Borodino, Russia

Kazan’, capital of the Republic of Tartarstan. Here’s a bit of geography for you – Russia is made up of 83 ‘subjects’ – republics, oblasts, krais, and autonomous regions (1). Tartarstan, like Buryatia, is a republic with their own parliament and they also have representatives in the Federal Parliament. Some republics are a little bit more troublesome than others, eg Chechnya. An oblast (46 of the things) was initially an administrative title but the meaning has been slightly bumped up but they don’t get their own parliament but are represented in the Federal Parliament. And, yes the lone Autonomous Region is the Jewish Autonomous Region in Far Eastern Russia. Here endeth the geography lesson.

Another highlight was the Soviet Museum, which is a private museum of all the ex-Soviet and Communist stuff that people were probably very quick to toss after Perestroika but one guy has gathered an amazing collection of stuff and put into some sort of order (school, music, entertainment, toys, etc) and you can visit there, marvel at the simplicity (or basicness) of things. Apparently, there were also activities available on the Volga (BIG river that runs through Russia) but we were too pooped to go looking for the Volga River. Opinion of Kazan – well worth the visit, lots of nice places to see and an oasis of modernity after traveling across from Vladivostok.

From Kazan’ we headed north towards Nizhny Novgorod. Now Nizhny is the 4^th (or 5^th or 3^rd, depending on who you talk to) largest city in Russia and we decided that it was too big for us. On looking at our trusty paper map, we saw that there was a BIG lake north of Nizhny and thought “wouldn’t it be nice to find somewhere lakeside to stay?”, So we headed along the Volga towards a place called Gorodets. We thought that we would find a lake-side holiday village, where locals from Nizhny go for weekends and holidays. Boy were we wrong! Gorodets was a big shipbuilding centre on the Volga! However, we did manage to find a lovely Gastnitsya where we were the only guests and for the paltry sum of 2000 Roubles per night, we had the Luxe Suite! And the price included Wi-Fi, breakfast and secure parking. Plus we were given some lovely souvenirs (a matrushka doll, a magnet and a wooden pot for salt). The only downside of our visit to Gorodets was that we were there on a Monday, which is Museums are closed Day! Actually, on looking at my calendar, I discovered it was Whit-Monday (or Tweede Pinksterdag), which opened up a whole avenues for sick jokes. You obviously have to be a member of the HESE family to understand these jokes!

Now that we are well and truly in European Russia, even the GPS is giving us more information, it was time to head towards the Golden Ring. The Golden Ring is a ring of villages or towns that circle Moscow and got its name because all of these towns and villages have at least one, but usually more, stunning Russian Orthodox Churches, Monasteries or Convents. And these all have very ornate Onion Domes roofs, generally covered in gold-leaf. You need your sunglasses on just to look at the horizon!

First stop was Vladimir, and its claim to fame is the Cathedral of Saint Demetrius and the Golden Gate (a real Gate not a bridge). There is also a great children’s museum which is in the old Public Administration Building. One of our gripes as we have visited museums or such places in Russia is the complete lack of any English explanations. Sadly, this was also the case in the Children’s Museum, but as it was an interactive museum, and some of the staff really got into the swing of things, it was really interesting. In one room, which was a restored children’s bedroom in a wealthy early 20^th Century house, when the caretaker realised that we didn’t speak Russian, she asked “Angliski?” and when we said yes, she produced a sheet of paper with information written out in English (by hand) explaining the story of this room. Now, that was great!

In the main part of town, there is this long park that runs along the main road for about a block. Behind this park is the Cathedral of Saint Demetrius, then the Public Administration Building and then the Cathedral of the Assumption. I’m not going to count the other 10 churches in Vladimir (which includes 1 Monastery and 1 Convent), but the old Water Tower has been turned into an interesting museum which is all about old Vladimir (the town) and walking along the main street from the Golden Gate to the other end of town, there are many, many fine examples of old secular buildings, including the aptly named “House with an Attic”. Yes, you guessed it, it had an attic! Which is pretty amazing for a building that is only one floor high! One church we did visit was the Church of St Trinity, which these days is home to a glass museum as well as a museum of enamel-ware, which is a skill developed by Icon painters when they lost their jobs with the advent of Communism. Lots of lovely (and expensive) things to look at.

By this stage, when we went anywhere near a church, Nick was started to get a “hunted” look in his eye. In our past travels, he has tolerated me visiting churches in Paris, London, Hamburg, Berlin, Munich, Venice and Rome but I always knew when he had had enough. Now he is muttering about “Death by Icon”. For those of you who may not know about them – icons are religious paintings that have a very particular style, are generally very ornate and usually involve lots of gold and bling. Now that Orthodox faith has been given the nod in Russia, lots of churches are being restored, the old icons are being recovered from Museums, or brought out of hiding, cleaned up and hung in Churches all over Russia. They are basically the Russian Orthodox equivalent of the Roman Catholic penchance for statues of saints, etc. And like the Catholics of old, many houses have an icon corner (unless the occupants are well-indoctrinated Atheists), which is called “The Red Corner”. How’s that for a piece of trivia!

