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We awoke to a grey blustery morning … and then it began to rain. Fortunately, by the time we’d had breakfast it had stopped, but it was quite a bit cooler, which was actually very pleasant. Chris has picked up a bit of a cold, but put on a brave face and soldiered on.

Zamoskvorechie – which means ‘Beyond Moscow River’ – stretches south from the bank opposite the Kremlin. First we stopped at the Cathedral of Christ the Saviour which was completed in 1997 in time to celebrate Moscow’s 850th birthday and replaces an earlier Cathedral built to celebrate the victory over Napoleon, which was destroyed by Stalin. A 315m high Palace of Soviets topped with a 100m statue of Lenin was planned for the site, but never materialised and the site was used as a swimming pool for 50 years. The new Cathedral is garish and opulent with gilding but somehow lacking in any heart.

From here we walked over Patriarshy most which crosses the Moscow River to Bolotny Island, spotting Dom na Naberezhnoy, a prestigious residential block in Soviet times …

… and the former Red October Chocolate factory, now a vibrant arts centre …

… as we crossed the island. We took a sightseeing boat from Tretyakov bridge down the river as far as the MOD of the Russian Federation …

… turned and came back passed the gargantuan statue of Peter the Great which was erected in 1997 to commemorate 300 years of the Russian Navy, and at 98m is the 8th tallest statue in the world.

Next was the Cathedral again looking sparklynin the sunshine …

… then the Kremlin and from the river gives a far better idea of how big it is.

There was a quick peek at St Basil’s …

… and another view of the Kotelnicheskaya Apartments …

… before turning into the Vodootvodny Canal to complete our trip round Bolotny Island passing a mixture of new developments, neo-classical restorations and building sites.

Disembarking, we crossed the bridge …

… and walked to a vegetarian restaurant called Sok where we had a lovely lunch of soup and warm mushroom salad, Hot Ginger for Chris to help his cold and Buckthorn punch with cardamom and cinnamon which came in a teapot for me. I’ve had this sea buckthorn a couple of times – apparently it is a super food with lots of vitamin C and this is what it looks like …

We made a fleeting visit to the Tretyakov Gallery which has been designed to resemble an exotic boyar castle. The gallery contains the biggest collection of Russian icons and prerevolutionary Russian art.

A distinct Russian icon tradition began with Theophanes the Greek and here is his Our Lady of the Don.

His student Andrei Rublyov became possibly the best Russian icon painter and his most famous work is the Old Testament Trinity.

Jumping forward to C19th, The Peredvizhniki or wanderers were the major artistic force.  They saw art as a force for national awareness and social change and included Ilya Repin, perhaps the best loved of Russian artists who painted social criticism, history and the famous and here is Religious Procession in the Kursk Province and a portrait of Tolstoy.

Returning to the river, we walked past the huge Peter statue and noticed how the decoration of boat helms reminded us of the Rostral Columns in St Petersburg.

We continued along the Krymskaya Naberezhnaya embankment past some reclaimed Soviet sculptures and a monument to the Victims of the Totalitarian Regime.

We walked as far as the gates to Gorky Park or officially ‘Maxim Gorky’s Central Park of Culture and Leisure’ which says it all – a huge variety of sports, dance classes and bike tracks as well as regular musical and theatrical festivals and a massive ice rink in the winter. Not that we saw any of it as the sky came over black and we headed instead for the metro.

Foolishly, as it happens, we made a detour to a phone shop to sort out our Russian SIMs that had stopped working, and the heavens opened.  So you remember all those pavement works … well those together with a lack of Health & Safety and a downpour resulted in people balancing on bricks on get passed of huge puddles that would have swallowed Dr Foster easily.

We got pretty wet on our way back, not good for a chap with a cold, and decided to eat in the hotel rather than venture forth once more!

We were prepared for there being lots to see and had bought our ticket online to skip the queue. The word Kremlin means citadel and while The Kremlin is in Moscow, kremlins can also be found in many other Russian towns. We entered through the Trinity Gate Tower …

… with the arsenal on the left

… and the State Kremlin Palace built in the 1960s for Communist Party congresses and now home to the Kremlin Ballet.

Policemen in blue shirts blew their whistles very loudly if anyone strayed where they shouldn’t or if a child climbed on a cannon … and there were some large cannons.

Walking a little further we found ourselves surrounded by white washed buildings and golden domes. There are three cathedrals and the Ivan the Great Bell Tower.

