After much deliberation (as usual), we decided to go to Russia- Moscow & St. Petersburg, in the summer of 2018.
Russia wasn’t, as I expected, cold and grey. It was in fact really bright (think 10 pm sunsets in Moscow, 1 am in St. Petersburg), colourful, and bustling with tourists, especially due to the upcoming FIFA World Cup, which was to be hosted in Moscow.
This post is meant to be a sort of photo journal of my strongest memories from the trip. It isn’t a travel guide or such. (If you’re into suggestions and information, a good place to visit would be my mother’s Facebook page, Journeys Imagined, where she thoroughly documents all our trips.)
Day One
A walk around the red square at twilight
Day Two
The Kremlin, The Bolshoi Theatre, St. Basil’s Cathedral, Ivan the Great Bell Tower

Day Three
A quiet day spent in a wood on the outskirts of Moscow, with friends
Day Four
Ismailov flea market & a boat ride on the Moskva
The next day we flew up north to St. Petersburg
Day Five
St. Isaac’s Cathedral
Day Six
The Hermitage Museum, lunch at Kazan Mangal- a Georgian restaurant, Kazan Cathedral, Church of the Saviour on Blood, walking along the canal & grocery shopping on Nevsky Prospekt
Hermitage was beautiful and extremely opulent, which led to us getting rather satiated after visiting only a few rooms.
Lunch at Kazan Mangal (“Mangal” means barbecue in Georgian)
Kazan Cathedral & Nevsky Prospekt, the main street in St. Petersburg. The photo of Nevsky was taken at around 9 pm.
Church of the Saviour on Blood
Day Seven
Peterhof Palace
Day eight
Peter & Paul Fortress & museums within the complex
My favourite within the complex, the Museum of Cosmonautics & Rocket Technology
The Museum of Space Exploration housed an amazing amount of history, including recreations of the offices of several Soviet rocket scientists, newspapers announcing the first successful human spaceflight, vintage photos, rocket parts, Yuri Gagarin memorabilia and more.
The following day we took another flight back to Moscow.
Day Nine
The same evening, we went to a friend’s country house for dinner
Day Ten
The Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts, The Gallery of 19th & 20th Century European & American Art, Gorky Park.
Pushkin & the Gallery of 19th & 20th Century European & American Art had a simply overwhelming collection of famous artwork, including Van Gogh, Monet, Cezanne, Rodin, Renoir, Gaugin, Picasso, Degas, Matisse, Rembrandt, even a sketch by Leonardo Da Vinci, & tonnes more. I’ve obviously not included all here, but you can see more of it on my instagram, under the highlight “exhibitions etc”.
Degas’s famous ballerinas

On our last day in Russia we visited the traditional ceramic factory in the village of Gzhel, where we were given a tour and shown the process. We even attended a pottery painting workshop.
Final sights from Moscow
It looks like you had quite the summer—beautiful photos!
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Thank you!
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Beautiful tour Sarah
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thanks! 🙂
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Beautiful pictures. You are obviously talented young girl. Keep the creative juices flowing.
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thank you
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That was an amazing tour of Russia for the initiated. Beautiful pics.
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Lovely post. The painting’s and art is stunning.
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