Day 1:
We arrived at St. Petersburg around noon on our flight from Brussels. After an uneventful immigration check, we took airport taxi to our hotel (Staybridge Suites St. Petersburg).
After freshening up, we took the metro from Moskovskie Vorota Metro stop (Line M2) near our hotel to Nevsky Prospekt (Line M2).
Nevsky Prospekt is the main street of St. Petersburg. Its crowded and quite touristy.
We passed by the Kazan Cathedral and then walked along the channel embankment to Church of the Savior on Blood.
The Church of Savior on Blood is quintessential Russian architecture with onion domes.
After paying 250 Rub entry fee per person, we went inside to explore.
There are numerous interesting mosaic work inside the church as well as the notable spot where Emperor Alexander II was assassinated.
After spending about an hour inside the Church we walked back to Nevsky Prospekt. It was getting time for dinner and we walked to a Russian fast food chain restaurant named Teremok. All of us tried Blini (thin Russian pancakes) with tasty fillings and I also had some Borscht (Russian style Beet soup) with meat.
After dinner my parents decided to go back to hotel while we continued our sightseeing.
We walked from Nevsky Prospekt to Palace Square, home of the world famous Hermitage Museum. It was quite late at night (close to midnight) and there are lots of people out on the streets. It wasn’t quite “white nights” season yet but we got the hint of the festive atmosphere during that time.
After walking around for a couple of hours we took a cab back to the hotel. I must mention that we used cabs heavily in Russia. The prices are extremely affordable (bordering on really cheap compared to US) and we used the Yandex.taxi app for all our bookings.
Day 2:
Early morning after breakfast we took a cab to Palace Square. Palace Square houses the world famous Hermitage Museum and although we were not in the mood to spend half a day at a museum, we still wanted to check out the square.
The weather was very cold that day with extreme windchill. We quickly walked towards St. Isaac’s square.
The line in front of the St. Isaac’s cathedral was about 20 minutes long as the tour buses had started to arrive by now. Tickets were 350 Rubles/person.
The interior of the St. Isaac’s Cathedral is very impressive and not to be missed. There are a lot of amazing mosaic artwork pieces inside as well as very beautiful paintings.
After spending about an hour inside the cathedral we had lunch at another Teremok restaurant. This time I tried a blini with Salmon roe filling along with a generous helping of Borscht soup with meat.
In the afternoon we walked around Nevsky Prospekt and walked over to Palace Square again.
Day 3:
This was our last day in St. Petersburg and the only attraction on the itinerary was Peterhof Palace. There are many ways to reach Peterhof from St. Petersburg but the quickest and most convenient (and pricy) is the hydrofoil trip to Peterhof. There are various companies providing this service and we used AstraMarine company that operates the Peterhof Express departing from Admiralty embankment, 2 (“Pier with lions”).
On our way to Peterhof Palace we passed by Lakhta center, the tallest building of Europe.
Entrance tickets to Peterhof Palace is 1000 Rubles/person. We were only planning to see the lower gardens and Grand Cascade.
After spending about 3 hours in the lower gardens we walked back to the pier to take the hydrofoil back to St. Petersburg. After reaching St. Petersburg it was getting time for our train to Moscow so we took a cab to Moskovsky railway station.
The Sapsan train took less than 4 hours traveling from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Although we were not too impressed with the meal choices, the convenience and pricing is very hard to beat.