Russian Opulence at Peterhof Palace

Today we had much less ambitious goals as there was only one remaining "must do" item left on our St. Petersburg agenda. Furthermore, we wanted to allow for a generous time cushion to get to our boat and not get penalized with a hefty fine for staying in Russia beyond our 72-hour travel visa.

Our last destination was the Peterhof Palace, located approximately 19 miles outside of central St. Petersburg. The construction of this palace began in 1705 by Peter the Great (hence the name), and served as the Tsar's summer retreat. For those of you who have visited the Semingson's "summer/winter retreat" in Big Bear, you will see quite a few similarities to the scale of the structure and ornate fountains that surround the grounds j/k.

While the most expensive option for arriving at Peterhof, taking a hydrofoil is both the most convenient and scenic way to arrive at the palace. The hydrofoil (high speed boad), takes about 30 minutes and drops you off in front of the palace's lower garden. Arriving in this fashion allows visitors to experience how it felt for royalty to visit Peter's home back in the day when navigating their boats up the canal to where the numerous fountains frame this extravagant villa. Henry was pleased that we chose this option as he found a local Russian girl to hold him and flirt with him for half the ride to the palace.

Once on the Peterhof Palace grounds, we headed straight up the canal to the grand staircase where a fountain show had just begun.

After maneuvering through the crowds and enjoying the show, we walked the enormous park that makes up the lower garden. The massive park has numerous fountains, smaller "cottages," ponds, and gardens to explore all within a thickly covered canopy of beautiful green trees. We worked up quite an appetite and met our quota of fountains for the day while walking a couple of miles up, down, and diagonal through the gardens.

We enjoyed a great meal of Russian cuisine outside of the gardens as we headed to the front of the palace where non-sea voyaging visitors would enter the palace grounds. After our meal we walked the upper gardens which were not quite as impressive as the lower gardens but by any other standards very beautiful.

Peter the Great had a vision to design a palace to out match the world renowned beauty of Versailles in France. While we have yet to visit Versailles for a first hand comparison, it seems to us that he has succeeded (and many others would agree).

In mid-afternoon we returned to St. Petersburg on the hydro-foil where Sam and Henry took a quick cat-nap and then hustled back to our hotel where we picked up a cab for our Finland bound boat. The night on the boat was nice and we awoke in Helsinki, Finland only for a brief moment before catching a bus to the airport for our flight to Stockholm, Sweden.

We have now arrived in Stockholm where over the course of the last five hours we have travelled by boat, bus, plane, train, subway, and of course feet (well except for Henry). Our room will be ready any minute at which time we will drop off our bags and then enjoy our first taste of Stockholm... both literally and figuratively.