The Assumption Cathedral was the most important church before the revolution and all the church patriarchs are buried here, with frescos round the doorway.

The Archangel Cathedral was the coronation, wedding and burial church of the tsars.

The Annunciation Cathedral was built by Ivan the Great as the royal family’s private chapel and Ivan the Terrible added six more domes and corner chapels, making it a bit of a warren to look round.

No photos were allowed in any of the buildings so just to say the frescoes, soaring roofs and gilded icons were beautiful. We also caught a glimpse of the chimneys for the Terem Palace which was closed to visitors …

… and the stairway down which Peter the Great’s relatives were thrown onto the pikes of the Streltsy guard below, which might explain his dislike of Moscow.

Last but not least, we walked passed the huge Great Kremlin Palace to the Armoury containing tons of decorated gold and silver, armour and Faberge eggs  – but not as nice as those we saw in StP!

We returned to GUM for lunch and I finally found pod shuboi on the menu – literally ‘herrings in fur coats’ with slices of herring, beetroot and pickle in creamy sauce.

We went for a walk through Kitay Gorod, the oldest part of the city. Nikolskaya was pedestrianised in 2013,  and city authorities ordered the construction of a cosy European-style promenade with street lamps, benches and flower beds …

… and is home to the Synod Printing House where Russia’s first printed book was produced in 1564.

The very short Tretyakovsky proezd begins with an arch and was built privately by the famous art patrons, the Tretyakov brothers.

Next the former Detsky Mir (Children’s World) Department Store, once the main shopping center for children in the Soviet Union. Built in a Stalinist-era architectural style, visiting Detsky Mir was the dream of every child and it has recently been restored and reopened. Chris enjoyed it too!

The building opposite looked interesting too.

We passed TsUM (Central Department Store), another major Soviet-era shopping center which is now one of the most luxurious shopping malls in Russia.

Behind is the Bolshoi Theater …

… and across the road the lovely Art Noveau Hotel Metropol …

…and then the bus back.

Out for dinner, we went to Mari Vanna and were shown into another cosy interior rather like someone’s front room! A meal of salad and soup then pike cutlets for me and potatoes with mushroom for Chris and very nice it was too.

Our hotel is in Presnya, one of the oldest neighbourhoods in town.  Each day as we leave the hotel, we catch a glimpse of a golden dome and today we are going to take a look Church of the Grand Ascension, quite a smart church where Alexander Pushkin and Natalya Goncharova married – I said we would hear more about them.  He died six years later defending her honour in a dual – such passion, such romance! The couple are together forever in the Rotunda Fountain, erected to celebrate the poet’s 100th birthday.

The house of Maxim Gorky interested me more as it was advertised as an art noveeau treasure than because it was his house, but the trees outside obscured the tiling and we were too early for it to be open …

Next on the literary trail is Patriarch Ponds which is just a pretty little park with swings for children, a pond to push prams round and benches to linger. It also featured in the beginning of The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov which I started reading … but seem unable to get along with.

I usually try and find something relevant to read when we travel … but just didn’t fancy Pushkin, Tolstoy Dostoyevsky, Maxim Gorky or even Pasternak among a whole listing of authors, many I’d not heard of. I’m obviously not doing any better with Bulgakov! I had more success with books not by Russian authors, just about Russia like the Madonnas of Leningrad about a woman who helped in the evacuation of art from the Hermitage in WWII, and The Siege and The Betrayal by Helen Dunmore telling of Anna and Anton’s struggle trapped inside the besieged city of of Leningrad in 1941 and later how danger in Stalin’s Russia was never more than a twist of fate away, with Anton being sent to the Lubyanka Prison.  Other books on my reading list include Zoo about the official food-taster for the leader of the Soviet Union and The Bear and the Nightingale, a Russian fairytale but there never seems to be enough time!

Next we took a bus up to the Garden Ring, the road circling the centre of Moscow, where we saw a far more recent addition to Stalin’s sisters and another Soviet mural, this time the 17 Heroes of Moscow.

We have noticed in our wandering around the city what seems to be a very enthusiastic road cleaning programme and pedestrians beware – until one stops to think how much good it is to spray a fine mist of water with no sweeping …

I asked google to explain the phenomenon of the road and pavement spraying vehicles, which only seem to get everywhere slightly wet rather than actually washing the surfaces and there seems to be a possibility this is done with the intention of reducing heat in the city or maybe being a scheme that would prove a good employer – see what you think …

http://www.businessinsider.com/russian-cleaning-trucks-spray-water-microclimates-2015-9

… then to the Museum of Decorative & Folk Art, which was a little disappointing, but we enjoyed their collection of bears!

