where to get fuel, we were finally on the right track, or so we thought until a car was coming straight for us and we realised we were on the wrong side of the road but a quick swerve and a bounce over a traffic island got us on the road to Lille.

The next major issue was to find something for dinner and a place to spend the night. Dinner was solved reasonably easily and after venturing down a couple of back roads we found a good spot to camp, just off the road outside a little village behind a huge pile of what looked like turnips but we later discovered were sugar beets, of which France is the largest producer in the world. The sugar beets hid our tent perfectly from the road and we quickly fell asleep. We were woken abrubtly at 6:30 in the morning by a roar of machienery - a couple of trucks, tractors and a ditch digger had arrived to load out the sugar beet so we stumbled out in the dark, wished a driver 'Bonjour', shoved all our gear in the car and took off.

Sugar beet harvesting



Top quality camping camo....



After a rocky start the rest of our week was somewhat less eventful. The car perforemed its not starting trick once more in the main street of a little town completely surrounded by mountains and we had to run start it again up a slight up hill which was hard work.

Other mishaps included:

- being stopped by French police on the second to last day who didn't understand a word of English so didn't know what we were showing them (licence and registration). Luckily for us they just laughed and sent us on our way.

- our nightly hunt for somewhere to sleep. So often we ran in to signs saying 'Ferme' (which means closed) on the entrance of camping grounds. We managed 5 nights in camping grounds, one in a motel (what a treat that was) and 3 'camping rough'

- a rainy night down south near Sete on the Medeteranian coast. Fortunately we managed to find a camping ground by following a camper van. The tent got pretty wet and despite best efforts it also come up through the groundsheet.

- a freezing night in Chamonix. All the camping grounds were closed which so we were on a grass verge outside the camping ground and it was pretty cold at 1000m.

- a noisy night camping beside a canal. The canal wasn't moving but there were some funny noises including strange chewing noises, splashes and a sound like a duck getting eaten alive - not condusive to a good ight's sleep

We did have some pretty good times too of course. For starters it was great spending a decent period of time with Bevan which is something I hadn't done for a while. We got on pretty well and had relatively few arguments over directions, although we took a lot of wrong turns.

We did do an awful lot of driving which didn't leave a lot of time for other things but we did see a lot of countryside. We didn't go on a single toll road either which meant that we went on some more interesting roads.

The clear highlight for both of us was the gondala ride up to this place:



which was about 1,000m below Mt Blanc and had perfect views of the peak and surrounds. It would have been great to get out on the snow but we really needed crampons and ice axes so we had to settle for the fat American tourist style of sightseeing and go for a walk a bit further down. We did take a lot of photos though.....





Glacier heading down the hill towards Chamonix





Looking toward Chamonix on the way down.



Aiguille Du Midi



Mighty Mt Blanc itself



We had great weather for most of the week, it only rained once although it was quite cold a couple of nights.

Stopping for lunch / drying out the camping gear



Viaduct



We stopped for lunch at this place which was built on a hill and had walls surrounding it.



Dinner by the canal



Grapes in Bordeaux



Military cemetary near Calais



Looking down the Atlantic coast

Berlin

The dreaded weekend had finally arrived, dreaded not because of the company or the location but because of the marathon that Angus and I were running on Sunday and the fact that neither of us were feeling supremely confident given our less than perfect build ups. Nonetheless, it was a good feeling to be leaving work early and boarding the plane to Berlin on Friday evening and an even better feeling when we discovered that Jamie's father had a pretty good grasp of German. After a bit of a shake up through security in Frankfurt we made it to our hotel in Berlin which was right near the airport, so close you could almost watch the planes as they were driven down the road....yes, down the road, whoever said the Germans were efficient wasn't wrong.

The weather wasn't so flash on Saturday so after getting up early to avoid the crowds at marathon registration, Kelley and I got a train out of town and visited the Tropical Rainforest Biodome. This huge ex cargo hanger was home to a few trees, some wildlife, a couple of glorified swimming pools and some mean water slides and it was certainly a lot nicer than being outside, but it was a pretty strange place.







After the greasiest pasta I have ever eaten it was off back to the hotel for an early night to get a good sleep before the race.

Sunday dawned dull and overcast, absolutely perfect running weather. Haile Gebrselassie proved this by winning in a world record time of 2:04:26 - I was a mere minute per km slower which I think I'll be able to make up if my legs grow about 18 inches longer. I was very happy with my race though; I ran the whole race at a very even pace and finished with my best time of 2:47:39. Angus also ran well but faded over the last 5km which he was disappointed about and finished in 3:26. It was good to recognise the familiar faces of Kelley, Jamie and her parents around the course amongst the thousands of others yelling strange stuff in German.

Runners in front of the Reichstag after the marathon



On Sunday night we went out for a well earned German dinner and indulged in a bit of 'beer trading' where the prices of beer were dictated by the demand of the drinkers which was quite funny.

Monday was a slightly brighter day so we wandered slowly around the city, visiting the Reichstag, Potsdamer Platz, the Holocaust memorial, Brandenburg Gate and Checkpoint Charlie before being held up for over an hour on the plane as everyone had to get off and identify their baggage. We were then told that we had been rebooked on the second leg of our flight in the morning but some quick thinking and good luck saw us safely on the plane back to London that night, tired, but pleased to have made the flight.

Remains of a Cathedral in central Berlin, bombed during the war.



Potsdamer Platz



Brandenburg Gate



Checkpoint Charlie