St. Petersburg (1 Viewer)

[Theseus Mock]

Jaysus, this travel forum has expanded a lot since i last clicked in here.

anyone been to st. petersburg? we're planning on doing the riga to st. petersburg train journey and about 4 days in the petersburg itself. anything decent to do there? anyone do the apartment accommodation thing?

 

[Lillian]

I'm on my way to St Petersburg via Irkutsk and Olkhon island right now. I don't think I could be more excited about getting to St Petersburg I've decided no matter what happens I'm going to live it up. I'd say apartments are the way to go, did it that way in Moscow but left it too late to book it in saint petersburg. I'll be back in 2 weeks and i'll have a more comprehensive list of deadly things to do.

 

[spuded]

Jaysus, this travel forum has expanded a lot since i last clicked in here.

anyone been to st. petersburg? we're planning on doing the riga to st. petersburg train journey and about 4 days in the petersburg itself. anything decent to do there? anyone do the apartment accommodation thing?

me and my lovely lady friend did the a similar journey last september, What we did was fly from dublin to tampere in finland (cheapo ryanair) and then took a train to helsinki, stayed their for 2 days, then took the train to st petersburg stayed there for six days, then on to moscow, got the fuck out of there pretty fast (ill explain again) and then went to riga and stayed there for six days and flew back ryanair, nice and cheap!

St Petersburg is amazing, such an incredibly city and there is just such crazy historical buildings around every corner, bascially you'd wanna stay around Nevsky Prospect (not sure if thats the spelling) but thats pretty much the main street there, it has all the best shit on it anyway, we stayed in a pretty nice hotel that worked out pretty cheap just off nevksy. So much to do in st petersburg, so many amazing places to eat, good inidan restaurants too if yer veggie as alot of russian food is meaty as fuck. Some great boozers too, our favourite was a dostoyevsky themed bar called the idiot, its a lil small place with amazing cheap booze, every drink that you order comes with a shot of vodka too which leads to mad pissedness. So many great things to see and I'd defo recommend the museum of the grotesque, pretty crazy stuff. Anyway I can give you a list of good places to eat and where we stayed and stuff when I talk to herself she has all the details.

Fucking loved Riga too, great place.

Helsinki was not my cup of tea, found it a lil boring

Moscow was too mental and too expensive to stay in for too long.

All in all go to st petersburg, its an amazing city

 

[Theseus Mock]

woah, thanks dudes!

spuded, that bar/cafe idiot sounds great, it's been cropping up a lot in my searches for decent grub. we're flying to Riga and then taking overnight train to St. Petersburg. We've opted for the second class 4 bed sleeper compartments on the journey as 'regular' class sleepers are comunual which we're told is about 30 people per carriage, that'll be one strong stench of baltic arse after the 13 hour journey.

Did ya come across (or see) any dodgy types there?

 

[spuded]

woah, thanks dudes!

spuded, that bar/cafe idiot sounds great, it's been cropping up a lot in my searches for decent grub. we're flying to Riga and then taking overnight train to St. Petersburg. We've opted for the second class 4 bed sleeper compartments on the journey as 'regular' class sleepers are comunual which we're told is about 30 people per carriage, that'll be one strong stench of baltic arse after the 13 hour journey.

Did ya come across (or see) any dodgy types there?

Yeah yer better off getting a scond class or first class carriage, its not hugely expensive, me and my girlfriend got our own room all the way for from moscow to riga (13 hour journey) for 45 quid each, pretty sweet setup, also when your goin across the russian border they are less fucking mental if yer not in one of the main carriages I believe.

I didnt find St Petersburg pverly sketchy compared to moscow but then again our experience there was a bit mental, arrived there too late at night, cab driver brought us up some crazy road ages away from the place we were meant to stay then tried to get more cash off us. Later realised that the guesthouse we were meant to stay in didnt fuckin exist, so we tried to just get a hotel for the night, nowhere would even let me in the door basically, so the girlfriend tried to get us a room, the only place that would give us a room was the comofrt inn, it was a single room, and from 12 at night til 8am they wanted 250euro for the room! So we stayed awake all night in this all night pizza place where pimps kept coming in with their prostitutes and all these sketchy fuckers drving crazy up and down the mainstreet with the noise of guns ringing out loud (its crazy that you can just buy an ak47 at a stall on the underground right beside the newspapers and smokes!). So we stayed awake all night realised how insanely expensive moscow is and headed straight to riga.

Riga was good, fair few nazi skins around though which was a suprise, me and herself headed out to this gig gorilla biscuits were meant to be playing in the dockland areas and got tailed by three of the scariest fucking skins i had ever seen in a bmw and had to leg it! We also went out to a concentration camp just outside riga and it was eerie as fuck cause you have to walk through woods to get to it and ironically loadsa nazi skins apparently stall out near the paths through the wood to mug people.

So all in all st petersburg was grand, although late at night its best to keep your mouth shut while walking down the sidestreets, and riga was grand too.

 

[Lillian]

Yeah the second class cabins are brilliant, but I wish I had taken at least one journey on the third class one, everyone I talked to had a great laugh with the russians on them.
Im going to go against the general opinion hear and say I prefer Moscow, St Petersburg is lovely and all but its very like lots of other European cities and very unlike the rest of Russia, I was really surprised when I got there and there was a bus from the airport to the city and signs in English, a tourist information centre its almost like they want tourists, madness.
Didn't have any problems in St Petersburg at all, even though like the stupid drunken fool I am I was shouting in the streets at night.
We did all the regular things, The Hermitage, Peter and Pauls fortress, Summer Palace, Russian Museum, Church of the Spilled blood, turns out the vodka museum has been closed down, the ballet in the Mariinsky theatre was amazing, you can get tickets for cheap by pressing the reduced price yoke on their website its technically only available for Russians or foreign students studying in a Russian college but give it a lash, we did and got away with it. Bring your student card if you are one, museums and the like are far cheaper that way.

 

[Theseus Mock]

cheers Lillian.

Riddle me this, did you need the original letter of invitation from whatever accommodation you stayed in to get the visa processed? or was a copy of it okay? (i'm guessing we're gonna get a faxed or scanned email copy of it). I just tried ringing the embassy in Dublin and yer man couldn't speak a word of english so he ended up hanging up. i then tried the office listed in limerick and the irish dude hadn't a clue (jeez, ya think something such as this would be known by all the staff).

 

[Lillian]

Nah, I never even had an original copy, waytorussia e-mailed it to me and I printed it off.
Forgot to stay the steiglits and leningrad blockade museums are also worth a visit if you've time.

 

[piggles]

Hi,
Any accommodation recommendations for St. Pete?
Don't know where to start and I'll be there in high season so it looks to be extra pricey!
Thanks