Since I’ve finally found an internet center that allows me to use my flash card, I have Moscow pictures to show you! There are quite a few, so I’ll do it in a few different posts. Today I’ll show you my pictures from our trip to Yaroslavl, Kostroma and Ples, even though that was actually at the end of our time in Moscow.
First, a somewhat hazy view of the Volga:
This little spit of land was somehow important to the city, so there are fountains there, which you can see, and 996 – Yaroslavl’s age – spelled out in flowers, which you can’t see.
Now some cupolas! No old Russian city is complete without cupolas.
Here’s me in the bell tower of the monastery with some different cupolas.
It’s hard to see in this small picture, but the thing on top of the spire is a bear with an axe, the symbol of Yaroslavl.
And here’s the same tower viewed through a window in the bell tower.
It was Kostroma’s “city day,” a holiday celebrating the founding of the city. There was a concert and fireworks and stuff, and I came across these little guys (presumably out for the festivities?) in the park.
Lenin looks more like Lenin than I look like Lenin (I think that’s a good thing). This monument has a funny history: it was started in 1914 as a monument to the tsars, but then WWI came along and work was halted. After the war came the revolution, of course, and there was no longer any need for a monument to the tsars. The half-finished monument sat around for several years more until Lenin croaked in 1924. Kostroma, jumping at the chance to be the first city with a monument to Lenin, melted down the half-finished statues of tsars and made a statue of Lenin instead.
This is what Ples looked like:
This is what my jeans pocket looks like. (After several hours you just get tired of listening to Russian and can no longer process anything the tour guide says. And you start playing with your camera.)
For Denise, this is a picture of the sign to the Levitan museum. The big word at the bottom is “Levitan” (except it’s in the genitive case, so it has an A on the end).