Saturday – 23 June 2007

Another rest day. Up at noon and around 2 pm we took the metro to Alexander Nevsky Monastery where they have the tombs of famous Russian artists. The metro was interesting as it is supposedly the deepest in the world. The escalators taking you down into the depths keep going, going, going. The other interesting bit was that the rails are hidden. One sees doors ala Star Trek and you enter directly into the train. No problem with someone falling onto the tracks here.

Otherwise it is about a 5 mile walk

Click here for photos of the tombs

Ticket to graveyards shows silhouette of statue by the Metro of Alexander Nevsky

We got back around 5 pm and found a kiosk with Bliny. Bliny is another russian treat which seems pretty similar to crepes and the Hungarian palachinta I grew up with. English translation: pancakes. I had mine with dry cottage cheese while Earl had his with hotdogs (huh?).

We then hunted up the palace where another concert was taking place. I had found the ad in English at the last concert we attended.

It turned out to be in the military academy complex which took over an old palace..

Earl concluded just being able to go into the complex was worth the price of the $6 ticket

The church had been built by Paul I (Catherine II’s short-lived husband) and had very nice acoustics for the tenor that sang.

I didn’t recognize most of the pieces except for Bach’s Toccata and Fugue. Later I heard from Earl that the tenor had sung extra pieces. No wonder I couldn’t follow the playbill.

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