Meet me in Saint Petersburg (August 31 - Sept 8)

This year my very brave parents decided to close their eyes, hold their breath, join hands, hope for the best and make their first trip to Russia. After hearing so much (much more than they ever wanted to know, perhaps) about my travel here for more than 4 years now, they decided to check it out. Although I have yet to convince them to visit Siberia or the Far East, Mom and Dad did come to Saint Petersburg for the first week of September. This first picture is my mom and dad on the Catherine Canal (from Nevsky Prospect, Petersburg's largest -- and quite famous -- downtown thoroughfare.)

Petersburg was the first place I ever visited in Russia; I lived there for a month in July of 2003, but haven't been back since. I still learned plenty of new things for myself this time around. One of the coolest things was my parents' interest in the siege of Leningrad (1941-1944), so this time I learned a lot about the city during the years of WWII, the colossal efforts that must have been taken to restore it since then, and more.


Despite knowing no Russian or the Cyrillic alphabet, my parents did learn to recognize words like "coffee house," "restaurant," and, of course, "McDonalds" (something they wouldn't see in Vladivostok) by the end of the trip. Overall they deserve quite the kudos for trying to learn more about strange and overwhelming country that their daughter is for some reason fascinated by. My dad was even reading War and Peace on the plane ride over! And, after surviving the Petersburg metro several times, hopefully they now feel ready to take on anything.

Also, this blog entry is made possible by the photography skills of my mother. Thank you for being the photographer, Mom!

This is something else I did not do in Petersburg my first time around -- get my picture taken with Peter and Catherine the Great! Peter the Great was tsar of Russia from 1682-1725, and he founded St Petersburg and moved the capital of Russia there (from Moscow) in 1703. The capital stayed in St Petersburg until 1918, when the Bolsheviks moved it back to Moscow. Catherine the Great ruled Russia from 1762-1796. While Peter won Russia a northern port, St Petersburg, on the Baltic, Catherine won the country a southern port, Odessa, on the Black Sea. Ports of course were very important to Russia's development -- it's no fun being land-locked. There are Peter and Catherine the Greats all over St Petersburg and the palaces on the outskirts, just waiting to take their picture with tourists (for a $4 fee).


St Petersburg is a city of palaces. Tsars' palaces, people richer than the tsars' palaces, you name it. Above is St Petersburg's first palace -- inside is preserved the wooden house where Peter the Great lived when the city was being built. Peter didn't really like big stuff. All the palaces he built for himself were pretty little.

And on a more grandiose scale... This is the Winter Palace and Hermitage Museum, picture taken from Palace Square, where Nevsky Prospect ends. The 4 palaces of the Winter Palace (this is just a view of the most famous one) were built in the mid-1700s. The Winter Palace was the winter residence of the tsars. Obviously, they gave themselves a little upgrade over Peter's modest digs. Today you can go inside the Winter Palace, but you can't see what the tsars' rooms looked like -- the Bolsheviks weren't really too big on preserving that stuff. Instead you can tour the Hermitage, one of the world's largest art museums. The collection was started by Catherine the Great, and initially was a private collection of the tsars. Today the Hermitage has over 3 million pieces of art -- you could literally spend a lifetime there -- including 2 Leonardo da Vincis, Raphaels, many Rembrandts, etc. The interiors of the Hermitage alone are quite unreal and extravagant. Perhaps my mom will post a picture of them in the comments section :-).

This is the Aleksandr Column, in Palace Square in front of the Hermitage/Winter Palace. It commemorates Russia's victory over Napoleon in 1812, during the Napoleonic Wars. (Aleksandr I was tsar at the time.) At the top an angel is crushing a snake with her cross. (You guessed it -- Napoleon is the snake.) This column has no foundation and rests on its own weight.

Here's another snake-crushing monument. (The dudes in front are part of one of numerous wedding parties.) This is a monument to Peter the Great called the Bronze Horseman, since made very famous in a poem of the same name by Russia's greatest writer, Aleksandr Pushkin. As my dad astutely observed, the back hoof of the horse is also crushing a snake. However, this snake is not Napoleon but the Swedish king Charles XII, whom Peter defeated in the Great Northern War to win the territory that includes St Petersburg.

