Has anyone been to St. Petersburg Russia?

Jerry Bransford said:
Fucking Russia, we just canceled this trip. šŸ˜­ Hopefully things will settle down within the year so we can rebook it.
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You really want to give them your money after this? I'm sure it's beautiful in really utilitarian ways, but there's a lot more world to see IMO.
 
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rasband said:
You really want to give them your money after this? I'm sure it's beautiful in really utilitarian ways, but there's a lot more world to see IMO.
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For several reasons, yes. St. Petersburg has been a lifetime 'bucket list' item for me. Its' historical content is amazing, especially for those interested in WWII events as I am. The politics of Putin aside, St. Petersburg is a very special city and its museums plus its extremely historical (WWII) concert hall that its symphony orchestra still plays at are tugging at me.

One quick historical note about the St. Petersburg Grand Concert Hall I had tickets to for an evening concert . St. Petersburg was under siege by the Germans during WWII, everyone in the city was literally (!) starving, and 2 of the orchestra musicians even died from starvation in their chairs while playing a special morale concert. During that particular concert and under request by a Russian General, it was played through large loud speakers aimed at the Germans who encircled the city. Its purpose was to let the Germans know they weren't giving up. The Germans admitted later hearing the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra through those speakers hurt their morale and they began to believe they'd never conquer St. Petersburg. They didn't.

Not to mention their WWII museums that even have the rifles used by their snipers to pick off the Germans.

I want to go for the history... and to check it off my bucket list.
 
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I understand most of what you want to see is indoors, but this might be a blessing in disguise. You will have a much better weather situation from mid-June through September. Winter in St. Pete is not pleasant, especially if you're used to SoCal. Hope it works out for you.
 
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Jerry Bransford said:
For several reasons, yes. St. Petersburg has been a lifetime 'bucket list' item for me. Its' historical content is amazing, especially for those interested in WWII events as I am. The politics of Putin aside, St. Petersburg is a very special city and its museums plus its extremely historical (WWII) concert hall that its symphony orchestra still plays at are tugging at me.

One quick historical note about the St. Petersburg Grand Concert Hall I had tickets to for an evening concert . St. Petersburg was under siege by the Germans during WWII, everyone in the city was literally (!) starving, and 2 of the orchestra musicians even died from starvation in their chairs while playing a special morale concert. During that particular concert and under request by a Russian General, it was played through large loud speakers aimed at the Germans who encircled the city. Its purpose was to let the Germans know they weren't giving up. The Germans admitted later hearing the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra through those speakers hurt their morale and they began to believe they'd never conquer St. Petersburg. They didn't.

Not to mention their WWII museums that even have the rifles used by their snipers to pick off the Germans.

I want to go for the history... and to check it off my bucket list.
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I know someone from Russia and my boss went a couple years back and from their travels and living there:
DO NOT BRING ANY JEWELRY YOU'RE NOT ACTIVELY WEARING AT ALL TIMES, IT WILL BE STOLEN.
That's all I got.
 
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Dr. Internet said:
I understand most of what you want to see is indoors, but this might be a blessing in disguise. You will have a much better weather situation from mid-June through September. Winter in St. Pete is not pleasant, especially if you're used to SoCal. Hope it works out for you.
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True, and we expected colder weather in mid-May when we were scheduled. But not THAT cold. We chose our date because 1) lines are shorter for the majority of tourist attractions in St. Petersburg and 2) due to the concert schedule of their symphony orchestra. One of the cruises were choosing from would be there during an especially good concert. We learned it's really crowded there during the summer so May was our choice for those couple reasons.
 
Jerry Bransford said:
For several reasons, yes. St. Petersburg has been a lifetime 'bucket list' item for me. Its' historical content is amazing, especially for those interested in WWII events as I am. The politics of Putin aside, St. Petersburg is a very special city and its museums plus its extremely historical (WWII) concert hall that its symphony orchestra still plays at are tugging at me.

One quick historical note about the St. Petersburg Grand Concert Hall I had tickets to for an evening concert . St. Petersburg was under siege by the Germans during WWII, everyone in the city was literally (!) starving, and 2 of the orchestra musicians even died from starvation in their chairs while playing a special morale concert. During that particular concert and under request by a Russian General, it was played through large loud speakers aimed at the Germans who encircled the city. Its purpose was to let the Germans know they weren't giving up. The Germans admitted later hearing the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra through those speakers hurt their morale and they began to believe they'd never conquer St. Petersburg. They didn't.

Not to mention their WWII museums that even have the rifles used by their snipers to pick off the Germans.

I want to go for the history... and to check it off my bucket list.
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that is really cool stuff. I can see why you'd want to go. I feel like I know more history than the average man in my generation, but still less than I should. It helps to interest me when I can physically go there. I retained more knowledge of the Pearl Harbor attack by spending 3 hours there than I did in all the instruction I got in school.
 
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Jerry Bransford said:
For several reasons, yes. St. Petersburg has been a lifetime 'bucket list' item for me. Its' historical content is amazing, especially for those interested in WWII events as I am. The politics of Putin aside, St. Petersburg is a very special city and its museums plus its extremely historical (WWII) concert hall that its symphony orchestra still plays at are tugging at me.

