Saturday 6th September.
Quickest hotel check out of all
time. Handed over the key card and room number card to the young man at the
desk who said "Goodbye" When I hesitated he just said "Goodbye
" again. So I left. Got the metro to Komsomolskaya station for the Leningrad station.
The High Speed "Sapsan"
train comes into the platform about 40 minutes before departure and it takes a
while to get on since the attendant scans every ticket and checks it against
the passport for every passenger. I see one couple with a young child having to
show a birth certificate.
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| The Sapsan Train at Leningrad Station, Moscow |
We leave on time at 1330. Unlike the Chinese train, there is no indicator to tell us how fast we are going but it feels faster
because we are following the normal tracks rather than on a dedicated line so
the platforms at small stations and all the usual trackside paraphernalia whiz
by. Amazingly I can see footpaths crossing over the track! Go to the restaurant car and have a bite to eat,
cheese and ham pancakes, and a coffee.
The food comes in a pre-packaged packet but the microwave has done its job and
it is piping hot. There are several intermediate stations where the pre
recorded announcement in Russian and English warns that the train will stop for
just one minute. And it does! Pleased to hear the English announcement greeting
us as "Dear passengers". Can't see that happening on British trains
any time soon. Still lots of forest but many more settlements. Also something I
have not seen before, masses of what
look like garden sheds. What are they used for? The photo opportunity for "50
Sheds of Grey" shot past before I could catch it. Most of the others were
brown. Precisely at 1800 we glided into
the Moscow Station in St Petersburg .
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| Moscow Station in St Petersburg |
According to the Red Star hotel information, I can get a 22 bus from across the road from
the station. Get the bus, pay the conductor 25 roubles and carefully follow the
route we are following on the map I copied last night. Then it stops. The bus
driver and conductor get off for a smoke but other people get on so I assume we
will continue after the smoking break. We do but the conductor says something
to me that I soon learn means "we are going back the way we came".
Get off at the next stop and walk back to the smoking point. Next No 22 a few minutes later also does a turn round.
Reckon I am not that far to the hotel and walk it. Later learnt that some 22
buses do go all the way but bypass the stop where some of them turn round; so I
would have waited for ever at that bus stop. Once at the Red Star a very
helpful and fluent in English receptionist checks me in. Confess I never have
much faith in on-line bookings unless I have a piece of paper in my hand but it
all works and a few minutes later I am
in the room. Red Star is anything but bland. Graffiti-like murals cover all the
corridors and the room lives up to the "red" part of the name. Each
floor has a city theme. I am on Floor 3
which is Tokyo ,
so all the murals are anime type characters. Floor 2 is Rio de Janeiro ,
Floor 4 is London
and Floor 5 is New York .
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| The Red Star Lives up to its Name |
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| Anime Characters outside my door |
That looks a fantastic hotel! I once stayed in St Pete's at the Grand Hotel Europa on a special weekend deal. The only hotel I have ever stayed at where there was real caviar for breakfast, as well as a colossal display of smoked fish, cold meats, fruit, etc; and a man at the end of the room sitting on a chair and playing a classical guitar. I assumed he was supplied by the hotel.
ReplyDeleteNyevskiiy Prospekt used to have some trolleybus-trains (one towing another) which looked rather exciting (I think they had the driver in the front one), but I never managed to travel in them.
I was there in the summer, just after the "white nights" but soon enough after that it never got dark.
Did you have to get a non-standard Russian visa for your journey? My multi-entry business visas allowed me to visit only three cities (Moscow, St Pete's and -- strangely enough -- London). There was also a space for "number of accompanying children" with boxes for 1, 2, 3, etc but no box for "no children".
The Red Star Hotel was great except for the location, far from any metro station or tram routes. The No 22 bus ran quite close and was good for going into the centre from the hotel but not so good going back since it didn't always got the full distance. There were minibuses too but I didn't try them.
DeleteAs for the visa I had to list all the cities I planned to visit and identify accommodation in each but I didn't have to book in advance and in practice didn't always use the hotels I had specified. Real Russia booked my long distance train tickets and provided me with the letter of invitation which is needed for the visa. .
Hotel interior not at all what I'd have imagined in St Petersburg or indeed in Russia. Hope the city is as 'pretty' as I remember with its glorious Baroque buildings.
ReplyDeleteTrip Advisor did comment on the interior so I wasn't too surprised. Yes St Petersburg is still stunning!
DeleteRegarding Russian Visas although you need an official invitation and need to specify an itinerary, the visa itself no longer states specific places as it used to do in Soviet times. I think Russia uses visas as a negotiating tool rather than to track foreigners. Claudio, who I met on the train in Beijing, comes from Chile and didn't need any visa at all. Same for several other Latin American countries. .
ReplyDelete