Day 105 - Friday 16 August - The Hermitage

Friday 16 August

For those who don't know, this is the palace of the Romanov family, the last royals of Russia. It is now a museum, the biggest in the world, housing a collection of furniture and other household items from the time, and also artworks from BC to C18 from every part of the world.

And they are not just ordinary things - the room with the paintings of Peter Paul Reubens, 1577-1640 Netherlands, holds 38 of his paintings!!  So we had booked a 10:00 guided tour, which lasted 3 hours. 

Most of the display is on the 1st floor, so you need to go up the grand staircase.

The throne room.

The chapel

It's just gold everywhere.  When new, it would have been real gold leaf, but now it's just paint.

The ceilings are amazing.

I could have displayed this nativity with mine.  We don't have one that is an ink stand.

'The Kiss of Cupid and Psyche',  Antonia Canova, 1794-7.

'Portrait of an old Jew', Rembrandt, 1654.

'Peasant Cottage ',  Jan Wijnants, 1656

A ceremonial sled, with the carriage part made from a dragon, and the front St George.

 Then it was lunch time, and after that we went back and caught up on what we hadn't seen. By 18:00 we were pooped, so we didn't finish the last bit. 

'Visiting Grandmother', Louis le Nain, 1600-48.

'Kermess'  (= village fair), Peiter Brueghel younger, 1564-1638.

This room was just jammed full of paintings.

Full coats of armour.

The ceiling of one of the 3 rooms with ceiling windows.

The back stairs, from ground floor to first.

From Egypt, 2nd half of C7 BC.

We had to pick up our tickets for the next couple of days, then it was dinner time.

The Church of the Saviour on Spilled Blood, is the site of the assassination of Alexander ll.


We stopped at a restaurant near where one guy was  showing 2 racoons/lemurs, and another had an owl.   (Hold this, take a photo and pay me.)

It was busy.  That was OK, but we ordered 3 dishes and they forgot to get D's dinner order so we shared. Instead we ordered desert, and that took at least 40mins. By then it was 21:30, but still hordes out on the streets. We went looking to catch the no17 bus that we'd got in the morning, but it didn't return the same way because of 1-way streets. So I went looking for it, and we walked for miles and miles in a direction different to home.

Finally we found a metro station, but the train line we wanted wasn't exactly there.  It was a group of 3 stations connected by long underground passageways, and we needed the furthest one,  so we walked for more miles underground.

The Metro is soo deep, and the escalators are sooo long.

 So now it's 23:00, and we are poooped. I'll sort some photos tomorrow.