Next stop on the Golden Ring was a quick visit to a place with the unpronounceable name of Bogolyubovo. This town (village) takes its name from Prince Andrey Bogolyubsky, who in the 12^th Century, had a vision telling him to build a church (who doesn’t?). He also built a palace in the village which was his preferred residence until he was murdered there in 1174. Andrey had a brother called the Grand Prince Vsevelod the Big Nest (I kid you not!) who was responsible for building the Cathedral of Saint Demetrius in Vladimir. Don’t you just love their names?? Now, it’s on to Suzdal’!

As we were driving towards Suzdal’, we could see domes glistening along the horizon and Nick started to get that look in his eye! Not again, he was thinking! We arrived at our accommodation, which was at a really lovely Guesthouse with a lovely garden and the loveliest hostess – Zena (not sure if the spelling is correct but I’m sure she will forgive me). Zena and her husband Sascha run the Guesthouse and love it when they get international visitors. Apparently they play host to staff from Australian Embassy in Moscow quite a bit because they were very enthusiastic about us being from Australia. Zena had some English and she pulled out a map of Suzdal’ and started to point out the things to see – 2 Monasteries, 2 Convents, the Kreml’ (apparently it’s not a full-size Kremlin), 35+ Churches in Suzdal’! Nick was starting to turn green at the gills! On our first day we decided to do a nice walk to a Monastery and a Convent. We got the Monastery – closed! Next we headed off to the Convent which was open but I got lectured in the church because I was wearing man’s clothes and not woman’s clothes! One of the nice things about the Guesthouse was that we could cook our own meals, so first night, we had Chilli Con Carne. One thing I have noticed as we travelled across Russia was the dearth of Mexican cuisine! Boy was I glad that I had brought the ingredients with me to make our favourite Chilli! And not a corn chip to be seen anywhere! Over the next two days, we visited the Saint Euthymias Monastery, which was open now. Big Monastery with lots to see but every hour, on the hour, the bells ring. And it’s done manually, by one man. You stand on the ground, looking up at the bell tower and you can see him pulling strings and ropes to ring about 15 bells – it was great to hear and see! Sorry, no recordings! We didn’t think about that until after he had finished playing. We also went to the Kreml’, walked around town, walked along the river to admire a nice vista of Suzdal’ and we even helped out a couple of Swiss travellers who had lost the campground (a campground in Suzdal’, I hear you exclaim) but we had our trusty map (in Russian) and were able to help them orientate themselves and work out where they needed to go.

On our last night in Suzdal’, Zena and Sascha’s family came over for a barbeque (of the biggest shashliks we’d ever seen) and we were invited out to meet the family. We had a great evening talking in English (both Dzema, Zena’s son and Kyril, a friend spoke very good English), answering questions about Australia, talking about our adventures crossing Russia and then we were invited to join them in a Banya. Now, Russians are REALLY into Banyas which is like a Sauna and Shower combination and involves getting beaten with bundles of birch sticks. Sounds great doesn’t it? In fact, yes it it! Cold shower first, then into the sauna (wearing a sheet if you are modest), then back under the cold shower, then back into the sauna to lay down and get the living daylights beaten out of you! Then you go to the kitchen and sit around the table drinking tea (or vodka if you wish) and eating, and talking. This went on until about 1:45am the next morning! Nick says that you haven’t lived until you have been flogged with birch sticks, in a boiling hot sauna, in the nude by a Russian Judge, who is also nude! Sounds a bit kinky for me!! 😀

Actually I was interested in the Napoleonic connections whilst Nick was interested in the WW2 connections. For a village with such a big history, it was surprisingly hard to find but after many hours of poring over maps and searching the Internet, we found it and were able to work out where to go. The journey involved a couple of overnight stops before getting there but we had an interesting afternoon walking around the Borodino Field (in the rain), looking at monuments from 1812 and 1942, as well as visiting the Borodino Museum. The only downside of the trip was that the car radio had decided to go on the Fritz and so Nick couldn’t play the 1812 Overture at full volume as we drove into Borodino!

Wow, it’s hard to believe that we are almost at the end of our time in Russia. We arrived here more than 2 months ago, have been on the road for over 7 weeks, have spent a couple of weeks in Mongolia and tomorrow we turn north and head towards Saint Petersburg and then the Baltic States! And this alone is why we had to get a Business Visa – can you imagine trying to this in 30 days? Impossible and unrealistic!!