4 (thousand) Weddings and a (cool) Cathedral

It seems that on Fridays and Saturdays in St Petersburg, tourists fight for prime photo space with busloads of Russian wedding parties. At every turn in the Summer Garden was another blushing bride being photographed next to a rude statue - while the wedding party (Russian mafia types in suits) milled around downing vodka and talking loudly about the latest furry hat on the market.

Escaping the bridal parties, we stumbled across the simply named Church of the Savior of the Spilt Blood. This has to be the coolest looking church we've ever seen - a gynormous jumble of golden and multi-coloured spires and cupulas. Apparently it's modelled on St Basil's in Moscow but we prefer this one.

The rest of our time in St Petersburg was spent cruising the city's maze of canals, exploring Peter and Paul's Fortress and generally getting lost and confused following signs written cryllic.

Other random thoughts in no particular order:

Wasn't expecting to encounter mosquitos in St P's but had we done our research properly we would've known that the city was built in the middle of a bloody great swamp. Jools took a couple of hefty bites to the face on day 1.

Appears to be a bit of a beer culture over here, so we're struggling to integrate. 90% of the population seem to wander the streets clutching a bottle of beer. But clutch your bottle of beer in the wrong place and you'll be frog marched off by the local militsia - as we witnessed.

Dozvedanya.

Kev and Jools

PS Current cribbage score is Jools 1 Kev 0.