Catherine the Great’s Palace

Now I’ll admit – before going to St. Petersburg, I didn’t know much about Catherine the Great other than the fact that she ruled Russia a long time ago. My visit to STP told me all about Catherine and I can confidently say she was one rocking lady! (I should have known. I mean, she has “the Great” attached to her name!) She was a ruthless leader (exhibit A: she had her own husband killed so she could rule Russia), she expanded the Russian empire to include from current-day Poland and Lithuania east to Alaska, and the time of her reign is considered the Golden Era for the Russian empire and nobility. Her accomplishments are impressive especially considering she lived during the 1700s when women around the world had very few rights.

At the ballet in the Hermitage Theater.

I visited Catherine the Great’s Palace during my stopover in St. Petersburg. The Palace is located about 45 minutes from STP and the long-ish bus ride didn’t disappoint. The Palace continues the seemingly standard baroque style of St. Petersburg and is enormous (I’m learned that everything in Russia is big. If you think things in Texas are big, go to Russia – mind blown). The Palace was damaged quite a bit during World War II and has since been refurbished to resemble how it looked when it was first built. Just when you thought St. Petersburg couldn’t get any gaudier, take a look at the Palace pictures below!

The most amazing room in the Palace is the amber room but because it's so wonderful, you cannot take pictures in this room. The room's interior is basically wallpapered in amber, a gemstone found in the Ural Mountains. The whole room glitters and shines with an orangey-yellow glow. Here's some pictures of the amber room for your viewing pleasure.

Continuing on with the Catherine the Great theme, I also attended a ballet in St. Petersburg in the Hermitage Theater which was Catherine’s favorite theater. Just in case you’re interested, Catherine always sat in the seventh row. I missed the opportunity to sit in Catherine’s seat but nonetheless, the ballet “Swan Lake” was very good.

I hope you’ve enjoyed reading about St. Petersburg as much as I enjoyed visiting. This blog may mark the end of my St. Petersburg posts. We’ll see if I can come up with anything else about STP and if not, I’ll move on to my next country visited: Stockholm, Sweden!

The seal of Catherine the Great, as seen on the gate leading into her Palace.

Catherine the Great's Palace. Everything you see that is now painted a brownish-yellow was once pure gold.

Catherine the Great's Palace. The palace is enormous.

Selfie in the "Gold Room" with Professor Mark Peters!

Catherine's "Gold Room"

Detailed work in the Gold Room at Catherine's Palace.

Main staircase in Catherine's Palace.

A replica of one of Catherine's dresses, as seen in the painting on the adjacent wall.

WWII damaged the Palace greatly. Here's the before...

...and after. The Palace has been restored to it's original beauty.

Added bonus on my day trip to Catherine's Palace: Peterhoff Palace and Gardens, home to thousands of fountains!

The Peterhoff Palace and Gardens, showing many of the fountains.

Orthodox St. Petersburg

About 75 percent of Russians practice Orthodox Christianity, a religion I know very little about, so while in St. Petersburg I took a tour of four Orthodox churches. Two of the churches were working churches and two had basically been turned into museums. The two churches I write about today are the two “museum churches:” the Church of the Spilled Blood and St. Isaac’s.

Church of the Spilled Blood in STP.

Probably the most famous church in St. Petersburg is the Church of the Spilled Blood (sometimes known as the Church of the Savior on Blood). The church was built on the site where Tsar Alexander II was assassinated in 1881 and a special memorial marks the exact spot where he was mortally wounded. The Church was supposed to be torn down just before the beginning of World War II but when the war broke out, the gunpowder to be used to blow up and destroy the church was instead used for the war efforts.

The outside of the church is pretty spectacular but believe it or not, the inside is even better! Covered in more than 7,000 square meters of mosaics, the church’s interior sparkles as the sun streams through the windows. Sorry Michelangelo, but this may beat your Sistine Chapel!

My visit to St. Isaac’s included options: go into the church or up into the Dome for a view of the city. Over 200 stairs later, I was up taking in an amazing view of St. Petersburg! It was a beautiful day with a beautiful view.

Visiting the two working churches was interesting. I heard from the religion professor on board that Orthodox Christianity is one of the purest forms of Christianity still practiced. I was surprised by their use of icons. The churches were covered in paintings and statues representing religious icons, and patrons seemed to pick an icon and pray to it plus also make little offerings. The patrons’ behaviors regarding the icons reminded me of the Hindi temples I visited this spring. Perhaps common threads run through the world’s religions after all.

Inside the Church of the Spilled Blood. Everything you see is mosaic!

The spot where Tsar Alexander II was mortally wounded. It's said that the stones on the floor still have his spilled blood on them, although I couldn't see anything. Hence the church's name.

Interior of Church of the Spilled Blood in St. Petersburg. All mosaic work.

Church of the Spilled Blood.

Church of the Spilled Blood.

Church of the Spilled Blood.

Libby, a Charlottesville native, UVA student and one of my work studies, and I at the top of  St. Isaac's Church.

View from the top of St. Isaac's Church in St. Petersburg. You can see the Hermitage State Museum on the left and the Church of the Spilled Blood on the right.

Ceilings of the Hermitage

In front of the Hermitage in St. Petersburg!

On to St. Petersburg, Russia! Having the opportunity to go to St. Petersburg was one of the reasons I accepted the offer to work for Semester at Sea this summer so I was very excited when we docked in STP a week or so ago. My first activity: the Hermitage.

The Hermitage is a state museum featuring an art collection originally purchased by Catherine the Great. Catherine the Great was very adamant about purchasing collections, rather than just one or two paintings from an artist, and because of this desire for collections the Hermitage now has one of the largest art collections in the world. The Museum is only able to showcase about 10 percent of the collection at a time and literally has millions of dollars of priceless artwork sitting in the basement.

The collections include Picasso, Goya, Monet, da Vinci, Titian, Matisse and many more art superstars. However, I have to admit I didn’t spend much time looking at the artwork. Why, you may ask? Because the building itself is A-MAZING! The architecture and interior design are so overwhelming wonderful that I couldn’t take my eyes off it long enough to enjoy the surrounding artwork. For this reason, I have dedicated this blog post to the ceilings and interiors of the Hermitage. I hope you enjoy.

One may think that I wasted my trip to the Hermitage by not carefully examining the paintings. This may be so but because I basically missed the artwork on this first trip, I now have an excuse to return! J

Front of the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg, Russia.

One of the first rooms I entered in the Hermitage. The vase is so large they created the room around it! The vase is made from malachite which is found in the Ural Mountains.

So, I lied. This blog post features a few other things besides the ceilings. This is the inlaid wood floors in the Museum.

This room is known as the "Small Italian Skylight Room." Small you say...hmmm....

Another view of the Small Italian Skylight Room in the Hermitage.

Many ceilings were intricately painted in the Hermitage.

Me standing in front of a royal seating area in the Hermitage Museum.

Another royal seating area in the Hermitage Museum.

Up close of the gold and carvings above the throne.

Pretty, pretty! Another ceiling and chandelier in the Hermitage Museum!

Pavilion Hall in the Hermitage Museum.