The temperature was hitting 30 in a mini-heatwave and we decided to pace ourselves especially as we have a big day tomorrow.  Instead, we did a little metro hopping on the way back, stopping at Mayakovskaya where the Art Deco design was based on a Soviet future as envisioned by the poet Mayakovsky. It also has 34 ceiling mosaics with the theme ’24 Hours in the Land of The Soviets’ …

… and Ploschad Revolyutsii, a dramatic gallery of bronze sculptures showing the roles of people in the revolution and in the world after. Apparently touching the dog’s nose is good luck!

It was Saturday evening and very lively as we wandered down the Arbat …

… and ate at Varenichnaya No1, decorated in retro Soviet style which seems all the rage in Moscow. They specialise in different types of dumplings, vareniki and pelmeni but also a some dishes with buckwheat and mine was so good, we might return so Chris can try the mushroom one.

One of the oldest sections of Moscow, Stary or Old Arbat dates from the 16th century.   Originally the street formed part of an important trade-route and was home to a large number of craftsmen, but by the 19th century it became a favorite district of the aristocracy, and a century later it became a shopping street. Today it is full of expensive cafes and tacky souvenir shops with artists wanting to draw your portrait or a cartoon … but there is often a mural you aren’t expecting!

The architecture in Moscow seems to be a really mixed bag. The city had to be rebuilt after a fire in 1812 and many of the new buildings were in the grandiose Russian Empire style. The end of the C19th brought the revival of early Russian styles which produced GUM and the State History Museum, followed by Style Moderne typified by the Hotel Metropol. Soviet constructivism brought buildings whose appearance was dependent on their function and materials – a new architecture for a new society and Melnikov’s own house in Moscow is a fine example. Stalin preferred neoclassical architecture echoing ancient Athens but also anything on a gigantic scale represented by the Seven Sisters, the gothic-style skyscrapers built just after WWII. Khrushchev condemned the excesses of Stalin and after this artitects favoured a bland international modern style … with no style.

Just off  Arbat we found the Melnikov House, created his home from two interlocking cylinders which required no load bearing wall. This gave an opportunity for experimental open plan living, but unfortunately the house was closed.

Further on, we came across the Church of the Saviour in Peski where a service was in progress. Pictures were not allowed, and I put on my headscarf to enter. The congregation, with all the women in skirts and scarves, generally stood, although there was a bench at the back for the elderly. There was also coming and going, with new people arriving, doing the rounds of the icons displayed on the pillars and bowing and kissing, then standing to listen to the priest, with more bowing and crossing themselves. The Church was covered in brightly coloured painting of saints and bible stories with an iconostasis at the front as with other churches we had entered. The service ended just after we left, and the bells were rung, with a similar pealing sound to those we had heard at Kizhi and I caught a snap of the bell ringer, wearing gloves and pressing down on the strings connecting the bells to make the sound.

Another walk along Arbat brought us to the beautiful empire-Style mansion that Alexander Pushkin lived in with his wife Natalya Goncharova after they wed – and more about them tomorrow.  Behind is the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, another of Stalin’s Seven Sisters.

Having walked to Smolenskaya, we took our first trip on the Moscow metro. Here we saw mosaics in the entrance, some rather pretty columns and a relief at the end of the platform depicting soldiers of the Red Army in battle …

… Kievskaya was next, a white marbled hall with panels showing idyllic Ukrainian rural life and a fresco at the end celebrating 300 years of Russian-Ukrainian cooperation …

… on to Slavyanskiy with Paris-Style Metro Art Noveau decorations on the platform …

… then back to Park Poebedy, with a mosaic of the 1812 victory over Napoleon at the end, and the deepest station in Moscow – 3 minutes on the escalator!

Park Poebedy is huge and commemorates the 50th anniversary of the Great Patriotic War as the Russians call WWII, filled with memorials, museums and fountains. The obelisk topped with St George killing the dragon, although it’s hard to make out, is 141.8m tall with every 10cm representing one day of the war.

On the 60th Victory Day celebrations, Putin unveiled 15 bronze canon symbolic of the war’s 15 fronts.

