Hut to Hut hiking in Austria

Already our summer is over and I have so much to say about what we have done and where we have been for the last 7 weeks! We just returned a week or so ago from a long and fun summer vacation in first Finland and then Austria. I hope to write about the whole trip in pieces if I can make the time, but I'm starting with a piece that happened towards the end of our trip.

We have done lots of hiking in our lives, and a fair amount of backpacking too. But this seemed like the perfect European adaptation: spend the day hiking through beautiful scenery and at your journey’s end enjoy a hot meal, a cold beer and a comfortable bed in an alpine hut. A lighter pack to carry, no cooking involved, no dishes, no night after night of set-up and take-down of camping equipment. This was something we wanted to try!

It proved harder to plan than I thought it would be. This seems to be a mode of travel that hasn’t really found its place on the internet. Google “hut to hut hiking Austria” and you will find plenty of sites that extol the benefits of this pastime, and other sites that advertise lots of different huts to choose from, but hardly anything on routes. We wanted to spend several days going from hut to hut to hut and I was hoping that I could just copy someone else’s tried and true trip. I found a route called the Eagle Walk in Tirol that perhaps looked promising, but on digging into it farther it was too challenging for our family; maybe someday in the future. I found a website that listed “nearby huts” for each hut listed, but that really wasn’t enough information to build a plan around. Finally Hedi suggested that we look in a certain area, Schladming, that has lots of beautiful hiking. When I narrowed my search to that one area, I found exactly one suggested route, “4-day hike in Obertal Valley”, which was “suitable for families and children.” https://www.schladming-dachstein.at/en/holiday-activities/summer/hiking-climbing/4-days%20Family%20Hike%20in%20Obertal%20valley_tour14955517#dmdtab=oax-tab3

The next step in planning was to secure our overnight huts in successive nights. If there wasn’t enough space in the specific huts on this route then I didn’t have a Plan B route! Booking huts is old school – no online reservations - so I emailed each hut and waited for responses. Lucky us, all three huts were available on our dates.

The day before the hike began we were ready to think about logistics. Where would we park our car for four days? How would we get to and from the car to the trail? I knew there was a hikers’ bus that we could take to the trailhead, but we weren’t sure where we were allowed to park our car overnight. We devised two options. Option 1: Park in a €7/day lot in Schladming and take the bus to and from the trail. The bus only runs every 2 hours so we would need to be precise on the first day and patient on the last. Option 2: Drive close to the trailhead and park at an Alm (alpine restaurant) that is closed for the summer. Walk to the trailhead or ride the bus one stop. Not knowing for sure if we could legally park at the alm, and figuring we wouldn’t mind hanging out to wait for the bus at the end of our hike since the last day’s hike finishes at another alm where we could have coffee or beer or desserts, we chose option 1. But after paying €28 for parking in Schladming we were hit with another sticker shock - €20 bus ride each way!! Wow, we had assumed a bus ride would cost a couple of bucks. Note to self: don’t assume that a bus is a cheap option. As it turns out, we could have and should have driven our car right up to the alm at the end of the hiking route, where there was a large and free parking lot. This was actually marked on the map, but we just weren’t sure until we saw it that it was large enough for us to leave our car there. We hadn’t wanted to drive all the way up only to find the spaces all taken, and then we would have to drive back down and wait two more hours because we would have missed the bus. This felt like a painful and expensive mistake, €70 just to get to and from the trailhead, but these are the travel mistakes you make that you just have to sigh and say “oh well, next time.” Sometimes you choose the safe option and it turns out not to be the best choice, but you made the best decision you could with the information you had.

At the trailhead

So on to the hike! Day one had some serious uphill! I was dripping sweat as we trudged constantly and steeply uphill. There were almost 2000 feet of elevation gain in the first two miles of the hike! My feet seem to have grown a half size since I last wore my hiking boots, and they rubbed my heels with every uphill step. We had to stop about halfway and apply moleskin, and I suffered from blisters for the remainder of the trip. Guess I need some new bigger boots! Eventually the steepness leveled out and we were in a wide valley with a beautiful stream running through it. The kids were troopers and they didn’t complain much during this challenging start to our hiking trip. Taking a cue from our bike ride reward system in Finland, we stopped every 2 km to celebrate with a sugar gummy apple ring and this seemed to do a good job of motivating them. 

The trails are well sign-posted showing the direction to
the various points of interest, the difficulty of the trail
(blue, red or black) and the approximate amount of time it
might take to hike there (of course our slow party took way
more time than the signpost suggested...

The beautiful valley we found at the top of the steep part of our hike

A toast of beer and hot chocolate on the deck at the
Ignaz-Mattis hut

We made it to our first destination, the Ignaz-Mattis hut by around 3:30 and since we hadn’t brought a lunch on the trail, we scarfed down a big meal outside on the deck. Then we decided to clean up; the hut offered €4 hot showers which Carter opted for, but Haley and I decided to try a dip in the beautiful Giglachsee lake instead. Oh my gosh, talk about frigid!!! We hyperventilated our way a few steps in and then the lake dropped off to about my chest level. We both dunked quickly, screaming, and then raced out of the water before our hearts could freeze. I had brought a bathing suit in case we were able to swim in the mountain lakes; no need to carry that weight next time! We rinsed out some laundry to wear again another day and hung it on the provided laundry line to dry in a stiff wind. It was about 5:30. 

The hut's menu "Ignaz-Mattis-Hütte, 1986m", with a
Schladminger beer, the region's local brewery

Hmmm – now what??? This is the part of the trip that we did not anticipate at all. When you’re backpacking you arrive at your campsite, set up camp, cook your dinner, clean up the dishes, clean yourself, and then it’s pretty much time to relax a little with a book and go to sleep. But with hut hiking there are hardly any chores to do. How do you fill your whole evening? I had thought we might swim or maybe tackle an extra hike to visit one of the mountain lakes or summit a surrounding peak. But the lakes were freezing and we were exhausted from a tough climb, definitely not up for any more hiking. It was chilly and very windy outside, not exactly good for hanging out, and inside there was very little space. Our room was tiny, only fit for sleeping – a bunk bed, a single bed, and an extra mattress on the floor in the middle. We couldn’t even pass the time eating, because we had eaten so much when we arrived that we were too full to eat dinner! And the final blow: Haley and Carter both finished their books the first night and had nothing else to read! So, another lesson learned: when hut hiking, bring lots of books and some small games to pass the evening hours! Thankfully Haley found a deck of Uno cards stuck down in her backpack. We played a few hands of Uno and then tried to fall asleep with the sounds of raucous merrymaking from the other guests having dinner and drinks in the meal room downstairs. Later the windy night blew into a storm and thunder and lightning crashed outside.

The view of the upper and lower Giglachsee lakes, as seen from the Ignaz-Mattis hut. We came up to the hut from the
valley to the left of the lakes; on our second day we walked down to the right and around the far side of the lakes, then
up and over those mountains in the back.

View of the lakes from the window in our Zimmer

Dan stands in our tiny Zimmer. Bunk beds
on the left, a single bed on the right. My bed
was a mattress pulled out from under the
bunks that sat on the floor between the
beds.

