If not considering visit to relatives, I’d say you can spend 3 days in St.Pet. and go with a nighttrain to Moscow for two days.

quote:
Hi! I was only able to get 5 days off (excluding travel time to and from Russia and Manila)

Iam abosultly agree wth Andrew. 2 days’ for Moscow it’s anoth! ANd ofcause more days for St-Petersburg! Im sure u will enjoying time in Russia, espicialy in St-Petersburg. And if u cam in May’05, so u can get many interest things…cause from 1-10 May there are hollydas and u can see big Pared, great salute, Day’s Beer..B/Day of St-Petersburg.. and more…

It is not as suicidal as it feels.

I second Andrew’s opinion on two days in Moscow and three in St.
Petersburg. Each city has two major art museums, but IMHO
architecturally St. Petersburg is more attractive. In May daylight
hours will be considerably longer in St. Petersburg, so you’ll have
a chance to do and see many things in one day. Sure you will not be
disappointed!

I just came back from a 2 week Russian trip, and even that wasn’t enough time for the two cities. It takes 5 days just to wait in line for a ticket .

St P has a lot more to offer than Moscow, so as Andrew said 3 days there, night train then the remainder of Moscow is your best option.

quote:
It takes 5 days just to wait in line for a ticket .

roflmao

Whew, thanks, I feel reassured and can now plan for the trip in earnest. Was actually planning the 3 day St. P and 2 day Moscow thing too.

BTW, as for train tickets Moscow – St.Pet. is a popular route and especially if you’ll be going in the beginning of May (when we have several holidays in a row) you might face problems with train tickets. Thus is may be wise to ask your relatives to buy them in adbance.

Haven’t been to Moscow but from what I heard, people enjoy St Petersburg alot more. Plus St Petersburg is modelled like Rome, so there’s alot of sight seeing to do. The city is really modelled on Amsterdam but it has alot of architure which it ripped off from Rome.

have a look at :

http://www.ets-company.fi/english/news.htm

There is one supermarket mentioned in the itinary which we went to on way home from St Petersburg. I bought 2 cartons of cigarettes, 2 bottles of wine, and a slab of beer for 17Eur. Great City.

Plus there’s a million museums. From the chocolate museum to the hermitage museum where they have paintings from Rembrandt and Da Vinci.

If I have one peace of advice. Take the tour, you will enjoy the experience much more.

One thing I wanted to see but I didn’t was the bridges opening up at night. There are 22 of them and they open up some time during night to leave ships pass through.

If you are going to St Petersburg, the best time to go is during the summer. One is because the weather and two, they have some city festivals.

quote: Thus it may be wise to ask your relatives to buy them in advance.

Is that possible? I mean, wouldn’t they need mad-doc’s passport?

quote:
Plus there’s a million museums. From the chocolate museum to the hermitage museum where they have paintings from Rembrandt and Da Vinci.

And of cause museum of RUSS VODKA )))

Seraphim, I think they can go with a passport page faxed.

I just spent over 2 weeks in Russia and was able to take 2 day trips to St. Pete from our camp. We saw a lot by having a guide provided for us(a bonus with the camp I worked at) and walking around with her! Fabulous city!! I then traveled with 2 other people for 2 extra nights in St.P. and then took a 5 hour fast train from St.P. to Moscow which left at 4pm and got into Moscow at 9pm…cost was $47 or so. (The slow train left at 1 pm and took 8 hours but was cheaper and hence full…we were lucky that we wanted to take the fasster train). We emailed our passports ahead to our tour guide in St.P. and he was able to buy us our tickets in advance. Someone else thought that he would not be able to do this, but he had our train tix in hand when we showed up at his apt. St. P. is much better than Moscow! A must in St. Pete is the Summer Palace in Peterhof, just south of St.P!!! Peter the Great saw Versailles and he one-upped it!!! It was beautiful!! Moscow in 2 days is fine! Make sure to get up to the hill where Moscow University is, it is a hit with the locals because of the view!! and the University is lit up really neat at night!! A suggestion is to look up a guy in Moscow named "Moscow Rick" , he has places to rent out and knows of a lot of places to go for good times, he has a website enjoymoscow.com I hope it still works. If not, I can get you a phone # for him.

I have to second the suggestion to see the bridges at night…it is a big thing! Be careful of corrup police in St.P and in Moscow…it is documented, and was in the news in St.P. when we were there. The look for tourists(especially those who are walking around alone) and have scam to make money if you don’t have a validated Visa with you. People suggest to get the Visa validated in both cities, but because it apparently takes 48 hours to get done, it is basically impossible to do at all. Just avoid the police on Red Square and you will be fine!

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Be careful of corrup police in St.P and in Moscow…it is documented, and was in the news in St.P. when we were there.

This isn’t really a problem in St P, but in Moscow they do prey on tourists. What I did was simply carry around a photocopy of my passport and when the cops asked, I simply told them my visa was being registered @ the hotel and thats why I had a photocopy. Worked like a charm, and I never bothered to register my visa (saved 30$)

It took me one whole day for the Hermitage.
One day for St issacs cathedral and summer palace…

Moscow is fine with 2 days…2 hour waiting for lenin’s tomb and 3 hours at the Kremlin….

do watch the ballet in petersburg..really really good.

Of course I went to see the Russian circus …..

quote:
Of course I went to see the Russian circus …..

Go to Moscow,Circus on Cvetnoj bul’var (Color avenue). Theris the best circus shows.I love that circus!