Last month, we took a long-planned road trip through the
so-called Golden Ring of Russia – a circle of about 650 km in total, starting
in Moscow and
going north-east, dotted with beautiful old Russian towns, featuring the
obligatory gorgeous onion-domed church or seven, typically organized in
so-called Kremlins. (Generally, a Kremlin is a major fortified complex found in
the center of a typical old Russian town; the most famous one is, of course, in
Moscow , and
houses the Russian government, among other things). When I say long-planned, I
mean I have been talking about it forever and we decided to go on it three days
before the actual trip, which always means great prep work. We also decided to
travel during the biggest holiday weekend in Russia – the May 9th
holidays (anniversary of Victory Day of the Second World War) – which made the
task of finding hotels and navigating the traffic of Russians leaving Moscow to
go to their dachas for the long weekend that much more exciting.
After we
soaked-in the beautiful architecture, we left for our next destination – Pereslav-Zaleskyy. The exact opposite
of Sergiev Posad, the tiny town featured an old Kremlin with somewhat crumbling
but picturesque buildings and a lovely garden. After a half-hour walk and a
deep theosophical discussion with the Diplomat about the differences between
atheism and agnosticism (during which no agreement was reached), we continued
to the last stop for the day – Rostov
Velikiy.
Rostov |
Filled with awe and hunger, we headed to our hastily booked
“home for guests” perched on the banks of the lake. Since it was already 10 pm,
we went to grab a quick bite. That turned out to be a bit of a daunting task
given that we were, well, in the middle of not very much. Our only option
consisted of a simple café/restaurant with nice outdoor seating with not much
lighting, where several groups of happy folks appeared to have been celebrating
Victory Day for a week. So, imagine everyone’s utter shock when we pulled in
our giant SUV featuring a shiny red diplomatic license plate, and parked it in
front of everyone. All conversation abruptly ceased and all gaze focused on us.
At that point, someone pointed out importantly and quite loudly that we were
apparently American (he had already managed to decipher the license plate
symbols on his phone), and then inexplicably greeted the Diplomat with a hearty
“As-Salaam-Alaikum.” We sat down next to them, and soon a key bilateral
conversation ensued, ensuring friendship and cross-cultural exchange, enhanced
by several offers of vodka shots. I ordered the only wine there was, a
particularly horrid red varietal of unknown origin – the price for the bottle
was $6, so you make your own conclusions. After a mediocre meal but a lovely
discussion on various engaging themes varying from politics to the merits of a
sink incinerator, it was time to go back. I offered the rest of the wine to the
merrymakers, who happily accepted it but then insisted that we take a bottle of
vodka in exchange.
Ipatiev Monastery |
The next morning, we continued on to the next couple of
pretty towns – Yaroslavl
and Kostroma . The Yaroslavl Kremlin was rather
large and well preserved, and hence as usual besieged by tourists. We used the
bathrooms, took a quick gander to see the church, and went out to the
neighboring Uspenskiy
Cathedral Church ,
which featured stunning 16th century frescoes. Next – Kostroma , where we strolled through the stunning Ipatiev
monastery complex located on the banks of the Volga River .
There, I almost caused an international scandal when I remarked to the Diplomat
that there was a group of elderly German tourists visiting. Suddenly, their
young and overly zealous Russian group leader jumped and yelled at me in heavily
accented English, “If you have a problem with Germans, you have a problem with
me!” Utterly stunned, I asked him what exactly his problem was to which he
responded that he was joking. We clearly had different definitions of humor.
Tune in tomorrow for Part 2...