St Petersburg, Part 3

We continued our intensive sightseeing the following day. The destination was the Peter-and-Paul Tower, which is sort of similar to the Tower of London in its structure and purposes, even though the architectural style is completely different. This structure, located on what is called the Hare Island, was actually the first building in St. Petersburg and is considered the site where the city was founded by Peter the Great. It used to be a military/defensive structure, the site of the first church, a prison, and the site of the first Mint, which is still functioning in some capacity. Every building there is a museum, spanning the history of the Tower, the city itself, and Russian monarchy. A particularly interesting one was an Air and Space Museum---very interesting to see clippings from newspapers when Yuri Gagarin did his flight around the Earth in space (Yes, Russia was the first country to send the man into out space, despite what the US textbooks will tell you). The church is quite unique also---it is actually the burial site of most Russian monarchs, including Peter the Great and the last Russian tzar and his family.


In the evening, we took a boat tour around the city's numerous canals. St. Petersburg is actually build on a man-mind island, amidst swamps and marshes, and on the banks of the Neva River. Besides, its particular geographic location allows it to have the "white nights" (nights when it never gets dark) and long light evenings. The boat ride took us around some of the more historic areas of the city, even though there is hardly a building in the vicinity of the downtown that was not at one point a home to a famous poet, painter, musician, writer, or a member of Russian nobility.

The last stop of the day was actually just a few blocks from where my brother lives---a site of this incredibly beautiful Cathedral and the adjacent building that serves as the seat of the mayor of St Petersburg. This group of building actually played a prominent role in the Russian revolution. It used to be a prestigious boarding school for the daughters of Russian nobility, but was overtaken by Lenin and his posse on the eve of the revolution---it is from this building that all the main decisions were made during the final hours of the pre-communist Russia.