By the morning the rain was mostly gone. The other guests were mostly gone too! People were up and gone so early that it really made me wonder – where are they going? How far do they have to hike? Why get up and leave so early? They must have all been going a lot farther than we were. Which brings me to a comment about the other guests at these huts: I was very impressed with their fitness and stamina. I consider us to be an active family, reasonably fit and capable of moderately demanding physical activity on a vacation. But this “family friendly” hiking route which “caters especially to families with younger kids” kicked our butts! And we didn’t even do the suggested sidetracks in the trail description. I know we have lost some of our hiking stamina from being away from Montana for a few years, but I was surprised at how challenging this route was. Not terribly far distance-wise, but lots of elevation gain in a short distance (read: steep) and challenging footing. Dan and Carter managed a little better because they have been doing some hiking with Carter’s scout group, but still the first two days of hiking were the most challenging I would ever consider planning for our kids at this age. And yet there were other families staying in the huts with us who were doing the same or similar route, and they were faster than us: got up earlier, moved more quickly, seemed unphased by the steepness of the route. There was one little girl from Holland who was only 6! (Turning 7 next week but still…) Maybe we are wimpier than I thought…

After skipping dinner the night before, we were looking forward to a big breakfast spread to fuel us for the day’s hike. We had to pay our bill before going to sleep and had been shocked to discover that the price for breakfast was €10 for adults and €7 for the kids. So we were expecting a feast for that price. I suppose I have set you up now to be able to guess that we were sorely disappointed. For that price we got 1 cup of coffee or tea each and brown bread with either butter and jam or cheese and cold cuts. What a ripoff! 

If you look closely you can see a building on the hill to the left of the lake.
That's our hut and in this photo we have hiked down to lake level and are
walking around the lakes

Our second day of hiking was beautiful but just as challenging as the first. It started with an easy loop around the lakes below our hut but quickly turned into an ascent of the Rotmandlspitze (Red [something] Peak). The wind was so strong as we were hiking up the mountain that we often had to stop and brace ourselves so we wouldn’t blow over. At the top we were rewarded with the most beautiful view in all directions! The day was clear after the overnight storm and we could see row after row of mountains. At the summit there was a metal box which contained a log book, and we all signed our names. We ate some snacks, took lots of pictures, and then began the steep, steep hike down the other side of the saddle. At one point I stepped on a piece of ground that gave way and I fell. I was okay but I had strained my calf muscle. Two girls in their late teens who we had met earlier on the trail came along quickly and one offered to let me use her anti-pain spray. It was basically like an aerosol version of Bengay that she said she had brought along because she had sprained her ankle two weeks before the trip. I sprayed some on my leg; not sure it had any healing properties but it felt good anyway and the injury was so minor it didn’t bother me. Dan shook his head laughing that out in the Austrian wilderness we had managed to find someone peddling essential oils!

Dan makes his way through a field of purple wildflowers

Up, up, up 

Carter uses the provided rope to scale a
particularly steep piece of rock 

Looking down on the Knappenseen lakes. We were supposed to take a
trail detour and go to those lakes but we were too tired to get off
the main trail and do the extra hiking!

Dan stands atop the summit with row after row of mountains in view

The metal box with the summit log book

Haley signs the book

On the way down through the scree

Going down was tougher for Haley than going up, and we soon fell way behind Dan and Carter. We could see our next overnight hut, the Keinprechthütte, resting in the valley at the bottom, and I could also see a black storm blowing in, so I tried in vain to get Haley to hurry so we could reach the hut before the storm got to us. Thankfully the black clouds stayed always to the left of us and it didn’t storm until after we were safely in bed for the night. 

Using the rope on a steep downhill

In the direction of the dark clouds 

On the way down: tiny Dan and Carter on the trail on the right, our destination is the hut above the lake on the left

One of the Lager rooms at the Keinprechthütte

This is probably a good time to talk about the beds in alpine huts. When I was making room reservations, I didn’t yet know that there were two kinds of accommodations in Austrian huts. A “Zimmer” is a private room, meaning you get to sleep behind a door (the door is pretty much your only amenity). Everyone else sleeps in a Lager (Lagerplätze), which is basically a row of beds in an open room (Kappa sisters think sleeping porch). Not knowing this distinction ahead of time, I failed to reserve a Zimmer for us, or indeed to ask if the huts even had Zimmers (some only have Lagerplätze). Lucky for us, the first night our hostess led us directly to a room, albeit a tiny one in which there were only 3 beds and we had to put the fourth mattress on the floor. Thank goodness, because we hadn’t brought comfortable sleeping attire that would have been appropriate to wear to sleep out in the open! And, since 3 out of 4 of us snore, it was much better to confine our own snoring to our own room, and to avoid the snoring of the multitudes out in the Lager. Not to mention changing clothes, reading at night, falling asleep and waking up when we wanted to, etc. The second night, our hostess said “I have a surprise for you” and led us to a Zimmer. Whew! It seems that maybe I didn’t reserve a certain type of room but we were somehow awarded the Zimmer. Our luck ran out the third night and I had chosen a hut without any Zimmers, only Lagerplätze, but we ended up deciding not to stay there, more on that in a minute.

What I did know about sleeping in the huts was that we all needed to bring Hüttenschlafsäcke – “hut sleeping bags”. The huts provide a mattress, blanket and pillow but no sheets, and for both your protection and theirs they require that you bring your own hut sleeping bag. You can buy fancier ones if you want to, but ours are just thin polyester rectangles that you climb inside to put fabric between you and the mattress and blanket. There’s a slit in the top to enclose a pillow and Velcro straps on the side to seal yourself in. Ours came in multiple colors with a matching stuff sack, so the kids and I had fun each picking out a different color. They were super light and easy to carry, and since the stuff sacks matched the color no one could steal anyone’s bag and claim “no, yours is lost; this is mine!”

Back deck of the Keinprechthütte

Our second night was better than the first. We found the staff at the Ignaz-Mattis Hütte to not be terribly friendly, and we felt cramped with having to place a mattress on the floor in our room in what would have otherwise been the only floor space. The food was just okay, and we felt isolated from the other guests since we didn’t go down to the common room for dinner. Dan and I had tried to go down for an evening cup of tea but had found every table occupied and no one looking like they wanted us to join them. At the Keinprechthütte we felt immediately welcomed by the hosts, and we also recognized several other groups of people who had spent the previous night with us. We spent the first hour after completing our hike sipping beer (adults) and hot chocolate (kids) on the patio while swapping stories with the other hikers about the gusting wind and the beautiful summit. Dinner worked differently at this hut; there was a limited menu and when we arrived at the hut we pre-ordered what we wanted to eat. The kids had hoped to eat schnitzel the first night but it hadn’t been on the menu. This second night it was on the printed menu but not offered on the limited menu we were given. Dan expressed disappointment to our hostess and she paused for a minute, then promised she would rustle up two portions of schnitzel for our kids but not to tell anyone! 

We were told that dinner would be served between 5 and 5:30, so we did a quick splash-wash in the wash room. Both huts had a wash room, one for men and one for women where you could splash yourself off next to a big sink, and could also rinse out your laundry. The wash room water was freezing at the first hut but warm at the second. Seating in the cozy dining room was communal and we shared our table with an older couple from Austria who were kind enough to speak slowly so we could understand their accents (so different from the Berlin accent!) After a dinner of schnitzel (kids) and gulasch (parents), we hung around outside in the nice evening air for a little while. I met a man from Berlin who was traveling with his family along some of our same route. It came out in conversation that he graduated from high school the same year as me, and he spent his last year of high school in Texas just like me (he was in San Antonio, I was in Houston). We talked about appreciating different cultures and the value of having the experience of living abroad. His English was great so he could help if I needed a word or two, but our conversation was primarily in German. I have gotten a LOT of practice with my German during this vacation, especially since I’m not dependent on Dan anymore for conversation and we can split up and talk to different people.