In the summer the tsars got away from their drab living in St Petersburg and the Winter Palace and went out to the suburbs. This is me and my mom in front of part of the main fountain cascade at Peterhof, the construction of which was started by Peter the Great in the early 1700s. Peterhof is on the Gulf of Finland, 20 km from St Petersburg. Peter may have abandoned his modest principles *just a little* when he went to build this palace and particularly the beautiful grounds, meant to rival Versailles. There is quite a lot of gold and many amazing fountains here, and it is difficult to imagine a place being more extravagant, although I suppose we'll just have to go to Versailles to compare. Like all the tsars' suburban palaces, Peterhof was occupied by the Germans in WWII, and much of the grounds and palace interiors were destroyed by them. From here the German army used to fire on St Petersburg, aiming for the huge gold dome of St Isaac's Cathedral downtown.

This is the main palace, or Catherine Palace, at Tsarskoye Selo. (The weather wasn't as super for our visit there -- St Petersburg can already be pretty chilly, windy and rainy at the beginning of September. Fortunately we had sunny -- if cool -- weather about half the time.) Peter the Great gave the land here to his wife, Catherine I, as a present in the early 1700s. Most of the building was overseen by their daughter, Elizabeth (her architect was Rastrelli, responsible for much of the baroque architecture of St Petersburg), and then Catherine the Great. Both Tsarskoye Selo and Peterhof are a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

St Petersburg was home to come of Russia's greatest literary and artistic geniuses. This is Dostoevsky's tombstone.

This building is home to the House of Books (Dom Knigi) on Nevsky Prospect. It just looks cool. It was originally built to house an American sewing-machine company, which I suppose could serve as a partial explanation of the architecture.

This is the Church on the Spilled Blood, built on the spot where Tsar Aleksandr II was assassinated in 1881. Fortunately this church was not destroyed by the Communists, although it was closed and used to house theater props, among other things. It took longer to restore it (25+ years) than it did to build it. The inside walls are covered in very ornate mosaics. Along with Kazan Cathedral and St Isaac's Cathedral, this is one of the most famous churches in St Petersburg -- and they are all right downtown, literally within minutes' walk of each other.

This bear is helping us toast our trip. You have to indulge in the Russian stereotypes sometime. The vodka was in fact really good.

The Venice of the North? Many people claim that St Petersburg deserves this title.

We also took a trip to Novgorod for the day, climbed St Isaac's Cathedral, wandered around the Peter and Paul Fortress in the rain, visited the Piskaryovskoye Cemetery, where many of the estimated 1 million victims of the siege of Leningrad are buried in mass graves, and much more. Perhaps Mom will post some more pictures.

Travels in the Altai-Sayan Region (August 15 - 30, 2006)

From August 15-30 my friend Anya and I traveled in the Altai-Sayan Region of south-central Siberia (see map right) , which is home to some of Russia's most beautiful, striking and varied landscapes.
Anya is from Irkutsk, and we met during my first trip to Russia over 4 years ago. During our trip we visited Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve on the Enisei River (one of the largest rivers in Siberia and on Earth, running from south to north to the Arctic Ocean); the Republic of Khakasiya and Khakassky Zapovednik (nature reserve); we traveled along the border of Khakasiya, the Altai Republic and the Republic of Tuva (home to nomads, throat singing, camels and yaks), through Tuva and to the park Ergaki in the Krasnoyarsk Region. We had an amazing time!!

We are very, very grateful to the directors of Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve and Ergaki Park, and also the director of the Idgir hunting and fishing company for inviting us to visit and taking time out of their incredibly busy schedules to organize everything for us. They are wonderful. We also owe a big thank you to the staff of Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve and Ergaki Park for teaching us about the protected natural territories where they work. Lots of pictures below!

Lenin Exiled Here: Town of Shushenskoye (August 16)

Anya and I spent our first day in the town of Shushenskoye, a town of 20,000, where the offices for Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve are located. The next day we headed out to the reserve.
City government building in Shushenskoye.

Church in Shushenskoye.

Shushenskoye's claim to fame is that Lenin was exiled here for 3 years, from 1897-1900, during the reign of Russia's last tsar, Nikolai II. We took a tour of the Shushenskoye ethnographic museum, which was basically a Lenin tour, with some other houses from the time period thrown in. Above I am standing in front of the house Lenin, "the leader the the world's proletariat", lived in from 1897-98.

This guy is showing us how they used to make those classic Russian wooden spoons in villages in Siberia. (At the ethnographic museum.)

