russia: tver again

 

The first place I decided to visit when it became possible was Tver. Though I'd visited the city with my ladies last year, there were parts of the city we didn't see. Plus, it is close to Moscow, so I was able to do an easy day trip.

A day trip meant I didn't have to worry about accomodation, or food. I brought my snack bag with plenty of food, knowing I'd be able to find a bench somewhere in the city to sit on while eating. Cafes weren't yet open, I knew I wouldn't be able to get food that way.

I wore a mask the entire time I was on the train, which was just under 2 hours. The train wasn't as busy as normal, but it was more than half full. I'd say about half the people were wearing masks, and half of those were wearing them properly.

I arrived in Tver around 10am, it was hot. I started sweating almost as soon as I stepped outside the train station, but oh well. I'd planned out what I wanted to see in the city ahead of time, and marked all the spots on a map, I didn't want to waste time.

My first stop was a statue of Lenin, this one was not in the city center. To get there I walked a couple back roads, crossed a pedestrian bridge over the tracks of another train station, and passed some eye catching buildings. I'm a sucker for wooden houses, particularly those that have been kept up well, as they often have gorgeous flowers all around, and intricately carved window decorations. So pretty, and so quaint.

This particular Lenin was at the back side of a small park, and behind him was red stone, I think it was supposed to represent a red flag. 

These statues of Lenin always fascinate me, because I'm usually the only one around. It's rarely difficult to take a photo without anyone else in the frame.

After taking my photos with and of Lenin, I sat on one of the benches in the park to eat. Being in the shade felt soooo good, I already knew I'd have major heat exhaustion by the end of the day.

From there I walked back toward the part of the city most people visit when they come to Tver. Along the way I stopped at what used to be a big factory complex. 

There were signs with the history of the complex, but they were entirely in Russian, and I was hot. I should've taken pictures, to translate later, but I didn't.

I think some of the buildings are now used as apartment buildings, a couple are just plain abandoned, and others are maybe still factories? I'm not sure. I found an area with playground equipment, but it was slowly being taken back by nature.

After the factory area, I walked to a monastery. The name of the main church in the monastery was the Resurrection Cathedral, but I can't find the name of the monastery, argh. I was able to see a small chapel, and a church, both of which were outside the walls. Unfortunately, the monastery gates were still closed, so I wasn't able to see any churches or buildings inside the walls. The map I was using had me going through the monastery grounds, so I had to find another way around, which ended up being quite a bit longer than expected.

Normally I wouldn't have minded the extra walking, but like I wrote earlier, it was hot, and I was feeling it. When I got around to the other side of the monastery, there was a sign on the gates that basically said it was still closed for quarantine. From what I could tell, only people who belong inside the walls were going to be allowed in.

My next stop was an obelisk honouring the victory of the Allies in WW2. A very typical Soviet victory monument. There was another small church not too far behind the obelisk, also closed at the time. 

At this point, that wasn't much of a surprise. Many of the people I've seen in Russian churches are older, so they're more at risk for getting sick with Covid 19. As much as I want to travel normally, I also want to keep people safe if I can, and that sometimes means not seeing something.

Not long after that I got to one of the major bridges over the river, just by an art museum we visited in a previous trip to Tver. The bridge had walkways one both sides for pedestrians, there were plenty of people walking on the bridge. 

On the other side of the bridge I noticed something I hadn't seen during the first visit to Tver, a beach! There were quite a few people hanging out on the beach, enjoying the weather.

I turned onto another street, and before long ended up on another bridge. Walking over that one gave me a view of a pretty little marina, with a few boats moored. I wonder how many people in Tver have boats, and how often they use them. For that matter, how long is it considered boating weather? Where do the boats go when the river freezes?

Not long after crossing that bridge, I realized I needed to turn around and go back a bit. The road I was on at the moment wasn't going to connect with the part of the city I needed to get to. I know I've said it before in this post, but extra walking wasn't sounding as good as normal because of the heat and sun.

Continuing to walk, I passed the biggest/main Lenin statue in town. I also passed a stela that showed Tver is considered a city of military glory.

Eventually I got to my last sight of the trip: a mosque. Though Russia is generally known as an Orthodox Christian country, there are plenty of other faiths represented in the country. This mosque wasn't huge, but it was easily recognizable as a mosque. What I immediately noticed was that it was right next to a Catholic church. I love that kind of juxtaposition. I wonder if the congregations have any sort of relationship with each other.

From there I found the closest bus stop, and caught a bus back to the train station. Tver doesn't have a big train station, and not a lot of traffic, so they don't let you onto the platform you want until just a few minutes before the train arrives. 

Of course this means people gather right next to the barriers, (not many of them wearing masks,) waiting for the moment those barriers are removed.

The train back to Moscow went exactly as scheduled, which is exactly what I expected :)

Tver is a great city as a quick trip from Moscow, but now that I've seen it in winter weather and summer weather, I don't think I need to go back.

russia: tver

Another weekend, another trip. Tver was originally on the calendar for another weekend, but due to my laziness we switched the plan.