Guard bunny: this adorable rabbit stretched out in the evening behind the hut, surveying his territory

Snuggly under the cabin blanket

Haley poses with the sparse breakfast 

After night fell the weather worsened. Once again there was a storm overnight and we were glad to be safe inside and not sleeping in tents. We wondered if our breakfast at the first hut was an anomaly and maybe we would receive more for the price this time, now €10.50 for 3 of us and Haley free. But alas, Dan (always the first to wake) returned to the room to report to us that it was the same.

The weather forecast had been pretty awful for our entire almost 3 week trip, and we had expected a very wet hiking experience, so we were so glad and thankful that our first two tough days of hiking weren't done in the rain, and that the rain came only at night. But on the third day the rain continued into the morning, and the forecast looked pretty bad that day and much worse the next day. Our plan had been to do a very short hike to our third hut, the Fahrlechütte, and then spend the night and hike out and take the bus to our car the following day. But with the ugly forecast and such a short hike we decided we might rather get on out of the mountains and spend the night somewhere in town in a hotel. We forged a new plan to hike to the hut, have lunch, and then make a final decision.

This last day of hiking took us down off the mountain into a valley, only to climb back up again on the other side. The terrain was very different in this area, pine forest with vegetation that likes the wet: ferns, moss, mushrooms. It rained off and on. It was just a little over 5k to the hut, so we reached it before noon.

A perfect mushroom along the trail, just like
a smurf house

Day 3, rainy

The Fahrlechütte has a deck built right over the lake. We
almost sat out there but thought better of it with the
occasional bursts of rain.

At the Fahrlechütte we sat down to lunch and to decide what to do next. It was a pretty spot, and I was in favor of spending the day at the lake, reading and watching the storm come in with a nice bottomless cup of coffee or tea. There were just a couple of problems with that plan. First of all, only Dan and I had reading material. Second, the coffee at the huts was priced such that one small cup was the maximum I was willing to shell out for, no such thing as refills. And finally we discovered that there had been a miscommunication with my overnight reservation at the hut. I thought I had accepted their lodging offer, but they thought my response was ambiguous, so they hadn't reserved us a place. They may or may not have had room for us anyway, but we learned that this hut didn't have any Zimmers, only Lagerplätze, and Dan and the kids weren't feeling adventurous enough to embrace the group sleep experience. We decided to hike the final 2-3 kilometers and find a hotel to stay in for the night.

Fahrlechütte on the edge of the Duisitzkarsee lake

Waterfalls cascade down the mountain as clouds and rain move through the valley

Hard to tell from this picture but the waiter in the blue vest is
wearing leather shorts (lederhosen). The staff at all the huts
all wore traditional clothing. 

Soon we had reached our final destination, the Eschachalm. We sat down for a slice of cake while we waited for the bus. It came without incident, we paid our €20, and made it back to our car in Schladming. We used booking.com, our favorite source of lodging, to find a place to spend the night. Thank goodness we weren't up on the ridge that day and night! The rain was pouring down and thunder was crashing. There was even hail. Definitely dangerous weather to be outside in, much less for being exposed on a mountain. We got so so lucky to be able to hike almost our whole route in relatively nice weather.

I'm so glad we tried hut to hut hiking, but I have mixed opinions on whether or not I think I would do it again. Here are some considerations on hut hiking vs. backpacking.

• Cost - Backpacking is cheap, and I tend to think of "natural" experiences as being cheap. But hut hiking is not cheap. If you do it a lot, it's worth your while to join a hiking club, alpinverein, which gives you discounts on your lodging. But otherwise it's about €75/night for the four of us to stay in a hut. Cheaper than a lot of hotels, sure, but you don't get much for that money. Advantage: Backpacking
• Comfort - The older I get, the less I like sleeping on a ground pad in a sleeping bag in a tent. The hut at least provides a mattress, and also a toilet (shared with 10 or 15 other people, but still). Advantage: Hut
• Effort - One of the toughest things about backpacking is, literally, carrying everything you need on your back. Not having to carry your own food, pots and pans, plates, cups and sleeping materials is glorious. We still had to carry a very full daypack with snacks, clothes, toiletries, raingear, emergency gear, water, etc., but it was tolerably light compared to a big pack. I also didn't miss having to put up and take down a tent and roll and unroll sleeping bags and ground pads every day one single bit. Advantage: Hut
• Privacy - When you are backpacking (in Montana at least) you can often be alone at your destination, or at least with just a few other small groups of people. And there is privacy in your tent so you can dress and sleep on your own. It's very hard to be alone in Europe, even in the mountains! At the huts there is next to no privacy. The washroom and toilet are shared with others of your gender, the common areas are, of course, communal, and unless you are lucky enough to have a Zimmer your sleeping area is also shared. This is too much togetherness for my liking. I prefer to sleep away from strangers, even if it is on the ground in a tent. Advantage: Backpacking
• Social - A direct counterpoint to privacy, staying in huts provides the opportunity for social interaction. Typically I like to interact with the people I came with, not strangers, but I will admit that I did meet some interesting people at the second hut. Still, advantage: Backpacking
• Food - Hearty Austrian food, beer and wine at the end of a tiring day of hiking was one of the primary draws to this experience. But I have to say that it wasn't as fantastic as it sounds. The food was good but not great, and we had to spend so much money on it that it definitely dampened the pleasure quite a bit. There's something extremely satisfying about pulling out your bunsen burner, heating up a plastic bag full of dehydrated chili or some such, and scarfing it down out of your collapsible bowl as you sit by a lake somewhere at night. And certainly we can make a much cheaper and tastier camp breakfast than we were offered at the huts. Advantage: Backpacking

So it seems from this list that I would lean towards backpacking rather than hut to hut hiking. Of course this is a moot point because there's not really any such thing as backpacking in Europe where there's not exactly real wilderness. And there are very few examples of overnight hut stays in the US. So I guess when in Rome I will do as the Romans do!

P.S. In Montana we are always on the lookout for bears when we hike. But in Austria you have to watch out for cows! 

Dangerous cows ahead

Glad to be back in the west!

Grand Cascade at Peterhof Palace

When we first moved to Berlin, over dinner one night, our family went around the table and took turns saying 3 places we wanted to visit while we were living in Europe. St. Petersburg, Russia went on that list, and a few weeks ago we fulfilled the wish.

I probably wouldn't have planned this trip if I had known how much extra work and planning it would be. Russia is the only country we have visited that requires a visa to enter, and the application process is confusing, tedious, expensive, and time-consuming. First of all, you need an invitation to enter the country. Some hotels will issue the invitation and provide you with the necessary paperwork, so the first step was to secure lodging. I found a website that promised free visa support paperwork if you book one of their partner accommodations so I went that route. Next I bought flights on S7, a Russian airline. Reserving lodging and buying plane tickets took extra long for this trip, because each step requires that you enter passport information for each person.

