russia: sergiev posad again

One of the best day trips Claire and I did during our first year in Moscow was to a small town called Sergiev Posad, about 80 kilometers slightly northeast of Moscow. The town (which has a surprising population of just over 110,000,) exists because a large monastery was built there, the Trinity Lavra.

The monastery was established (according to Wikipedia,) in 1337. It is still one of the biggest monasteries in the entire country, though I don't know if that means by size or by number of people living/working in the monastery. Another Wikipedia page tells me there are more than 300 monks working here.

Like most monasteries, this one started out as a simple (wooden) church, with other buildings added over time, including protective walls. It is named for St Sergius, (who is the patron saint of the Russian state. Apparently the way this monastery started and continued to grow was a model for the followers of St Sergius, they went on to build 400 other similar monasteries around the country.

The monastery was closed from 1920 to 1946, mainly because the Soviet government was not a fan of religious institutions other than the state itself. Stalin allowed the monastery to reopen in 1946, and it was the seat of the Moscow patriarchate until 1983, when that designation moved to a monastery in Moscow.

I really like the ceiling in the main church of the monastery, and I love the way light comes through the windows of this particular church.

It was easy for us to catch an elektrichka to the town; since Claire and I knew where to go it was much easier than our first visit. The weather was also better, which always makes a difference.

We walked around the grounds, looking in every building we could. Claire and I saw the onion domes of the church in the middle and felt as if the paint had faded in the last year, the blue didn't seem as bright as we remembered.

After walking all over the monaster we walked up the main street in town, going a little further than we had the year before. I finally took a picture of a mural on the side of a building, it was quite pretty.

We also took a team photo with a bust of Lenin, something I don't think we did during our first visit to Sergiev Posad. Come to think of it, I don't think we even noticed the bust of Lenin at all during our first visit.

In keeping with copying our first visit, we went back to the same cafe. I was keen to have more of the best fruit tea I've ever had, and we were hungry. I ended up ordering way too much food, but I don't regret it.

After eating and drinking we kept walking, heading to a new part of town. I'd spied another church spire, it made me curious. The church ended up being more picturesque inside than outside, (though not well lit, and quite dusty,) I'm always going to want to check out a church when I see one.

We went back to the train station and didn't have to wait long for the next train back to Moscow. Now that I've seen Sergiev Posad twice, in two different types of weather, I doubt I'll return.

russia: sergiev posad

My first day trip in Russia, yahoo!! I looked at my guidebook, Sergiev Posad seemed like it was close enough to Moscow, with something worth seeing.

I met up with two women, one of whom works at another branch of my school, and one who works in my school. We met at Komsomolskaya metro station, (one of my favourites, one that never fails to amaze me every time I see it,) then went to find the suburban train station. It didn't take long, and the cashier even asked in English whether we wanted one way or round trip tickets.

We answered round trip, and were surprised at the ticket price, in that it was super cheap.

The train we wanted left in just fifteen minutes, which was awesome. It was an electric train, called an electrichka in Russian. It seemed as though we stopped every few minutes along the way, but the ride was smooth so I can't complain. Less than two hours later we arrived in Sergiev Posad.

The train station in Sergiev Posad was not big, it was basically just a platform. After getting ourselves oriented, we started walking. Not too far away we saw the bus station, I asked Caroline and Claire to stop and take a selfie with me. 

I wanted to have us in the photo with the city name, which was on the front of the bus station.

We kept going, heading in the direction of the main sight in town. On the way there, we stopped at a mostly frozen pond, it looked as if it would be perfect to play hockey when totally frozen. The area that wasn't frozen was full of ducks going every which way.

From the small bridge going over the water we could see a 'tree' with lots of padlocks. It was an interesting take on the idea of a bridge of locks. Every time I see one of these things, I wonder how many of the couples who closed a lock together are still together.

Near this 'tree' was a pair of statues, of Peter and Fevronia. (I had to look up the names, as Fevronia isn't exactly a name that rolls off your tongue or sticks in your memory.)

Then we arrived at the main sight of Sergiev Posad, the Trinity Lavra of St Sergius. It was founded in 1337, when St Sergius built a wooden hut. Obviously, over the years other buildings were built. The way in which this monastery was built was copied many times over the years, to create other monasteries around the country.

We approached the monastery from the side, so we had to walk along the walls for a bit. 

While walking we passed a WW2 memorial, complete with eternal flame.

Outside the grounds of the monastery we found two small churches, we entered both. Neither one of them was noteworthy. Perhaps the most noteworthy part was a stroller parked outside one of them, as it had skis instead of wheels. It also had hand warmers attached to the hand rail. Genius!

We got to the entrance of the monastery and walked right in. As far as we could tell, there was no entry ticket to buy. Entry is through a gate in the bottom of a bell tower, the gate was painted with frescoes.

As soon as we walked in, I realized each building in the complex was painted differently. One of them was actually painted with a geometric pattern of sorts, definitely not what I would ever expect to see on the outside of a church. Very photogenic, to say the least.

The geometric church was the first building we entered, the inside was painted as well. The ceiling was covered in frescoes, though they weren't very brightly coloured.

The next church we entered was more of a memorial chapel. We learned that there is a 24 hour a day memorial taking place in one corner.

The memorial is for the man for whom the monastery is named, St Sergius. There was a queue of people waiting to kiss the coffin. We did not join the queue, we watched for a few minutes then walked out.

All these churches are gathered around a small central platz. In the middle of the platz was a small fountain, I presume it runs on holy water. Since we were visiting in December, it was not running.

On another side of the platz was a big blue church, I presume it was the main church of the monastery. We walked in and loved the interior.

The whole thing was painted with brightly coloured frescoes. Love love love.

At this point we felt as if we'd seen everything there was to see. We walked out of the same bell tower through which we'd entered, and went looking for a cafe. There weren't many options, we ended up settling for one nearby. I ended up having the best tasting fruit tea I've ever had.

From the cafe we walked around the block, just to see another part of the town. We ended up seeing another church, the interior of which smelled like wet dog, probably from the wet wool clothing worn by various parishioners. 

We also saw a few government looking buildings, one of which had a big mosaic as decoration on the front facade.

Yet another section of town had newer looking buildings, including a couple souvenir shops. We found magnets in one of these :)

From there we walked up the main street, hoping to visit the toy museum. Unfortunately, we picked the wrong day, as it ended up being closed when we arrived. What kind of toy museum is closed on a Sunday? We hoped it was just a one off, and we were just unlucky. I always thought the typical day for museums to be closed is Monday. 

That was the end of our day, so we walked back to the train station. We boarded the train, thinking we were all good. Unfortunately, we weren't. Even though we were sure we'd bought round trip tickets when leaving Moscow, we hadn't. (We never figured out how the mix up happened, since the lady in Moscow had asked in English, not Russian.) We each had to buy another ticket, plus pay a 'penalty' for buying tickets on the train. Sigh, lesson learned. Fortunately, that was the worst thing that happened during the day. Yay for day trips!