Beyond that, it was Saturday afternoon, nudging 30 degrees and everyone was out enjoying the park, the water, the sunshine and the shade!

Chris got hauled into a group of Moldavian ex-soldiers having a reunion in Moscow. This involved military salutes, hugs, vodka at 2pm in the afternoon, photos and new best friends with not a word in common!

Walking back we could see how Stalin’s high-rise plan had progressed as well as a triumphal Arch to Napoleon’s defeat in 1812.

One more metro station on the way back, the one closest to where we are staying – Arbatskaya, with a baroque feel, and at 250m, the second longest platform as it had been built as a bomb shelter.

Outside we passed a couple more buildings, a Moorish Castle built in 1899 for an eccentric merchant and this Soviet Style apartment block.

We returned here …

… which now we’ve got the hang of Cyrillic/Russian translation we now know is called Khachapurija, fitting really since we had an early dinner of khachapuri before heading to the  Kostoma Folk Show …

This was undoubtedly a tourist show but rather too stagecrafted making it hard to believe anything was authentic. Nonetheless, the costumes were stunning, the choreography slick and the male dancers athletic and it depicted Russian history and then  costumes and folk dances of different regions. Maybe if you visit Moscow, you might want to give this a miss – if not you might want to dress up!

We metro hopped on the way home and can share with you that Dostoyevsky is decorated with black-and-white panels featuring the main characters from his novels The Idiot, Demons, Crime and Punishment and The Brothers Karamaz …

… Maryina Roshcha station has a collection of mosaic pictures showing pastoral mosaic landscapes.

… and Trubnaya gives the impression of a traditional Moscow boulevard with illuminated stained glass mosaics of various historic Russian cities.

A short walk brought us to the Alexandrovsky Gardens …

and on to the Resurrection Gate with the tiny C18th Chapel of the Iverian Virgin in front …

The original 1680 gateway, together with Kazan Cathedral just the other side were destroyed because Stalin thought them an impediment to the parades and demonstrations held in Red Square but they were rebuilt in 1995. We passed through the entrance to Red Square and expected to be amazed by the size and scale of the place, but they are setting up a temporary arena for an International Tattoo next week so most of it is partitioned off, rather reducing its impact.

Red Square was established in the 15th Century, under the rule of Ivan III, and was originally called Trinity Square after the Trinity Cathedral, which used to stand on the site where St. Basil’s stands now. Sometime later the name ‘Krasnaya Ploschad’ became popular. The word ‘krasnaya’ is ambiguous. Originally meaning beautiful in old Russian, it only came to mean red in more modern times. Commonly-held assumptions then that the ‘Red’ in Red  Square referred to Communism, blood spilt – or even the colour of the monuments – are in fact misplaced! Oh, and it isn’t square, but rectangular!

So once inside, Kazan Cathedral is on the left and the huge Russian Revival red building on the right is the State History Museum.

Further into the square and the elaborate GUM facade runs for 240m down the left side. This huge store with three floors of very swanky shops topped with a glass roof is as spectacular now as it was when it was built in 1890. Pronounced goom, the initials GUM stood for the Russian words for State Department Store. When privatised in 2005, it was changed to Main Department Store, which fortunately also starts with a G!

At the end of the square is St Basil’s Cathedral, built by Ivan The Terrible to commemorate the capture of the Tatar stronghold of Kazan in 1558 on the Feast of the  Intercession.

It contains 9 main churches, with the Church of the Intercession being the central one … very tall, some 47m, but only small …

and and Church of St Vassily the Blessed (aka Basil) one of the most elaborate. Vassily was a holy fool who personally humiliated himself to the glory of god and was revered by Ivan.

The inside is like a maze with narrow corridors connecting the other chapels which commemorate various victories during the Kazan campaign and are arranged round the outside the central church.

From the back of the Cathedral, there is a view towards the Kotelnicheskaya Apartments, one of Stalin’s Seven Sisters, the foundations of which were laid in 1947 to mark Moscow’s 800th Anniversary. Stalin had decided Russia was falling behind the USA as far as tall buildings go, and ordered the construction of these to jump start the skyline! Their official name in Russian is high-rise as skyscraper was thought too foreign.

We went to GUM and had lunch in Stoylovaya 57 which offers a nostalgic re-creation of dining in post-Stalinist Russia. We had salads and bread and cake and it was all very good for £8.57!