After receiving the support documents from the lodging website, I got started on the visa applications. There were about 10 different sections of questions I had to answer, many of which I didn't fully understand and had to research online. I wasn't sure how specific I needed to be; could/would they try to verify my answers? Would they deny my visa if I answered in a way they didn't like? Would they deny it if I omitted something, accidentally or on purpose, and they discovered it? For example, "Are/were you a member of a professional, civic or charitable organizations or do you cooperate/cooperated with any of these organizations?" Talk about a broad question! I could spend hours answering this - is that necessary? In the end I decided to list only a token one. I also had to list every educational institution I have attended, and my past three places of employment, including address, phone number, supervisor's name, and dates of employment. I dug up old resumes to answer these questions, and googled the businesses to find their current addresses and phone numbers. They wanted to know which countries we have visited in the last 10 years, and the date of the visit. Really?! 10 years??? That is Haley's entire life. We have been all over the place since we have moved to Europe, and some of us have been on trips that the others haven't, for example Dan has traveled for business. Do I really need to list all this???! And if we have been places more than once, do I need to list them each time we visited?? So many uncertainties. In this case I decided to do it. So I went back through our picture archive looking for trip photos in order to compile a list of countries with dates. Mexico, Argentina, Chile, Kenya, Czech Republic, Austria, Italy, Denmark, Austria, Spain, Slovakia, Croatia, United States, Austria, France, Italy, Kenya, Hungary, Greece, United States, Austria, France, Netherlands. Whew!

The next snag I came across was a question about travel insurance abroad. I wasn't sure if our health insurance would cover Russia, and if it didn't would we be denied our visa? It took several days of back and forth with our insurance company and Dan's company to find out that our insurance doesn't cover Russia but that we had supplemental insurance that would cover it. I contacted them and got them to send me a certificate verifying coverage during our travel period. Another week had gone by.

Finally I thought I had answered the questions to my satisfaction and submitted the online application, planning to make an appointment at the Russian embassy to apply for the visas. Luckily the online interface allows you to duplicate your application, so I didn't have to start from scratch for each of the 4 of us; I could start with my application and make changes to the others as needed. Of course the kids' applications were much less complex because I didn't have to fill out the work and secondary education history, military service, etc. But after all the applications had been submitted, I realized that there were no available appointments at the embassy for the foreseeable future. There is another option in Berlin, a visa service center, which charges a fee for their services but had available appointments. But any change to the application, including a change of the location of application, requires that you create a new application ID and resubmit the paperwork. So I changed the location to the visa service center and then resubmitted everything, times 4. After some confusion over the online interface and some back and forth in Russian, German, and not very good English, I made an appointment at the visa services center to submit all our paperwork: passports, 4-8 page application documents, visa support documents, proof of residency in Germany, proof of health insurance valid in Russia, and a bank account statement (presumably to show that we have money in Germany and wouldn't be interested in giving it up by overstaying our visas in Russia and never returning to Germany).

The visa can be denied for any error and you aren't allowed to make manual corrections by pen, so I sat down with all the papers and looked over them again with a fine-toothed comb. Something caught my eye - was the Land Voucher # the same for all of us?? No, it was a copy and paste error! We each have a different number on our support documents! I opened up each application online, duplicated it, got a new application ID, changed the Land Voucher #, resubmitted the documents, times 4. I caught a couple of other small errors and had to repeat the process; you get the picture, this was tedious and time-consuming!!! Maybe even more so than it is to read about it. ;)

The hard-won Russian visa!

And still there was one more problem with the visas. It turns out that on the day of my application appointment, Dan and his passport were scheduled to be in the United States. Although I had started this process in February, it was now only a few weeks before our end-of-May trip. I knew it would take several weeks to get the visas returned to us, so we were already cutting it close, but it would be even closer for Dan because he wouldn't be able to apply until he returned from the U.S. I went to the Mitte office at my appointment time and turned in the applications for myself and the kids. I tried to schedule a later appointment for Dan, but I couldn't get a time that was soon enough for our trip. They told him just to walk in first thing in the morning, which made us nervous (if that's the case why did we need an appointment?) but thankfully everything went smoothly from here. The visas were approved, took only 8 days to process, and I was able to pick them up with no wait time about a week before our trip.

And so the day arrived. May 25, the day after my birthday, we flew to St. Petersburg direct from Berlin. Easy! Figuring out a cab to our apartment was a little challenging, but not worse than navigating any other location where you don't speak the language and aren't quite sure what to do. The cab dropped us off at the address, but we weren't sure what to do then. The man we were renting from had told me to call him from the airport, which I had done. But now there was no sign of him. Hmmm. We looked for him in the convenience store next door and up and down the street. I called him again, and this time he said he would be there in 5 minutes. When he got there, he led us through a locked gate into a dingy, run-down courtyard. Hmmm. Then he unlocked an ill-fitting heavy metal door and led us up a dark staircase that stank of musty urine. Hmmm. We entered the apartment, which smelled only slightly better than the hallway and were given a tour. It was spacious enough, but had no real bedroom; only a loft, a futon, and a pullout couch. Hmmm, why didn't I notice that when I booked it? He told us the drain in the shower didn't drain well but was no problem. There was no soap or shampoo. Hmmm. He asked if I would pay with cash or credit card. We had picked up 5000 rubles at the airport which sounded like a lot, so I told him "either". I hadn't done the math yet to convert Euros to rubles, so I wasn't sure how much cash I actually needed.  He sat at the kitchen table and did the conversion, which ended up being 23,000 rubles. "Oh, I don't have anywhere near that much," I told him. I would rather pay with a credit card. "No, you can't," he said. "Cash only." Wait, what? You just gave me the option! "Cash only," he said. You can only take out 5000 rubles at a time from an ATM, so to make a long story short, I had to visit 2 different ATMs and make 5 different transactions to pull out the cash to pay him. After returning to Berlin, I checked my bank statement and Deutsche Bank charged me €5.99 for each withdrawal. The trip wasn't off to a good start.

Our living room with the pullout couch.
Looks nicer than it smelled.

Our apartment was on the second floor, left side, at the back.
This courtyard was far from inviting, but we didn't have
any issues.

Russian beer, nice ambience

After checking in, we went to lunch nearby at a dumpling place called Pelmenya, which serves dumplings from around the world including the namesake pelmeni, a small meat-filled Russian dumpling. This meal was a highlight of our trip. We ate dim sum from China, khinkali from Georgia, vareniki from Russia, and gedza from Japan. Unfortunately Haley wasn't feeling well, so she hardly ate and after lunch she and Dan went back to the room so she could rest and sleep. Carter and I wandered the Nevsky Prospect, the main drag of St. Petersburg, following the Rick Steves walking tour. After about an hour and a half, Carter's touring limit had been reached so I took him back to the room and he stayed with Haley while Dan and I went back out. Normally we are totally fine leaving the kids in the hotel for a while, but given the questionable safety of our apartment location we were nervous to do this. We checked in frequently, and thankfully all was okay.

Drinking the broth from khinkali

Closeup of the picture on the wall next to our table
depicting a dumpling meal

Dan and I continued the walking tour and got a feel for some of the sights in the area, but also got a feel for how large and crowded the city is. I hadn't really thought about its size prior to our visit, but St. Petersburg is the 2nd largest city in Russia, with more than 5 million people. I think it had the busiest sidewalks of any city I have visited. We were usually walking in a crowd, especially on Nevsky Prospect, and when we piled up at a street crossing to wait for the light to change, once it did a veritable sea of people would always be coming across from both sides, making each person navigate their way around row after row of oncoming pedestrians. It was here that I began to notice that I seemed to be the one to always step out of the way of the person coming at me. This is a peculiarity that I noticed during our stay in Russia: walking seemed to be a game of chicken, and I got the impression that the person who stepped out of the way was the weaker one. Is it a cultural thing that every encounter on the street is a chance to prove your strength? I also noticed that personal space is less sacred, and no apology seemed necessary for bumping into someone else, even roughly.

