For our second day in St Petersburg, we opted for what was billed as a ‘River and Canal’ tour for the afternoon. The day started somewhat strangely with the first instance of ‘toast rage’ at the buffet, with one male passenger being extremely rude to the girl running the toast machine – which seems slow anyway and not her fault.
A few minutes later, parents with two young girls on the next table, and the older of the two behaving as only a stroppy three or four year old girl can and the poor dad getting zero support from his wife. We think he walked off and left them to it!
Then one old boy approached a waiter with a scrunched up napkin, into which his wife had just thrown up! Charming… Who would be a crew member?
The day brightened considerably when we had a coffee down on deck 5, at the bar, and were joined by a lovely, tall, friendly 30 year old Californian lawyer. She was travelling with her parents and two younger sisters. Quite a long chat.
However, it went downhill again once on the coach when we had another (older) Anna who was one of those guides who seemed to think that she had to talk non-stop for the whole tour. We thought we’d get a break when she issued us with the personal earphone receivers.
It was not to be. When we got to the canal and boarded the boat, she elected to use the boat’s loudspeaker system - which seemed to be stuck on full volume. A diplomatic approach to her young assistant suggesting she use the personal headsets, failed, as the message that came through was that she couldn’t turn the volume down so would speak a little quieter…
We headed down the canal and into the Neva river after about 3 or 4 minutes and were served with another glass of (Russian?) champagne. Once we hit the Neva, we seemed to come almost to a standstill, as 30 minutes later, we were still opposite the Peter and Paul fortress. It didn’t shut Anna up at all either, as she continued to prattle on.
Now as she led us to believe, is a University Professor (moonlighting – which wasn’t allowed years ago), you’d think she’d understand why Uni lectures in most places, are a maximum of 55 minutes long. The average listener switches off after about 25 minutes anyway. Quite why these tour guides think that a boat or busload of holidaymakers, most of whom are over 50 (or even 70), are going to be enthralled, when 20 year old students are not, is beyond not only me, but most of the other passengers. Who on earth remembers after the tour that an event happened happened May 21st 1837at 3pm? When you get 100 of these precise dates over a tour, added to about 1,000 other facts, it all seems rather pointless.
We passed by the Aurora (on the water this time of course – doing our U-turn) and as she hadn’t made any attempt to find out how many had done a tour yesterday, we had the whole history of the ship again. Oh deep joy…
Having only made it through one bridge before the U-turn and then entering another canal, for the five minute return to the pier, we were somewhat underwhelmed by this tour. More so as it didn’t go alongside that magnificent photogenic cathedral. The canal part was only about ten minutes and the river part distinctly uninspiring.
We walked back along the canal bank to a bridge just a few yards from the Church of the Saviour on Spilled blood (not OF spilled blood as posted yesterday). We bumped into the three Welsh ladies yet again on the way. (pic) We had just 15 minutes to wander before being herded back to the coach and yes, another 25 minute stop at a souvenir shop. The Russians do have a sense of humour and I couldn’t resist a pic of the Russia vs USA chess set! We passed on buying a set of Putin matruska dolls.
It was interesting however, to learn a little about life under Communism over the two days and how today’s older pensioners particularly, preferred it. They got everything for free, didn’t have to work very hard (if at all) for their 120 roubles a week from the state. They are now relatively poor, as they now have to pay for rent, transport, medical assistance etc. The fact that many millions died of starvation, as the issued bread ration (and a very low one at that) usually contained an unhealthy proportion of sawdust and probably rat droppings, seemed to be overlooked. Maybe some of the reforms weren’t well thought out or rushed, but the overall feeling was very positive and we were impressed with much of what we saw.
Anna 2 ended the tour with a five minute diatribe against the Muscovites, who she branded as being rude, uncultured, uneducated and unfriendly, compared to the residents of St Petersburg. We still gave her a tip – but it was half what it could have been. Less is sometimes more – but at least you blog followers can just look at the pics or skip through the written drivel altogether. Note to self - buy MP3 player and earphones for future tours.
The first pics show older and newer flats or apartments and we saw no private houses at all! As mentioned yesterday, most parking is on the streets. The first ship picture is an old icebreaker.
The layout of St Petersburg was originally inspired by Venice, but many of the original canals were in fact filled in to make the roads – and traffic can be very bad now, so goodness knows what it would be like with fewer roads. Most locals use public transport anyway – trams and the Metro plus buses and trolley buses.
This wasn’t one of the better Princess tour days, as there was just no escape from the non-stop prattle at full volume. It’s a real shame, but the tour guides can make or break a tour, but doesn’t anyone ever critique their performance? Even Princess don’t seem to offer a feedback sheet and all it does is push people towards private tours on personal recommendations, where there is often a degree of customer control. That is why we have now done 3 private Sylvie de Cristo tours in the south of France/Monaco and we will be with her again next year all being well.
Anyway, back to the ship at exactly the same time as several other coaches - at the last minute (why all at the same time?) but fortunately, this time, Russian authorities were extremely quick, so the ship still left on time.
A quiche and Waldorf salad again, to tide us over until dinner. I hope salad isn’t addictive?
The beef stroganoff at dinner was nearer a goulash or stew, but a dollop of sour cream made it a little bit more authentic. It was washed down with my first cider of the cruise (5:95USD+) and followed by the very nice cheeseboard, which seems to have exactly the same structure each night – Gouda and Brie, plus soaked apricots, walnut bread, a leaf of endive and a port jus. Fine by me… I’m sure they’d provide a blue cheese if anyone asked, as nothing seems too much trouble for the staff.
On then to yet another production show – ‘Boogie Shoes’ notable for the excellent staging, lighting and scenery.
Clocks back again 1 hour tonight and Tallin in Estonia tomorrow, with a latish sail in.
We have been so lucky with the weather, with yet another fine warm day forecast for tomorrow.
No comments:
Post a Comment