One quick historical note about the St. Petersburg Grand Concert Hall I had tickets to for an evening concert . St. Petersburg was under siege by the Germans during WWII, everyone in the city was literally (!) starving, and 2 of the orchestra musicians even died from starvation in their chairs while playing a special morale concert. During that particular concert and under request by a Russian General, it was played through large loud speakers aimed at the Germans who encircled the city. Its purpose was to let the Germans know they weren't giving up. The Germans admitted later hearing the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra through those speakers hurt their morale and they began to believe they'd never conquer St. Petersburg. They didn't.

Not to mention their WWII museums that even have the rifles used by their snipers to pick off the Germans.

I want to go for the history... and to check it off my bucket list.
Click to expand...
As much as I hate the Russian government, I canā€™t fault you here. There is a lot there I would love to see from a historical perspective.

I really love the Boroque architecture that is so common throughout Russia.
 
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Tray Burge said:
I know someone from Russia and my boss went a couple years back and from their travels and living there:
DO NOT BRING ANY JEWELRY YOU'RE NOT ACTIVELY WEARING AT ALL TIMES, IT WILL BE STOLEN.
That's all I got.
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My cousins have been there a few times, along with Turkey, Poland, Czec Republic and numerous countries in that area.
They never bring anything of value. It will get stolen.
 
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oldjeepman said:
Jerry , You should look at Rick Steves travel site. Theres a episode on St Petersburg..
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I'm not sure that I've missed any of the St. Petersburg travel videos, there are sure a lot of them and I think I've seen them all. I like the "less professional" ones, those from regular folks who visited... and many of the less professional videos are still very good good quality. Some travel videos are a little over the top/overproduced.
 
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Morning,

I often go to Europe to work for months at a time. Iā€™ve lived in Sarajevo for a year total, Kyiv for 6 months and in Riga a month. Been to Croatia, Serbia, and of course Stuttgart, Germany. My favorite has been Sarajevo then Kyiv. I have made friends in both and sometimes talk to those in Kyiv still wishing them good luck and hopefully they are staying safe. It broke my heart and pissed me off when I saw Russia invade. They are a strong people and will hopefully be relentless in their fight. My favorite part of all the countries Iā€™ve been to, is they have a certain pride in their country that some people here seem to lack in the US.
I know Russia has a lot of history but Europe in general is so rich with it. Even if youā€™d visit other European Nations, you would not be disappointed.
 
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Jamesval035 said:
Morning,

I often go to Europe to work for months at a time. Iā€™ve lived in Sarajevo for a year total, Kyiv for 6 months and in Riga a month. Been to Croatia, Serbia, and of course Stuttgart, Germany. My favorite has been Sarajevo then Kyiv. I have made friends in both and sometimes talk to those in Kyiv still wishing them good luck and hopefully they are staying safe. It broke my heart and pissed me off when I saw Russia invade. They are a strong people and will hopefully be relentless in their fight. My favorite part of all the countries Iā€™ve been to, is they have a certain pride in their country that some people here seem to lack in the US.
I know Russia has a lot of history but Europe in general is so rich with it. Even if youā€™d visit other European Nations, you would not be disappointed.
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Absolutely. However, we have visited a dozen European countries so this time it was time for St. Petersburg. Especially due to my love (I'm a former musician) for composers like Russian composer Rimsky-Korsakov who wrote a wonderful piece called Scheherazade. That piece was made famous by the St. Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra who plays in that hundred year old Great Hall we had tickets to see a concert in. The history of all that, especially the piece called Scheherazade, is amazing. I'll sometimes play it after my wife goes to bed, it's quite a wonderful piece from a story dating back to the 14th-15th centuries. Tales of 1001 Arabian Nights and all that. For those who have a love for music, search out and listen to Scheherazade... it's pretty amazing.
 
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That story does sound really fascinating. I always get these types of jeopardy questions wrong when I play and I always chalk it up to a loss. Lol. Anyway, hopefully you do get to eventually get there. Š£Š“Š°Ń‡Šø!
 
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Jamesval035 said:
That story does sound really fascinating. I always get these types of jeopardy questions wrong when I play and I always chalk it up to a loss. Lol.
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Here's the short version of Scheherazade ...

Scheherazade was the legendary Persian queen who was the story teller behind the Tales of One Thousand and One Nights.

The story, which was written many hundreds of years ago, tells of Arabian king Shahryar who married a young girl every night. At the end of every night he would send his new wife to have her head chopped off. He had already killed 3000 women in this way. He did this out of anger after his first wife was unfaithful to him which made him think all women were like that.

Then, one day, Scheherazade heard about the king from her father who was the king's assistant. She said she wanted to marry him to stop the deaths of the village's young beautiful maidens. Her father disagreed, but she still married the king. She spent all of their first night telling him a story. At the end of the night she stopped the story at an exciting moment. The king wanted to hear the end of the story, but Scheherazade said he would have to wait until the next night to hear the rest so he did not have her executed.

The next night she finished the story and began another one, which she again stopped when it was dawn. The king had to wait another night to hear the rest of the story. Scheherazade kept this up for 1001 nights. She told him 1001 stories. In the end the king had fallen in love with Scheherazade and they already had three children, so he did not have her executed.

There are a lot of great ancient tales in 1001 Arabian Nights. The musical piece Flight of the Bumblebee is from one of those tales.
 
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