Even more than the crowds we noticed the noise. There was a lot more auto traffic than I'm used to, and there was a steady din of engine noise, punctuated frequently by an ear-splittingly loud motorcycle revving (often while popping a wheelie to show off.) Add the microphoned salespeople hawking tour boat rides in Russian and the blaring of music from cars or apartments and you get the picture. This video doesn't really do it justice, but it shows how loud it is even in this peaceful-looking setting right on the water near the Winter Palace with relatively little traffic.

Saturday morning we were scheduled to meet our tour guide at 9:00. I had figured that with the language and alphabet barrier we might do well to spend one of our days with a guide, plus there was so much history to cover that I thought a guide would be able to pull it all together for us in a meaningful way, and also keep the kids entertained. I guess that was a lot to ask. Again, the day didn't start well. We were late getting out of the apartment due to slow-moving children (nothing new there. A side note: on every vacation the kids never get up and get dressed when they are supposed to, and inevitably we end up angry and late as we leave the hotel. I distinctly remember doing this when I was a child. Dad would wake me up and I would go back to sleep, lying there for as long as possible and thinking that if he was letting me do it, it must be okay. Until he would start yelling that we were late and why didn't we get up when we were supposed to??? Dad reads my blogs of course, so I'm sure this phenomenon is very familiar to him. Maybe this happens in all families??) Anyway, we weren't sure what Russians eat for breakfast or where to go, so I went out ahead and scouted for a place. I had found a place close by with an English menu and they had told me that we could have breakfast in as little as 15 minutes, so when everyone was finally ready we went straight there. But it took a while to get menus, and way longer before they took our order, and way, way, way longer before any of our food or drinks were brought. In fact, only the kids got food. I asked 4 times for milk for my coffee before I finally got it. When we finally realized that they weren't going to bring our food and we asked about it, they begrudgingly brought mine but by now it was past time to meet our guide so Dan cancelled his order. Was this just poor service? Or something more? After 3 days in St. Petersburg we came to feel that we were unwelcome in the restaurants and therefore were served poorly. We were consistently served after other patrons or not at all. More on this later.

Things continued on the wrong foot when we met our guide. "So, where does your interest in the Bolshevic revolution come from?" he asked me. Ummmm....I wasn't sure how to answer the question. I told him what I had told the owner of the company when I booked the tour: that we were interested in all of Russian history, from the tsars through the world wars, to the cold war and communism, and into the modern era. I told him the kids knew of Catherine and Peter the Greats through the computer game Civilization, that we had traveled to Normandy to learn about World War II history there, and that we currently lived in Berlin where we were pretty familiar with the cold war. So we were interested in broadening our knowledge of all these things we already knew about and learning more about the Russian side of the history. "Oh," he said. "I was told you wanted an in-depth tour of the 1917 revolution, so I figured you were professors or doctoral students." My heart sank. This was going to be a long day. As with the apartment, the taxi service, the food, and practically everything else as we would come to find out, the language barrier was truly a barrier, even when both sides were speaking English.

Our guide did some quick adjusting and decided to take us on a city overview tour rather than giving us in-depth lectures on the 1917 revolution. This was interesting and we enjoyed the day, but it was a bit disjointed and in just "seeing the sights" I'm not sure we really got more value from a personal tour than we would have gotten from our guidebook. I had hoped we would tour the sites in chronological order so that we could understand how each historical stage led to the next. What was the history of St. Petersburg? What role did it play in the wars? What led to the revolution, and what was life like during that time? What was it like during the Cold War and how did it change with glasnost and perestroika? We got some of these answers, but definitely not all, and not in a cohesive way. In retrospect I can think of two plausible reasons why our guide didn't deliver what I was hoping for.

First, we weren't cruise ship tourists. When I was researching guides online, almost everyone I found catered to cruise ship tourists. St. Petersburg is a huge tourist destination for Russian tourists, but most foreign visitors come through cruise ships, which have the sizeable advantages both of providing accommodation on the ship and of not requiring a visa for a visit. The goal of most cruise ship tourists is, understandably, to see the sights in a day before returning to the ship at bedtime. So I think it was natural for our guide to fall back on this kind of tour when his original plan turned out to not be appropriate.

Second, Russia is in the best case a rival, and in the worst case an enemy, and this very obviously affected the information our guide was willing to give us. He had no problem explaining to us the proud history of St. Petersburg: its founding by Peter the Great, its victories in battle, its bravery and sacrifice during the siege of Leningrad (in what he taught us is known in Russia not as World War II but as the "Great Patriotic War"). But when it came to more modern post-war history, our very obviously proud and nationalistic guide wasn't interested in telling us about things that foreigners consider negative. We heard very little about Lenin, nothing about Stalin, virtually nothing about communism or its fall, and certainly nothing about current politics. We asked some questions, but he went pretty silent when the topic was uncomfortable for him. There was a tension between us, even towards the end of the day when we had spent 6 or 7 hours together and might have otherwise developed a rapport. It would have been nice to have a guide of another nationality who could have been more objective, but I don't know if that exists in Russia.

At some point during the morning Dan was starving, having left breakfast without being served, so we asked Vladimir if we could get a snack. He pointed us to a small sandwich shop which he said was excellent. They had a glass counter with various yummy-looking pastries under the glass and on approaching the counter we asked "English?" The girl behind the counter shook her head rather fiercely and (was I imagining it?) narrowed her eyes. No problem, we proceeded to order by making numbers with our fingers and pointing to the item we wanted (one of these, two of these, etc.) She fumed and glared at us and I missed the last part because I went to the bathroom but Dan said she practically threw the bag of food at him. We walked back where our guide and driver were parked and asked Vladimir if the average person here dislikes Americans. He didn't exactly answer the question, but told us that Americans and British people often think Russians are unfriendly because they don't smile. He told us there is a saying "If you smile for no reason, it means you are not far from a fool." Literally you must be crazy if you smile without a good reason, and a customer walking into your shop is not a good reason. In fact, Russian workers typically avoid smiling as a rule because it is frowned upon (pun intended!) by management; if you are smiling you are obviously having too much fun and therefore not working hard enough. Moreover, Russians don't smile at strangers in general. Smiling indicates interest, often sexual interest, so smiling at random strangers is just not done unless you are trying to convey a message. Very interesting and I think it explains some of the unfriendly vibe we felt, but not all of it. There is a difference between not smiling and just barely concealing your disgust, and we really felt the latter.

Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood,
where tsar Alexander II was assassinated.

One of two Rostral Columns on Vasilyevsky Island,
flanking the approach to St. Peterburg for incoming
ships. The things sticking out from the column
are the hulls of ships, to represent naval victories.

