16 September

Again I woke up at 0645 but resisted the temptation to rise until 0705 – again justifying it by the fact that breakfast is only a minute away, and I made it to the table in time. But … suddenly I was panic-stricken! I thought I had left my Vegemite in the cabin, only to return and be unable to find it. Had it been stolen? Unlikely, and if so there were only three suspects – the other Australians on the ship. Had I packed it away somewhere? Again unlikely, as there aren’t too many places in a cabin to do that? Had I left it in the room after breakfast yesterday? That seemed the most likely, but how could I pantomime to our table waiter Vladimir that I was frantic to find a jar of Vegemite? I tried for a time, and then finalyy, the light bulb went on, Vladimir went to the kitchen and returned, clutching said jar of Vegemite! Success!
The rest of breakfast went smoothly and was an anticlimax.
Not too long after it was get ready for the day (not too hard, as it only meant putting my jacket on, placing the camera and bag around my neck and then swapping the cabin key for a pass) and within a few minutes the ship had docked and we were all ashore, walking through a sister ship to get there.
Our usual suspects, the gang of three (comprising 21 in all, but now with a member of the crew (one of the ladies from Reception) added in), we met our guide Inna and started off into St Petersburg. Unfortunately we caught the now obligatory Russian traffic jam and were slower than expected to reach the city area, having driven along the riverside.
We stopped outside the old port buildings to take photographs and saw a Russian wedding (apparently none in May) and then went to Hare Island to see the Peter and Paul Cathedral. This is the site of many royals’ funerals and graves (the graves are two metres UNDER the stones we see, which are hollow) and is magnificent inside. Being of recent design (after 1714), it is very different to the churches we had previously seen.
We then went on to a square in the town to see St Isaac’s church, and here we lost a member for a time (the crew member, not a tourist) and headed back to the ship for lunch. We did leave (deliberately) some of our party n town as they were doing their own thing for the afternoon. Traffic was again heavy and we weren’t back to the ship until 1330.
We went for a quick lunch. Cindy was mortified when I took the entrée plates to the collection area to speed up the delivery of the main course. Vladimir didn’t bat an eyelid.
We were ready by 1415, but others weren’t, so we didn’t leave until 1430 (in a minibus, as our numbers were depleted and we had four from the French-speaking group along) and again, we had slow progress into the city.
We were attending the Yusupov Palace tour, followed by a canal boat ride. We got to the Yusupov Palace, which while biggish outside, didn’t look too special. However, inside … well, just look at the photographs of St Petersburg 099 to 326 to get an idea of it. I’ll have to describe it in detail later.
We finally left, boarded a canal boat (after an altercation with the operator) and had a delightful but cold trip seeing St Petersburg by canal. It really is a totally different perspective and many of the buildings changed from an imposing look from the road to a breath-taking view from a canal. After just over an hour of conditions which made the inside of a freezer seem like a warm day, we were back onto a bus and returned to the ship.
Dinner was smooth (we finished off the bottle of wine) and not long after I retired to process my photos (a lot!), do some washing and write this blog. I finally finished at 2320 and was grateful to get to sleep.