July 30, 2013
July 30, 2013
Today is a free day for us in Moscow. Aimee and I decide to do some exploring using the Metro system. For an English speaker it is a little intimidating. We are the only ones in our tour group attempting it. Moscow being the largest city in Europe has a huge complicated network. I need to constantly pull out my reading glasses to even read the station names on the map. And unfortunately it is all in Cyrillic. Even though I try translating for fun, it is not really necessary. You only need to match the Cyrillic letters at the stations to those on the map.
We take the Metro to Novodevichy Convent. It is a very old walled compound. It looks like the Kremlin fortress only smaller and white instead of red. It is supposed to be closed on Tuesdays but we find it open anyway. It must be still in use as we come across a few nuns and priests. We mostly walk around the grounds peeking in a couple churches. Aimee enjoys the visit because it played a part in the book she recently read about Czar Peter the Great. He made his half-sister take the vows here after he discovered her plotting against him. He hanged her co-conspirators outside her window. The convent also has a special exhibition with a film on the Soviet destruction of churches during Stalin times. It was a sad period of Russian history.
Leaving the convent grounds we walked around a nearby lake that had beautiful views of the convent walls and the golden domes of its churches. Tchaikovsky lived nearby and this lake was supposed to be the inspiration for his Swan Lake ballet. We ate our sack lunch soaking up this idyllic view.
Adjoining the convent is a cemetery that is famous for containing the graves of Moscow's elite, like Yeltsin and Khrushchev. We are not interested in seeing their graves so much as seeing the style of gravestones. Most are decorated with some expensive statuary of the deceased. It would be deemed overtly egotistical in America, but apparently common in the land where everybody was equal. Well, there are always some that are more equal than others. One of the many hypocrisies of Socialism.
From Novodevichy, we traveled to Poklonnaya Hill. It is the highest point in Moscow and provides the best views of the city. It is also the location of Victory Park, a huge expanse and obelisk dedicated to Russia's victory over Hitler in WWII. There is also a museum about this Great Patriotic War but Aimee nixes seeing it.
Nearby in the middle of the street is a Triumphal Arch dedicated to Russia's defeat of Napoleon in 1812. Down the street is the Borodino Museum about the war. We go through it primarily because I learned about it watching the movie, War and Peace, a couple weeks ago. The highlight is a huge circular panorama painting of the battle. When Napoleon attacked, the Russian army kept retreating and burning fields as they went. The Russians finally made a stand at Borodino just west of Moscow. It was a bloody draw and the Russians retreated again. Napoleon entered Moscow in triumph just before the Russians burned it to the ground. Napoleon was stuck. He couldn't stay in Moscow with no food or shelter. As he trudged home in the cold, the Russians picked his army apart. The Russians followed all the way to Paris.
Our feet are tired from all the walking so we head back to the hotel to rest. Tonight we have a farewell dinner with our tour group where we say goodbye to our travel mates.
Today is a free day for us in Moscow. Aimee and I decide to do some exploring using the Metro system. For an English speaker it is a little intimidating. We are the only ones in our tour group attempting it. Moscow being the largest city in Europe has a huge complicated network. I need to constantly pull out my reading glasses to even read the station names on the map. And unfortunately it is all in Cyrillic. Even though I try translating for fun, it is not really necessary. You only need to match the Cyrillic letters at the stations to those on the map.
We take the Metro to Novodevichy Convent. It is a very old walled compound. It looks like the Kremlin fortress only smaller and white instead of red. It is supposed to be closed on Tuesdays but we find it open anyway. It must be still in use as we come across a few nuns and priests. We mostly walk around the grounds peeking in a couple churches. Aimee enjoys the visit because it played a part in the book she recently read about Czar Peter the Great. He made his half-sister take the vows here after he discovered her plotting against him. He hanged her co-conspirators outside her window. The convent also has a special exhibition with a film on the Soviet destruction of churches during Stalin times. It was a sad period of Russian history. Leaving the convent grounds we walked around a nearby lake that had beautiful views of the convent walls and the golden domes of its churches. Tchaikovsky lived nearby and this lake was supposed to be the inspiration for his Swan Lake ballet. We ate our sack lunch soaking up this idyllic view.
Adjoining the convent is a cemetery that is famous for containing the graves of Moscow's elite, like Yeltsin and Khrushchev. We are not interested in seeing their graves so much as seeing the style of gravestones. Most are decorated with some expensive statuary of the deceased. It would be deemed overtly egotistical in America, but apparently common in the land where everybody was equal. Well, there are always some that are more equal than others. One of the many hypocrisies of Socialism.From Novodevichy, we traveled to Poklonnaya Hill. It is the highest point in Moscow and provides the best views of the city. It is also the location of Victory Park, a huge expanse and obelisk dedicated to Russia's victory over Hitler in WWII. There is also a museum about this Great Patriotic War but Aimee nixes seeing it.
Nearby in the middle of the street is a Triumphal Arch dedicated to Russia's defeat of Napoleon in 1812. Down the street is the Borodino Museum about the war. We go through it primarily because I learned about it watching the movie, War and Peace, a couple weeks ago. The highlight is a huge circular panorama painting of the battle. When Napoleon attacked, the Russian army kept retreating and burning fields as they went. The Russians finally made a stand at Borodino just west of Moscow. It was a bloody draw and the Russians retreated again. Napoleon entered Moscow in triumph just before the Russians burned it to the ground. Napoleon was stuck. He couldn't stay in Moscow with no food or shelter. As he trudged home in the cold, the Russians picked his army apart. The Russians followed all the way to Paris.Our feet are tired from all the walking so we head back to the hotel to rest. Tonight we have a farewell dinner with our tour group where we say goodbye to our travel mates.
posted by Mike and Aimee at 11:43 PM
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