Imperial Academy of Arts

One building we visited, somewhat randomly it seems, was the Imperial Academy of Arts. Vladimir took us inside because he said the building was uncharacteristically open to the public that day because of an end of semester exhibition. He took us into a couple of classrooms where students' art and architecture projects were exhibited. Then he told us he wanted to show us something really cool. He led us down several flights of stairs into a poorly lit basement hallway. The building looks nice on the outside but it has seen better days on the inside, so the thought occurred to me whether or not we could escape if the building collapsed. Then as we ventured down a long hallway that got darker and darker until the light completely disappeared, I started to be nervous about a completely different type of disaster. Did he lead us down here to dispose of us??? Fears about the Russians that I didn't even know I had came to light during this little episode. I took out my phone and turned on the flashlight, and he took it from me and went ahead, shining the light around. My senses were tingling and I couldn't help thinking of the book Devil in the White City about the serial killer during the time of the World's Fair in Chicago. Some of his victims had probably lived to tell the tale because they refused to follow him when he tried to lead them somewhere, say into his office or up onto the roof. Others had presumably followed to their deaths, maybe even if they felt weird about it, rather than have to have the awkward moment where you refuse to go with someone and therefore they find out that you don't trust them. When I read that book I figured I would have been one of the victims, because I am someone who would follow even if it was against my better judgment, just to avoid an awkward conversation. So I thought of this as I followed Vladimir into the darkness underneath the Academy of Arts. Needless to say, Vladimir had no evil intentions. He was trying to show us a room full of discarded statues, but the room was locked. We returned to the surface and continued with the tour. I asked Dan the following day if it was just me, or if he got nervous down there in the cellar and he simply answered "I was looking for escape routes."

St. Bean coffee stand, in the shape of a large
coffee cup

Park on Vasilyevsky Island in between the two Rostral Columns

The Peter and Paul fortress is on
Zaychiy Ostrov, "Hare Island", named for the
animals that used to live here in large numbers

Peter and Paul Cathedral, resting place of the
Romanov tsars

Tomb of Peter the Great. The circular medals
commemorate important dates

We toured the prison at the Peter and Paul
fortress. The cells were surprisingly large, but
Vladimir explained that the political
prisoners held there were mostly affluent and would
have been accustomed to large estates, so relatively
speaking this cell would have seemed torturous. 

A prison uniform. The red diamond acted
like a target in case of attempted escape.

Walls of the fortress on the banks of the Neva River. This
is a popular spot for sunbathing. Apparently many Russians
sunbathe standing up, presumably because the sun is so low in
the sky!

Very beautiful pre-meal tea

Finally we stopped for a very late lunch. Our guide chose a nice restaurant right by the fortress, looking out on the Neva River. It was a little awkward because we were tired and very hungry and, to be honest, were ready for a break from him. We thought maybe the four of us would eat together and he would meet us afterwards, but he sat right down with us. It was fine; he ordered a special tea that is traditional to drink before the meal to cleanse your palate, and helped us to choose typical items that he recommended. He apparently also does gastronomic tours of St. Petersburg. Dan and I wondered what would happen when the bill came, but we figured (correctly, it turns out) that we would be expected to pay, even though this was an added expense to the tour that we weren't expecting and he was ordering items for everyone at the table to share without asking us first.

Lunch feast on the Neva

Apparently these little fishies are only available in April and
May and are a specialty. You eat the whole thing - head, tail
and all!

After lunch Vladimir informed us that we still had another hour to the tour and he was going to take us to another site, but we declined. We were worn out, and needed at least a little time to get home and rest before the our evening plans at the ballet. He didn't protest. There was one more surprise: an extra charge for paying with a credit card, which I hadn't been told about. Sigh.

After a very short recovery time at our apartment, we got dressed up and took an Uber to the much-anticipated Russian ballet performance at the Mariinsky Theater. Everyone was excited to see the ballet, and Carter had even bought a blazer for the occasion. Unfortunately, our enjoyment of the event was marred by the discovery that we had paid four times the face value on the tickets! Let me explain.

I knew that I wanted to see a Russian ballet during our visit, so one of the first things I did at the start of my planning was research the ballet. Somehow through google I ended up at the website http://mariinsky-theater.com/, which I took to be the official website for the Mariinsky Theater, but which turned out to be a ticket broker. There were many red flags along the way that should have clued me in to the fact that I wasn't using the official website, not the least of which was the exorbitant pricetag for the tickets. I was shocked at the cost, but I thought maybe the prices were inflated because we were visiting during the Stars of the White Nights festival. (Being so far north, St. Petersburg has "white nights" during the summer season, where it never really gets dark. There weren't white nights while we were there at the end of May, so this festival is poorly named or at least poorly timed.) In the end I decided that this was a one-time experience and if that was the price then we would suck it up and pay it. There were other flags though: I had to put my name on a sign-up list to be notified when the tickets became available and I would receive "VIP pricing"; when the schedule did become available, the link they sent me to purchase tickets didn't work; I was receiving direct communication from someone named Alla Petrova, not robot communication from a large theater operation; after purchasing the tickets they offered us free transport to and from the theatre, and they continued sending me emails about this over and over when I didn't respond (This sounded too good to be true. We were afraid they would kidnap us or something. I looked all over Google to try to find out if this was standard practice, and I also asked the man renting us the apartment, but I couldn't find any indication that this was a standard service from the theater.)

Gilded balconies at the Mariinsky

So yes, I'm a dummy. It should have been obvious that this was not the professional ballet company's ticket operation. I certainly thought it was all very strange, but I thought maybe they were a little backwards or maybe they were just a small operation, I don't know. It never occurred to me that I had been doing business with a reseller until we were actually at the theater with tickets in hand, and we had been in St. Petersburg for a day so we knew the approximate conversion of Euros to rubles, and we realized that the ruble price listed on each ticket was only 1/4 of what we paid. This was so frustrating, and most definitely detracted from the cost-conscious adults' enjoyment of the show. Too bad, because apart from that it would have been a really fun evening. The kids were very excited from all the build-up to the evening and the dressing up and the glitzy gold decor and crystal chandeliers. And it was a very entertaining ballet, The Fountain of Bakhchisarai: a ballet adaptation of a famous poem by Alexander Pushkin. In addition to some beautiful traditional dances, there were several very energetic group dances with lots of movement and color. It held the kids' attention for all four acts and also spurred conversation afterwards. I was surprised, though, that I was able to pick out some mistakes in the performance. I had expected perfection from the Russian ballet, something more beautiful and well-executed than I would have seen somewhere else, but in fact there were noticeable flaws: a couple of extra steps on a landing from a jump, legs of two dancers at unequal heights, a group not completely in sync. Surprising, but still a great performance. (Update: since as usual I'm running late getting this blog finished and published, I can report that I complained to the ticket seller and they refunded about 1/3 of our money. Not perfect, but it was a better outcome than I expected.)

Stylin'

The Mariinsky Theater

After the ballet, we took advantage of the long day and our position in the center of town to stroll around and take some photos in the twilight (around 10-10:30 p.m.)

We happened upon a fireworks show for
the birthday of St. Petersburg, which
happened to be celebrated during our stay

Friday was such a long and tiring day that we decided to take it easy on Saturday. We planned for a casual mid-morning breakfast and then a trip to the Peterhof, Peter the Great's suburban palace and gardens, inspired by Versailles. Vladimir had recommended this as a day trip, and had written down a list of things he felt were worth seeing there. Once again the day started out poorly, however, because we ran into problems with the meal. Dan woke up earlier than the rest of us and ventured out to get food. The kids and I planned to meet him there, but he ended up walking out of the restaurant after 45 minutes of sitting and waiting for his order to arrive. The kids and I found another place that was nearby and highly rated on TripAdvisor and tried again. The service seemed friendly enough and we placed our order in good time, but once again the food just never came. We were one of only 4 or 5 groups of patrons in the place, so crowds weren't the issue. And all we ordered was oatmeal, eggs, etc. After asking about our food and waiting a bit longer, we finally got part of it. We scarfed that down and decided to forego the rest of it and ask for the check, since it was now time for us to leave to catch our boat to the Peterhof. Our waiter seemed confused when we asked to pay; then he disappeared and came back with the rest of the food we had ordered. Could it be that in Russia one needs to eat one's breakfast in courses? Like, you can't order oatmeal and eggs and receive them together, you have to completely finish the oatmeal and then eat the eggs? I don't know what kind of cultural misunderstanding had occurred, but by the time we finished this second round of food and paid our bill, we had missed the boat and were looking at waiting another hour for the next one.

