We crossed the Iron Curtain to St Petersburg

Not cycling, but this had to be done as Jeanette had wanted to go to St Petersburg for a long time, bucket list. Its a shame that we did not get to see a performance of Swan Lake while we were there to top it off for her.
I had many misconceptions of Russia. This trip blew most of them away. I will not go into details about Russia because we were only there for 3 days in great weather and in holiday time. I am not big on visiting cities anymore, how many museums and art galleries can one take in in one lifetime, really? 
I will add that we had a great Airbnb in the heart of the old town. It is on the 4th floor of a very old rundown building (as most are). They had sent us a good little pictogram of how to get around the back to the entry through a dingy alley/porte to a large untidy courtyard with grass and trees. The entrance to the staircase for our apartment stairs is a plain sheet steel door into a Victorian or earlier stairwell.

This pic is one floor down from our apartment with the entry below the camera.

Any how I am going into too much detail. Young Artem met us with his lovely laid back relaxed  Russian nature. The room we had in the apartment he shares with his lady Lera is totally charming. If you were going to have an apartment in an ancient rambling old building in an old part of a historical city that was unique and charming this is it. We loved it to bits.

Then the bike trip with Elenka, a local St Peterburgh girl historian and journalist. We spent 4 hours roaming the quieter (and not so) streets taking in the many golden palaces and sights of interest in the old city. 

Here is one of the many golden spired palaces to god, and to/for royalty of the Russian Tsars. The opulence of their lifestyle is grotesque, no wonder there was a revolution. Its a pity that it did not turn out better for the normal Russian people after the October revolution.

Here are some revolutionary scars on a grand old building, can you imagine a cold October day with the Bolsheviks being machine gunned by the kings soldiers. Ice & snow on the ground maybe some blood staining the snow.

Would I recommend St Petersburgh? absolutely! Russia? perhaps a bit of Russian would help? I would love to travel more acrosss to the east. In Stockholm there are lots of faces from all over the world, in St Petersburgh there are lots of ethnic faces from all over Russia. This gives me an itch to visit where they came from, Siberia, the Ural mountains, the desert Stan's in the south, Georgia? Russia is massive and still a bit secretive but more open than before, so much world so little time! Sigh.