Getting to Tver was easy, fast, and cheap. We took an express suburban train, called a lastochka. The price worked out to about $8USD, the ride was about 90 minutes.

It was snowing when we arrived, which we weren't ready for mentally. All three of us had been checking the weather all week, and hadn't seen word one about snow. Oh well.

After a bit of hanging out inside, we walked into the center of town. I'd booked us a place to stay, but we couldn't check in until 1400, so we had some time to kill. Right around then we saw a giant mosaic mural on a wall near a school, which was really eye catching.

Also nearby was a Baskin Robbins ice cream store. We figured we hadn't taken an ice cream selfie in a while, and we had the time, so why not.

After ice cream we walked through a park. We saw people cross country skiing on several paths of the park, which looked fun. I've always wanted to try it, but I bet on the first try I'd last only about ten minutes. Anywho.

In the middle of the park is what is called the Veterans Pantheon, a war memorial. There was an 'eternal flame' in the middle of it all, but in this case it wasn't eternal. The spot where the flame would normally be was completely covered by snow.

After going through the park we were back on the closest main road, conveniently only a block or so from our accomodation. Checking in took about 3 minutes, after which we relaxed in our flat for a while.

Upon walking back outside we headed in the direction of our first real sight of the day: a statue of Lenin. This one was a little different from many of the others we've seen in that his name was written near the bottom of the pedestal. 

Most of the time I guess the people who put up the Lenin statue in a town assume you know who he was.

After taking a team photo at the statue we walked up a pedestrian street to our next sight, a goat museum. A goat museum!!!

The museum was small, only 3 rooms in total. It was basically a really really big collection of all things goat. There were some kitchen tools with goat legs as the handles, glass goats, stuffed goats, etc...

There was a giant display case with a fake mountain in the middle, with small goats all around. One of the docents told us we could count all the goats and enter a contest, but we didn't take the time to do so.

We learned a bit about the way goats are part of many cultures around the world. According to this museum, (the docent, anywho,) the people of Tver are nicknamed goats. I've never heard that before, but since I'm not a Russian speaker that wouldn't be random knowledge that simply gets absorbed.

It didn't take us long to see the entire museum, we were in there only 30 minutes or so. After the museum we walked back in the general direction of our flat, picking up sushi and breakfast food along the way.

The next morning we were pretty proud of ourselves for checking out and leaving the flat before 1100. A long walk took us back along the pedestrian street from the day before, over to a main artery through town, and over a bridge.

While crossing the bridge we spent a lot of time looking at the river below. It was covered in snow, and looked frozen, but we also noticed spots that looked rather melted. As we watched, we saw a couple people ice fishing, and three others crossing the river on foot. I have no idea how people had the confidence to do that, since the air temperature was over freezing, and we could see soft and completely melted spots.

Anywho, on the other side of the river we climbed down stairs to the embankment and walked along it for a while. The path was a mix of soft snow, hard pack, and ice, so it wasn't always easy to walk. We weren't the only people out, but the path wasn't exactly crowded.

Eventually we got to a corner of sorts. There was a big city name sign at this corner, perfect for a team photo.

After the team photo we walked back along the embankment. We walked under the bridge and continued along the other side, staying near the river. This side looked the same as the other, in that there were some soft spots, but it also looked frozen. Either way, we stayed on the embankment, not going anywhere near the river/ice.

We eventually came to another bridge, the modern version of the first bridge tying together the two sides of the river. 

The sign said the first bridge was several centuries ago, and had originally been a pontoon bridge.

Back over on the first side of the river we came followed the road to the entrance of the Imperial Palace. The palace was built in the 18^th century as a place for Catherine to Great to rest during her travels from St. Petersburg to Moscow. It is now a beautiful art museum.

We checked our coats and bags, and put on our shoe covers. I hate the sound these shoe covers make, but it wasn't an option. When we went to the ticket counter we read the price list and got our money ready, only to be told that the price was twice as high as we thought.

The ticket lady said 'foreign price.' We took a closer look at the price list, and over on one side of the paper, written in Russian, it did indeed list a price for foreign citizens.

Since we've been through this before we immediately pulled out our passports and registrations to prove that we live in Russia, and didn't want to pay the fee for foreign citizens.

The lady let us pay the 'local' fee, though this left a bad taste in our mouths. I hate when foreigners are charged more to enter a place, and it was even worse that it was only written in Russian. It's so sneaky. We only knew because we looked carefully, how often are other visitors surprised?

The museum turned out to be awesome. We didn't go through the entire thing, but we enjoyed the part we did see quite a bit. Each room was well organized and looked slightly different. There was a docent in every other room or so. A few of the rooms were very very grand, to the point that I whispered 'whoa' while walking in. Beautiful rooms, absolutely beautiful. I should also mention that Angela notcied a marble sculpture titled "Eva." Of course I took a photo with myself.

From the palace we walked back toward the pedestrian street, stopping to pick up food along the way. We also got more ice cream, just because we wanted to, and had the time to do so. From there we hopped a bus to the train station.

Buying tickets to get back to Moscow was easy, as was finding and boarding our train. 90 minutes after departure we were back in Moscow. Here's to another successful weekend.