It didn't sound like Lenin had it too rough in exile. Actually, kind of sounded like a well-paid vacation to Siberia. Lenin liked to head out of Shushenskoye and go hunting about 20 km out of town, in the territory that is now part of Shushensky Bor National Park. Here Anya and I are standing in front of the hut where Lenin would take a break during his hunting capades.

The sign says "Hut. Lenin liked to relax here while hunting."

We are totally relaxing to the fullest!

A little change of pace: this is the river-boat station on the Enisei River in the town of Shushenskoye. In a totally cool project - the brain child of the director of Sayano-Shushensky Reserve - the reserve bought up this building in 2000, when it was in a total state of disrepair (i.e., no glass in the windows, etc.). The reserve invested its own money to restore the building and turn it into a gym/nature exhibit in one. Now residents of the town of Shushenskoye can go workout here, so the reserve has taken on a societal role in keeping people healthy, and the fees the gym-goers pay go toward the reserve's budget. There are information signs about all the reserves of the Altai-Sayan region here, plus many professional photographs, info about other reserves, etc. So instead of watching talk TV while working out, people can watch and read about the amazing natural places in their own backyard. A pretty unique idea. The station also houses a conference room equipped with a projector and all, as well as the offices for the Association of Zapovedniks and National Parks of the Altai-Sayan Region.
We had a great place to stay in Shushenskoye - in the Sayano-Shushensky Reserve's little hotel lodge. Here's a picture from the outside. We were very well taken care of.

Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve (Aug 17-20)

Anya and I spent our first weekend on the edge of Sayano-Shushensky Biosphere Reserve, a huge territory with an area of almost 400,000 hectares. The reserve is a strict protected area and therefore no tourists are allowed into the reserve territory. The enormous Enisei River makes up the eastern border of the reserve and is also the reserve's buffer zone. All boats in the section of the river bordering the reserve have to have special permission from the reserve and have to register on site. We lived on the other side of the river, in the so-called "biosphere polygon." Under UNESCO biosphere reserves should have a strictly protected territory, that is the reserve itself, and a "polygon" where limited natural resource use is allowed with the goal of demonstrating sustainable economic development. Hunting and fishing tourism are the main activities in Sayano-Shushensky's polygon. In the first picture is the Enisei River; the reserve is on the right side, and the polygon is on the left side.

Here is a picture of Anya and the little boat we took almost 200 km (a 4-5 hour trip) down the Enisei River to the ranger station where we stayed. Anya is feeding this dog sunflower seeds, and he could actually shell and eat them.

Sayano-Shushensky Reserve was created in 1976 partially to offset and study the effects of the construction of Sayano-Shushensky Hydroelectric Dam on the Enisei River. This is why the river, much like the Columbia, doesn't look like a wild river with rapids, etc., but rather like a large peaceful sea.

Russians claim Sayano-Shushensky Dam is the largest on earth, which I haven't been able to confirm. However, it is huge. (It is the largest hydroelectric station in Russia.) When it was built the water level on the Enisei River behind the dam rose 240 meters up the sides of the mountains along the river!

These mountain sides were forested, and unfortunately they were not logged before the dam began to operate and the water level rose. Not only were millions of dollars of valuable timber lost, but dead logs still float on the reservoir nearly 25 years after the completion of the dam. The decaying logs pollute the river and make the water not so clear underwater, too. (I checked it out when I went swimming in the reservoir.) They say the logs that have sunk actually haven't reached the bottom of the river, either, but rather are floating as a huge underwater forest about 40 meters below the surface.





Logs still floating on the surface of the Enisei. Makes for interesting navigation for water craft.

Huge letters on the mountain side saying "Sayano-Shushensky Reserve." You can't miss that!

We stayed at the reserve's nicest ranger station, which was really, REALLY nice. Like a fancy ski lodge in the U.S. Here are me and Anya next to the fireplace.

This is a view from the ranger station in the evening.

Here is a view of the house we stayed in from the outside. Swimming was pretty chilly but still fun.

This is Valery, our super guide during our time in the reserve. There are just not enough positive adjectives to describe him. On our first day he took us on a hike over the cliffs near where we stayed, totally redefining the definition of "trail." Here he is probably waiting for us to hurry up and stop taking pictures of the great views we saw.

Anya and I became quite the rock climbers.

Valery also took us to search for the wild mountain goats that inhabit the steep slopes of the reserve. Amazingly, he could spot them with no trouble, even though they were hard for us to find even using binoculars! In hot weather the goats will come down close to the water level, but since it was chilly and misty when we went looking for them, we only saw them from far away. Which was still really cool!


