Oof.

I say this only because I loved St. Petersburg so much and I have maybe way too much to say/show. (tl;dr St. Petersburg was amazing.)
This was our only Baltic capital that wasn’t a European one, so we had to get blanket visas through a tour company called TJ Travel. (This company also did our Berlin tour for us!) It was nice having a tour guide again as opposed to our usual independent venturing, primarily through hop-on/hop-off (“ho/ho”) buses. Ours was a nice young man named Michael. (I say that like I’m an old lady; I think Michael was at least 2 years older than me.)

My mom told me long ago that she has some traces of Russian ancestry. (This was her explanation for why I don’t have typical Chinese facial features and why people think I’m half-European.) (???) I like the thought of having some Russian ancestry, so this was really an opportunity for me to visit my motherland!

I’m not sure I can accurately articulate how excited I was to visit St. Petersburg. I played “Rumor in St. Petersburg” in my cabin all morning as I got ready to go, if that’s any indication. The song played for maybe 30 minutes straight.

(I add this Read More because you shouldn’t be subjected to the photos if you don’t want to be.) (It’s a lot.)Read More »