We wandered through the length of the building …

… and out the other side in time for the hourly Changing of the Guard by Tomb of Unknown Soldier, whose soldiers must have trained at the Ministry of Funny Walks!

We passed the entrance to the site of Lenin’s Mausoleum but had no interest in seeing his embalmed body.

Our bus back took us passed what was Lubyanka Prison, the feared destination of thousands of innocent victims of Stalin’s purges, then headquarters of the infamous  KGB, and today the Federal Security Service.

I’d strained my calf muscle a couple of days ago and it hadn’t been too bad, but my ankle became a bit swollen and Chris raided the bar for ice and gave strict instructions about elevation and after a couple of hours it felt much better. Nonetheless, we decided to eat in the hotel and had a very nice meal, starting with vodka shots – for medicinal purposes of course! I tried Okroshka, a popular cold summer soup which comes with a neat pile of diced cucumber, potato, boiled egg, ham and herbs in the bowl. You are then offered kvas – fermented rye bread water or kefir – drinking yogurt to be poured round the outside. I find the kefir too creamy and chose kvas, which was very slightly effervescent and tart and very refreshing – a winner.

From humble beginnings as a trading post, Moscow’s strategic importance enabled it to blossom into an economic centre and become a regional capital early in the C13th. Then came the Golden Horde, an army of nomadic tribesmen led by the grandson of Genghis Khan, whose domination demanded tribute and allegiance.  Muscovite officials became tax collectors for the Mongols, and Moscow slowly prospered both economically and politically, consolidating various Slav states. By 1480, Prince Ivan III’s army was strong enough to refuse to pay tribute any longer and the yoke was broken. Ivan III was crowned ‘Ruler of all Russia’, earning him the name Ivan the Great. His grandson, Ivan IV was crowned Tsar of all the Russias and was known as Grozny, which usually gets translated as Terrible, but Formidable is closer. While his military victories helped tranform Russia into a multiethnic state, medical treatments gradually sent him insane and the last years of his reign proved ruinous. Russia entered a period of anarchy, chaos and famine known in Russia as ‘The Time Of Troubles’ which were brought to an end by the beginning of the Romanov dynasty, but Moscow took a back seat when the capital moved to St Petersburg.

Moving on a century, Moscow was rebuilt following Tsar Alexander I’s victory over Napoleon complete with a Triumphal Arch and an economic boom changed the city’s fortunes. Almost a century more and revolution arrived. After the Bolshevik coup in 1917, Lenin moved the capital back to Moscow and the abdicated Tsar Nicholas II and his family were shot. A civil war between the Bolsheviks Red Army and the White Army continued for six years culminating in the formation of the USSR but this brought an economic crisis that took its toll on the city and also on Lenin who died in 1924.

Stalin manouvered himself into the top job, launching a reign of terror, with an industrialisation campaign, collectivisation of the countryside and a new urban plan for Moscow with historic buildings destroyed, broad thoroughfares built and the metro begun.

Stalin’s death brought Khrushchev then Brezhnev and the Cold War when the Soviet Union competed with the USA in the arms and space race. Gorbachev brought change with perestroika and glasnost and this eventually brought the end of the USSR in 1991.

Yeltsin was the first president of the Russian Federation, followed by Putin and during this time, Moscow has weathered economic crises and political transitions, and more recently a focus on making the city a better place to live so we are looking forward to our visit.

The sapsan train took four hours to do 700km to Moscow. Billed as high speed, it’s certainly faster than all the other trains we’ve been on here but not quite a bullet train!

It then took 75 minutes to travel less than 6km on the bus to our hotel – maybe not the best transport choice in the rush-hour but it meant the least walking pulling cases. We spent most of this time at a standstill, giving us plenty of time to look about. We could admire the roadworks and new paving, no doubt in time for the footie fans next year.

But the last thing we expected to see, having travelled all round Kazakhstan, was a Sainsbury’s bag!

We finally got to Hotel Arbat and the receptionist was adamant he needed our visa registration form, but I said we didn’t need one and didn’t have one … so he rang the last hotel and said they would send it … and he seemed happy to check us in so that was all that mattered.

We checked out a couple of restaurants and ended up choosing this one for dinner, with a huge bread oven for cooking katchapuri, Georgia’s version of pizza,  Chris was delighted and the khatchapuri went very well with a bottle of Georgian wine.

So tomorrow we get to explore!