Jeppson's World Tour: New Year's 2015 part 1

Dec 29

Chris had to go to St. Petersburg for 12 days over the New Year holiday so, they offered to put up the whole family so that we wouldn't have to be separated. So, of course we jumped on that. Dalton and Seth had never been there before. True to our cheap nature, we took the metro to the train station with all of our luggage, rather than take a taxi. It was a bit awkward but, so much more affordable. Hee hee.

This is the train we took. It is called Sapsan which is Russian for peregrine falcon, the fastest of all the falcons. It gets you from Moscow to St. Petersburg in approximately 4 hours. It is around 800 kilometers (500 miles) in distance and the train travels at a maximum speed of 250 kph (155mph). This is the much preferred form of travel. There is a night train that you can board at night, sleep, and then wake up in the morning and you are there. It goes much slower and makes more stops along the way. Of course the Sapsan is more money but, we felt we could afford it since we took the metro instead of a taxi. (Hahaha) Actually we took it cause I have a hard time sleeping on gross Russian train mattresses...

With 5 of us, only 4 of us fit around a table so, Chris got to sit with some other people. He loved it, at least he acted like he did.

After about 3 1/2 hours, the troops started to get restless.

St. Petersburg train station.

Our first night we stayed in the Consulate General's residence. (For each country we get an embassy (usually in the capitol city). An embassy is there to serve their citizens who are living abroad. It is also there to form good relations with the host country, it issues visas to those wishing to travel to the US and such. If an American citizen in Russia gets in trouble, they contact the embassy. So, Russia is a pretty big country. It is very inconvenient for those trying to get visas and for our citizens to get to Moscow. Thus, we have mini embassies or consulates throughout the country. We have 3 consulates in Russia, St. Petersburg, Vladivostok, and Ekaterinburg. Russia has 5 in the US, Seattle, San Francisco, Houston, and New York.) So, at each consulate, there is a Consulate General (the "ambassador" of the consulate). The Consulate Generals all answer to the Ambassador who is stationed at the embassy. St. Pete is in between Consulate Generals right now and so the residence is vacant. They put us there for 5 nights, we stayed 1. It was big and empty. There were also guards etc that were in and out of the place which was a bit unsettling for all of us. So, we moved to one of the consulates apartments. The guy who Chris was there covering for let us stay in their apartment while they were in Germany. We liked it much better.

The yellow building on the right is the Consulate General's residence.

Main entry

Biggest book we have ever seen!

This was early on in the game, you can tell cause they are both still smiling.

Amazing detail throughout the entire place.

BEAUTIFUL grand piano

John Adams room. Back in the day when John Adams was the president, St. Petersburg was the capitol and the embassy was located here. This is the room he would stay in when he would come to visit. They have tried to keep it as it was when he stayed there. I was tempted to sleep in it just to say that I did but, I'm pretty sure the guards would have not allowed it. And let's be honest, any time I am somewhere where there are guards, I am usually on my best behavior.

The window pictured below is the window in the middle of this picture, by the corner of the wall.

Original window from when John Adams stayed here.

All the detail on this is inlay. Crazy amazing detail!

Dec 30th
Chris had to spend the morning at work so the boys and I ventured out and saw some things on our own before Chris met up with us.

St. Isaac's Cathedral.
This is the largest orthodox basilica and the 4th largest cathedral in the world. It is dedicated to St. Isaac of Dalmatia, a patron saint of Peter the Great. It took 40 years to construct. During WWII the dome was painted grey to help hide it from enemy fire. During the Soviet Union, the church was turned into a museum. It presently only holds religious services in a small portion of the church. The rest is still a museum.