Having successfully tried out the St. Petersburg bus system to transport ourselves back down to the river, I bought our tickets on a high-speed hydrofoil to Peterhof. We got lucky and there was a tour group boarding almost immediately with a few seats remaining on their boat, so we were able to take those seats and get going without much of a wait. There were people speaking English on the boat and since I hadn't heard anyone speaking anything except Russian since we had arrived (except our tour guide), I eavesdropped. There was an English-speaking couple who were cruise passengers and another couple who were travelling through Russia on their own but had booked this tour of Peterhof with the same guide. I was curious about their experience in St. Petersburg as Americans so I spoke up from the row behind them and introduced myself. I asked the non-cruise couple what they thought of Russia and if they were enjoying themselves.
They said: oh yes, very much.
I said: Really? We have felt like people haven't been very friendly to us.
Them: Really? In what way?
I described our experiences with either not being served or being served only grudgingly in restaurants.
Hmmm, they said. Come to think of it, we never got coffee in our restaurant this morning. We waited and waited and must have asked four or five times, but they never brought it so we had to go without!
At this point they got to talking again with the other couple, so we didn't speak again for the remainder of the ride. When we arrived at Peterhof we all stood up to leave and I told them I hoped they enjoyed the rest of their trip (they were heading to Moscow next). They wished us the same but the man said to me, you know I was thinking about what you said and that has been our experience too. We just thought maybe the service in St. Petersburg wasn't good, but I can see now that the people around us were getting served but we were waiting and waiting. I felt bad for complaining so I apologized and told him I didn't mean to put a damper on their experience. He assured me that it hadn't, but we both agreed that it was an interesting observation.

Back on land, we prepared to wander the grounds in search of all the different fountains Vladimir had recommended we see. My Rick Steves book had said that it was worth it to buy a map of the gardens for 100 rubles, so we looked around for someone selling them, but didn't see a map posted or any vendors selling them. There was some kind of little museum by the boat dock so I popped in there to see if they knew where to get one. The girl there was nice, but didn't speak English and didn't know the word "map". Next I tried the ticket counter selling return hydrofoil tickets. She told me that she only spoke the English words relating to boat rides, so she also didn't know the word "map". So I made my way back to the dock where we had come through a turnstile with a ticket-taker. "Excuse me, do you speak English?" I asked one of the women there. She stared at me and grunted, which I took to maybe mean "a little", so I proceeded to ask "do you know where I can get a map of the palace grounds? map?" She literally threw up her hands and turned her back to me, shouting "No do you speak English! No do you speak English!" So at this point I decided we would do without the map! But as I was walking away a man ran after me and asked me what I needed. This was really the first helpful person I had met in St. Petersburg. He didn't know where to find a map, but I appreciated his concern anyway. As I continued to walk on I heard him begin conducting a tour in Russian and English, so it turns out he was a tour guide.

So we wandered around following occasional sign markers and came upon most of the sights Vladimir recommended. We didn't go into any of the exhibits though, because there was an extra cost to all of them. The cost of this place really surprised us. The hydrofoil tickets were relatively expensive, but that was just the cost to set foot on the island. Once there, the grounds were free to wander but there were 5 or 6 smaller museums and exhibits, plus the palace, each of which was an additional charge. And there were long lines for some attractions. This was definitely the most tourists we had seen in any place we had been in St. Petersburg. The place was crawling with large groups of people jostling for position in the prime photo spots.

Vladimir had suggested that we take a tour of the underground pipes that run all of Peterhof's grand fountains. He thought this would be the highlight of our day. But when I found the place where tour tickets were sold, it wasn't clear exactly what the tour entailed and there was a long line of people waiting to sign up, not to mention the extra cost. And we were pretty sure the tour would be in Russian, given our experience so far. I tried to ask someone if there was any English information on the tour, but he didn't understand me. So we skipped it.

Looking down from the top of one of the fountains towards the Gulf of Finland

Babies riding on a dolphin

Tulips, with Peterhof Palace

A triton battles a sea monster

Detail of the Grand Cascade

This is the first trip we have taken where we simply have not been able to communicate, and it really affected our enjoyment of the trip. I felt very deeply how fortunate we are that English is our first language so normally when we travel there is an expectation that even if the local people don't speak any English there will at least be English signage in tourist areas. How much harder traveling is for people who don't speak English! I had always admired my Korean, Taiwanese, and Japanese English students who are so brave to venture across Europe with absolutely no expectation that anyone will speak their native language, but after this trip I have a newfound empathy for them. When you can't communicate, you miss things. We couldn't ask questions. We couldn't find what we were looking for. We weren't sure if we could leave one section of the park and return on the same ticket. We didn't know if we should take the tour. We had an okay time walking around, but we could have experienced the day more fully if we had had more information. (We did eventually find a map posted, up by the palace about 1 km away from where the boats dock. Note to the Peterhof people: it would be nice to also post that map at the docks where people are arriving.)

The Russian flag billows as people head back to the boats

It was kind of a chilly day so it wasn't great for lounging around on the palace grounds, and just as well because strangely there weren't a lot of benches or places to sit and relax. By the time we headed back to the dock the wind had really picked up, so we were glad to be going back. I had heard that the hydrofoils stop running at the slightest hint of waves, but ours had no trouble. These hydrofoils are cool, raising themselves up on skis and zipping across the water!

An oncoming hydrofoil, as seen through our window. The
front is raised up on skis.

Mamaliga, the restaurant's namesake dish. (That's cheese on
top, not butter). Not as good as southern grits, but interesting
when chopped up and eaten with a yummy Georgian stew.

Dinner was at a Georgian restaurant that Vladimir had recommended. Dan had tried to make a reservation for us, but had never gotten a reply from the restaurant, so when we showed up and asked for our reservation we weren't too surprised when they said they didn't have one. They told us it would be about a 20 minute wait, so we put our name down and took bets as to whether or not they would ever call it. To their credit, they did seat us in somewhere around the amount of time they had promised, and they even served us dinner - slowly, but it was a busy night so there was some excuse. We had a pretty excellent Georgian meal of some of our favorites, khachapuri adzhara and khinkali, and some new things, mamaliga (kind of a cross between polenta and grits) and some other tasty things I can't remember the names of.