Some cool pictures with reflections in the water. If you closely look at the bottom of the slopes you can see a little grey-brown edge right at the water level. That is the start of the "dead zone," where annually rising water levels from the dam don't allow anything to grow. In the spring, when the water is at its lowest level, this zone is 40 meters wide and very easy to see. Now it is only about 2 meters wide.

Me sitting in the rocky and dead-woody dead zone on the shore of the mighty Enisei.

Lakes, Steppe and Siberian Stonehenge: Khakasiya (Aug 21-23)

After Anya and I got back from Sayano-Shushensky Reserve we did a little loop -- or more like a triangle -- through the Altai-Sayan Region. (By "little" I mean 1000 km round-trip; we took a week to do it.) The northwest side of the triangle was in the Republic of Khakasiya, and we started at the northern tip and drove southwest toward the Altai Republic and Republic of Tuva. Northern Khakasiya has a lot of steppe and low rolling hills -- it seems the sky could just stretch on there forever.



We stopped for one night at Lake Itkhul' in Khakassky Nature Reserve (Zapovednik). (Sunset)


Khakasiya is home to lakes of all kinds. A few are protected in Khakassky Nature Reserve, and a few are open to tourists. Unfortunately we did not have the best weather for our lake touring day. Above Anya is climbing a steep hill for a windy and rainy lookout over Lake Belyo in Khakassky Reserve.

The soil on the climb up was very red (my socks changed color), as was this rock. On top is Ilya, our "guide" (I use that term pretty loosely) for our week-long tour.

Hanging out on another lake shore. Lake Tus is a lake with high mineral content that is a popular tourist destination in July. Unfortunately by August it is not really sunbathing weather there anymore. Although neither the chilly temperatures nor the "no swimming" signs stopped Ilya from taking a dip.

This was a nickel mine during the Soviet Union. However in the early 1970s part of the mine collapsed, killing the workers there, and they closed it. Now lots of tourists can come check it out for 20 rubles a head. The amazing thing is they dug this mine without any explosives or anything like that -- basically with hand equipment. Apparently they used to have bungee jumping here, too (after the mine's collapse, that is), which sounds like it was a disaster waiting to happen -- you can't go anymore.

These huge rocks are from a burial site from the 3rd century BC. They are huge (see picture below with me in it for some perspective). Ancient peoples probably dragged these rocks from at least 45 km away to this site, which is pretty unbelievable. The rocks made up the outer edge of a huge, circular burial mound that was covered in earth and hollow inside -- you could think of the rocks as the outer ring-support structure. Inside would be buried some famous ancient person (warrior, etc.) along with his family (if necessary they'd kill the wife so she could be buried with her husband), his property, etc.

Here's me next to a couple of these rocks. This burial mound was 0.5 km in length and 11.5 m high! Archeologists suddenly became interested in excavating it in the 1950s, when a local resident accidentally found gold here. Total they found 277 kg of gold in this burial mound -- so the warrior here must have been quite the VIP.

This mound in the foreground is what an unexcavated burial mound looks like. We saw hundreds of these throughout Khakasiya. Ancient peoples would build them on the steppe so that they would be visible from a distance. (That's why they had to drag those rocks from so far away -- no big rocks on the steppe, but you can't be building your burial sites on some river bank -- no one will see them there.)

This cow is chilling at a gas station in southwest Khakasiya. Cows were all over the place. And if they are crossing the road they definitely have the right of way.

11% of the population of Khakasiya is native peoples, and they have their own language. We saw signs in Khakasiya and especially in Tuva in the native language. (Tuva is 77% indigenous people.) Here is the first one of those signs -- the last 3 words are not Russian. Actually I'm not even too clear on what the Russian here is supposed to mean. Literally it appears to say "Wish the people a land of happiness!" but maybe it is supposed to mean "wish the people land and happiness"? Either way it seems nice.

Southwest Khakasiya is already close to the Altai Republic and is quite mountainous and forested. The roads through the mountains kind of reminded me of the Cascades in Oregon. When we camped out in the mountains in this tent Anya and I learned that late August is NOT summer in the Altai-Sayan Region. It got down to a damp and chilly 35 degrees F, at which point we decided to sleep in the van.

Here we are already approaching the border with Tuva. The landscape is already certainly quite different than the flat steppe at the beginning of our trip!