Purplelake: Day 7-8 – Jul 26-27, 2019 Moscow, Russia

Our overnight train arrived at Moscow’s Leningradskiy station at 8 am in the morning. From there, it was only a short subway ride on Line 5 (the Ring line) to our hotel, Radisson Slavyanskaya, located right next to the Kievskaya subway station and Kiyevsky train station. Arriving in the middle of Moscow’s morning rush hour gave us a firsthand taste of what fast speed means. I have never seen people walk so fast before. Not only were they fast, they were also orderly following the flow of crowds entering and exiting the subway stations. Most impressive are the unbelievably fast frequencies of Moscow’s subway trains. Most trains were only 30 seconds or less apart so there was no need to run to catch a train. Given Moscow’s population is just shy of 12 million, an efficient subway system is a must to move people around. Moscow’s subway stations are also world famous for their beautiful construction and decorations. We actually saw many guided tours walking around different subway stations just to appreciate all the outstanding art works like stain glasses and mosaics on the walls.

One of Moscow's ornate subway stations

Each station has its unique design and decoration

Commuters all followed the pedestrian flow and obeyed direction signs

See the tour group in the front?

This one is my favourite. Which is yours?

It turned out that one of our rooms at the Radisson was ready this early in the morning. We were able to leave our luggage and freshen up before going to our first attraction, the Kremlin. As expected, the line up was very long for people without ticket reservation. However, unlike Hermitage, here, even people with advanced reservation still had to line up to exchange tickets. This is quite frustrating since our allotted time for the Kremlin Armoury had come and gone. After lining up for the tickets, we still had to line up for security check before entering the Kremlin since this is also where the Russian Parliament is located. At the end, we were still fine to enter the Armoury even we were 30 mins late.

I had always equated the word “Kremlin” to mean the name of Russia’s Parliament. In fact, Kremlin simply means a central fortress in medieval Russian cities. Every large city had a kremlin which would contain cathedrals, palaces for princes and bishops, government offices, and munitions stores. Moscow’s Kremlin is the most famous of them all and is the grandest. There are several beautiful churches inside the Kremlin: Cathedral of the Assumption, Cathedral of the Annunciation, Cathedral of the Archangel, Ivan the Great Bell Tower. The Russian State Senate (not open to public) and the Armoury which houses all the treasures of the Tsar empire are all located inside Kremlin. After the Armoury, we had to line up for every building and fight with all the tour groups for entry. This made the experience very unpleasant given many tour groups were extremely rude. They would block anyone trying to go faster and past them.

Kremlin's wall and towers

Many different churches inside the Kremlin complex

Cathedral of Archangel

Grand Kremlin Palace and Cathedral of Annunciation

Tourists, and more tourists!

Cathedral of Assumption

Church of the Disposition

Everyone had to enter and exit through the same small door in front, creating traffic jam

Church of Assumption and Ivan the Great Bell Tower

Looking back at the Cathedral Square

This is the Tsar Bell, the heaviest bell on earth at 200 MT!

But it was broken before it was installed

The one up in the bell tower is much smaller

Russian Senate building

Beautiful background of the Kremlin complex

Tower with exit to Red Square

The famous Red Square lies just outside Kremlin’s red fortress. It is surrounded on the north side by the imposing State Historical Museum and on the south side by the iconic and beautiful St. Basil’s Cathedral. On the east side is the GUM Shopping Center housed in restored historic trading buildings. We were a little disappointed by the small size of the Red Square, thinking it would be bigger from all the movies and TV footages we saw. On the other hand, the most iconic symbol of Russia, St. Basil’s Cathedral, did not disappoint. This unique set of onion domed buildings comprises of nine individual churches circling around the tenth central church. It was built in 1555 on orders of Ivan the Terrible. Inside, it felt like a giant maze joining all the different churches together. By luck, we heard an all male voice ensemble singing inside the cathedral. The voice and the acoustics were so heavenly that I bought two of their CDs on the spot!

Iconic symbol of Russia - St. Basil's Cathedral

It used to be an Orthodox church but now is a state museum

Each onion dome is a church

Russian Orthodox depiction of Mary and baby Jesus

Ornate interior of another church

Red Square - looking north

Red Square - looking south

Red Square - St. Basil's Cathedral & Kremlin wall tower

GUM shopping mall

It is comprised of several historic trading buildings joined together

Busy and decorated pedestrian street next to GUM

The breakfast at the Radisson was so sumptuous that it might be one of the best during this trip. After breakfast, we started our second day exploration at another world class museum, Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts. Unexpectedly, we had to wait in the line for admission but it was well worth it. This is a premier foreign art museum in Russia collecting masterpieces from ancient civilizations (Egypt, Assyria, Greek, Rome), and Italian Renaissance & Dutch Golden Age. What impressed me most is their extensive collection of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings by artists like Matisse, Cezanne, Monet, and Renoir. The “Dance” by Matisse was highlighted during our visit and it was striking. After taking just a picture of the huge Cathedral of Christ the Saviour located opposite to the museum, we took the subway to another highly recommended spot, Novodevichy Convent. Although many buildings inside were undergoing major renovations, we could still walk around the peaceful cemetery and admire the quiet beauty of this place away from the busyness of the city.

Very impressive display of antiquities at Pushkin State Museum

Portraits of ancient Egyptians

Golden "Large Diadem" found in Troy

Assyrian statues

Assyrian wall relief cravings

Christ Pantocrator

Madonna and Child by Bernadino Luini

Portrait of an Old Lady by Rembrandt

Dance by Matisse

Nude by Renoir

Lilac in the Sun by Monet

Mardi Gras by Cezanne

Flowers in a Blue Vase by Cezanne

Red Room by Matisse

Cathedral of Christ the Saviour

Novodevichy Convent Cemetery

Our city tour continued to the famous Bolshoi Theatre which is world renowned for its ballet and opera. It was interesting to see how nice people dressed up to attend the performance. A few photographers even used this opportunity to get clients to stop for some fancy poses and pictures. Just a few blocks down from the theatre, we saw many (relaxed looking) riot police lining up along the street. We later learnt that there was a street demonstration earlier and over 1000 protesters were arrested! Our next stop is the Ministry of Foreign Affairs building located at the end of Arbat Street. Completed in 1953, this Stalinist austere looking skyscraper can easily fit in any Batman movies. It has 27 levels and 172 m tall, dominating the Moscow’s skyline. We explored the pedestrian Arbat Street a bit before going to dinner inside the modern mall Evropeyskiy next to our hotel and Kiyevsky train station. The water fountain show inside this mall was mesmerizing.

Bolshoi Theatre

This theatre is most famous for its ballet and opera performances

Riot police standing by for actions

Moscow's pay toilets on the streets

Ministry of Foreign Affairs building

As this was our last night in Moscow, we decided to go back to Red Square to see the night scene. We were glad we did this as all the lighting and decorations made the streets and buildings very magical as if we were inside a fairy tale. The Nikolskaya Street just outside the GUM shopping mall was especially pretty and made you feel Christmas came early in July. Even the onion domed St. Basil’s Cathedral looked completely different at night. We said goodbye to Moscow the next morning after breakfast and took the Aeroexpress train from Kiyevsky Station to Vnukovo Airport to fly back to Berlin to start the next phase of our Eastern Europe trip.