Detour to Moscow

So after just about 24 hours of travel (5.5 hours on a train to Beijing, 8 hours hanging out in Beijing, 7.5 hour flight to Moscow, and 2 hours of travel to Moscow downtown because I was deliriously tired), I finally made it to Moscow! I checked in to my hostel, took my sleeping mask that I got on my flight, and passed out for 4 hours. I woke up feeling refreshed and ready to face the city. I had about 8 hours until my mom’s flight arrived so I went to explore a bit and get some delicious Russian food. Oddly enough, I ended up at a sushi restaurant but hey, don’t judge! Also, I ended up, unknowingly, walking by and seeing some of Moscow’s most famous sites including Red Square, the Kremlin, this fancy grocery store, Pushkin Park, and Moscow’s equivalent of Michigan Ave, Tverskaya. Oops, my bad! :O

Old clunker train that takes you to downtown Moscow from airport.

Pushkin Square

Red Square

Fabulous grocery store. I got some cheese!!

The next day we all woke up jetlagged and disoriented and headed off to Yaroslavl, one of Russia’s oldest historically preserved towns. We did some touring and some eating and we stayed at pretty much the cutest hotel in the world! The second day in Yaroslavl we went to see a children’s play of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Even though it was in Russian (mom translated a bit for me) the story was pretty self explanatory and it was just beyond adorable. I’m sad kids in America don’t get to experience such treasures. O and to top it off, all of us got a present: a huge box full of candy! Russia is awesome! After our play, we headed off to sleigh rides! We got driven around an adorable neighborhood full of cutesy houses. Dream come true. Ride in a one horse open sleigh…check! And last but not least, we ended the day with going to a matrioshka workshop. Matrioshkas are those Russian dolls that have one inside the other. Anyways, we met a matrioshka master and we got to paint our own. Let’s just say that our dolls were just fabulous! Hahah

Sitting in the theater waiting

The seven dwarfs in Hello Kitty pajamas

Santa Claus comes and saves the day. I think this was Snow White holiday edition...

Snow White and her Prince

Ice fishing. Our hotel was on the river so this was the view from our balcony.

Checking in

Our hotel

Famous monument on the 1000 bill

At the icon museum in the monastery

Cute church

Handmade statuettes

More beautiful churches

Locks of love

View of two rivers meeting.

Famous statue and beautiful church

Calling Santa!!!!

Our painted matrioshkas!

And last but not least, today we took a bus tour around Moscow. It was a cloudy and rainy so I didn’t take many pictures. And since we are going back to Red Square tomorrow, I’ll try taking pictures again!

So overall Moscow is ultra great! I had no idea what to expect but this place is seriously cool. The food is heavenly, the architecture is so different from anything I’ve ever seen, and all the activities we have planned are so fun. The people could be a bit friendlier and it would be fun to speak the language, but I get buy. Moscow rock on!