After dinner there was one more thing on the agenda. Every time we came and went from our apartment we had noticed posters of cats in the outdoor corridor, and there was a door with an intriguing cattish name on it. I got curious enough to look it up on the internet and discovered that this was a "cat café" - basically a room filled with cats that people can go visit with, and they can hang out there and have a coffee or pastry. I had never heard of such a thing, but apparently I live a sheltered life because since learning about this I have learned that this is "a thing". Anyway, Haley and I really wanted to go visit the cats if time permitted. Since breakfast took so long we hadn't had a chance in the morning, but it was open until 9:00 and if we left the boys to pay the bill and raced home we could spend about 25 minutes with the cats. I'm so glad we did! The place was run by young girls in their 20's who seemed a little confused and surprised to see an English-speaking woman and her young daughter tentatively entering 1/2 hour before closing time. Thankfully they spoke some English so I was able to explain that we just wanted to check the place out, we didn't plan to stay long, and they were very nice hostesses. It was such a cute place, and it was heaven for cats! The walls were painted with colorful cat artwork, and there were cat attractions everywhere: scratching boards, climbing apparatuses, toys, beds, and cozy places to hide, even a cat wheel (like a giant hamster wheel). We learned that some of the cats there were “Hermitage cats”, descendants of cats who were brought in back in the day to take care of rats in the Hermitage, Catherine the Great’s winter palace. The girls told us that 20 cats had been adopted so far, and there were currently almost 40 cats in residence. There were some really beautiful cats, but they were all a little skittish and not very snuggly, as you might imagine being somewhat feral. Most of them didn’t let us pet them, but we enjoyed watching them race around the room playing, or sleep peacefully hidden away. Probably these cats would prefer to go on living here rather than find a new home!

A poster of one of the Hermitage cats, posing
(where else?) in the Hermitage 

Cats snooze in comfy beds around the mannequin in the window

Sunday morning it was time to go. Unfortunately I hadn’t been able to get a direct flight back to Berlin, so we had to make a stop in Moscow. The first flight to Moscow was uneventful and we thought we had plenty of time during our layover, but we quickly ran into problems with passport control, which was necessary since we were leaving Russia. The gate system in Moscow was strange and we had trouble figuring out which line we needed to get into. Again, language was a problem, but we eventually got into a crowd of people loosely gathered into lines about 15 or 20 people deep in a passport control area that looked like it would lead to our gate. We were directed into the first (farthest right) of maybe 20 lines in this area, presumably because we had children with us and this line was labeled as the “family line”. But it was also the line where flight crew could come and skip to the front, and also, being the closest to the ID check area, was the line where official personnel would bring passengers who were late for their flights and let them skip to the front.

For an hour we stood in the same place, not moving, while flight crews moved through and the one family whose turn it was to speak to the agent had some issue that was taking forever. We thought about switching lines but, strangely, the other lines close to us didn’t seem to be moving much either, and we were also afraid to switch because the official had told us to use this line. We started to get nervous about making our flight, because we still had to pass through security on the other side of passport control. Finally the line began to move and it was almost our turn when a man with some sort of official ID around his neck lifted up the line barrier and ushered his family of 4 to the front of the line. Dan tried to stop him, but it was pointless because they didn’t speak the same language and this man was determined that he belonged in the front of the line. Here is where the second helpful person we met on our trip stepped in. Another man in our line asked us in English what the problem was and when our flight was. We explained that it was boarding now, and I could see the ticket of the man who had just gone in front of us and knew that his flight was later than ours. The helpful man spoke calmly to the line-skipping man in Russian, presumably explaining the situation and asking him to let us go first. The man was defiant, angry, but after a few minutes of back-and-forth grudgingly allowed us to pass. We were so very grateful to the helpful man; we absolutely did NOT want to get stuck in Moscow. The thought of having to miss the flight and try to figure out how to get back home, possibly the next day, in this chaotic and confusing airport was enough to cause panic. After passport control, we still had to wait in another “line” (many “lines” in Europe are just unruly mobs pushing ahead until finally forced by space limitations to be single file) for security check. Once through, we grabbed our stuff and ran as fast as we could to the gate. There was a flurry of activity when they saw us coming, people radioing other people and herding us quickly through the turnstile and onto the bus, which apparently was waiting for us. We had made it! Seems like they could have saved us and themselves a lot of stress by paging us, or having someone monitor the passport control lines to clear passengers whose flights were leaving shortly…anyway, it’s water under the bridge and we were ecstatic to be on our way back to Germany.

At the airport in Berlin we laughed and said we had never been so happy to return to the “friendliness” of Germany. No offense to the Germans, many of whom are extremely kind and hospitable, but Germany and especially Berlin are not known for their kindness, at least not until you get to know someone better. But immediately we started noticing people saying “thank you”, people smiling, people yielding to others. Our passport control agent was particularly and uncharacteristically jovial, joking with us about our passport information. How sad to live in a place where this kind of common courtesy is missing. Of course I am not saying that all Russians are unfriendly or that their culture is not hospitable – we were only in one city for a few days. But we certainly didn’t come away in any hurry to go back.

After our return to Berlin, I have been trying to process our experience in St. Petersburg. It was very disappointing to not have the magical experience of palaces and exotic faraway places that we had hoped to have. But I’m not sorry we went. The trip was an interesting and valuable learning experience, even if it wasn’t very fun. First of all, it certainly drove home to me the advantage I have in speaking English. But we have been to other countries (Slovakia, Greece, parts of Italy, parts of France) where people rarely spoke English. What was the difference here? I think it was that in other places people have wanted to help us. When both sides are trying to understand each other, you can communicate quite a bit with a word here and there or hand gestures or whatever. But in St. Petersburg it definitely seemed that people didn’t want to help, and therefore we were left pretty much on our own. There was one funny exception to this: Haley developed a terrible cough after feeling sick that first day, so I went to a pharmacy to try to get her some cough medicine. The pharmacist spoke no English, but luckily “cough” is something easy to pantomime so I did that, and then held my hand waist high to indicate a child. Then it was the pharmacist’s turn to ask a question, so she pretended to cough and spit into her hand, e.g. “is she coughing stuff up?” “No” I shook my head. With this simple exchange she was able to help me get what I needed.

A second thing I have been reflecting on is the average Russian’s impression of us. I believe that people all over the world share some basic feelings and values, so I always tend to approach people from a position of commonality. I was surprised to feel like I was “the other”, even when we were polite and friendly, not giving anyone any reason to dislike us. When I made this comment to a friend in Berlin, she suggested that this attitude could have to do with the fact that Russia has only state-sponsored media. Without the free press, the government can control the information that is distributed to the people and can effectively influence their beliefs through propaganda. This was an interesting thought and not something I had considered; I wonder how the Russian papers characterize Americans?

A third thing I have been thinking about is the trip planning and logistics. I have planned so many trips since we moved to Berlin and for the most part they have gone really well; how could I have made such mistakes with the lodging and ballet? I looked back on Booking.com at the apartment I chose. While it got good reviews, I took a closer look and noticed that it hasn’t been reviewed very many times and the most recent 4 or 5 reviews were a perfect score of 10, which you almost never see and should have been a red flag if I had been looking closely enough. The reviews were also written in Russian and I hadn’t taken the time to translate them. Outside of these perfect reviews, there were some other reviews in German and other languages that gave much lower marks, well below the level I would consider booking for our family. So I think those 10’s are fake reviews, concocted by the owner and his friends to bring up the average score. I learned my lesson, that I need to be wary of perfect 10 scores when I look for lodging, but it makes me sad that I had to learn this lesson. There are shady characters everywhere, certainly also in the US, but it’s the first time I have felt like people in a city were trying to take advantage of me. Both the lodging and the ballet were examples of me trusting, as I have always done without any problems, that people are trying to make an honest living. I felt like in both instances I was cheated, so I will be more careful next time.

All in all, like most things in life, there were good points and bad points to this trip, but I put it in the positive column overall, just for the sheer life experience. I hope that US/Russian relations will improve so that eventually there will be no need to distrust each other’s culture.