After a good breakfast, we waked down to Khoroshevskaya metro station and took the black line to Luzhniki which, according to my map, was linked to Sportivaya on the red line. In fact they are two separate stations and we had to leave Luzhniki and walk 200 metres to to Sportivaya and, although Jennifer’s ticket worked, the entry gate said that mine had been fully used and I had to buy another for 80 Rub (about 80 p.) The red line took us to Okhotnyi Ryad where we transferred to another line which took us for two stops to the Red Square station. I think it must be relatively new because it doesn’t figure on my metro map. Walking towards Red Square we passed the section of the Historical Museum which deals with the Napoleonic invasion of 1812. It is excellent but rather hot and after a couple of hours we got very thirsty. We left the museum for a drink of water but spoke to the administrator who let us back in again. She was extremely friendly, telling us that she had visited London and how much she liked it. She was keen in researching London of the 1960’s with the Stones and the Beatles.
After leaving the museum, we had two coffees and a honey cake at the Bosco restaurant on the GUM side of Red Square, where a very personable young Chinese man engaged us in conversation. He comes from Suzhou near Shanghai and was touring Russia with a friend. We wanted to change some of our dollars into roubles and the waiter advised to go up Ilinka Street where, we were assured, there is a bank. We couldn’t find it so Jennifer addressed a smartly-dressed and (she tells me) handsome man called Ilya who told us that his friend runs a bank. With his pidjin English and my pidjin Russian, we had an interesting conversation. He wanted to know what we thought of Keir Starmer, and we told him!!! We mentioned that we were in Russia last October, driving through cities that tourists don’t usually see like Kazan. He said he came from Kazan and it then struck me that there was something Asian about his appearance. He took us to an Islamic bank where we got a very good rate of 79 Roubles per dollar. I would have liked to have taken a picture of him for the blog but he shook his head and showed me a pass in his wallet that said “Federal Security Bureau”. In spite of which he was utterly charming and couldn’t have been more helpful.
We then returned to Red Square and had a long walk round the food department admiring the incredible expensive goods on sale such as caviar. We then found the Okhotnyi Ryad station and took the light green line back to Khoroshevskaya and walked to the hotel.
Commemorating 80th anniversary of end of WW2
Fragment of a wall painting showing Aleksandr Nevsky receiving a Papal Legate from a church built to commemorate Russia’s victory over Napoleon in 1812
Russian soldiers at Borodino
Tsar Aleksandr 1
French field kitchen capture during French retreat from Moscow
Painting of Napoleon watching French invasion of Russia
Russian General at Borodino
Icon carried into battle at Borodino
Icon of Our Lady of Kazan created in early 17th century after defeat f Polish-Lithuanian invaders
Recruit being blessed before Borodino battle.
General Kutuzov at Borodino
Sled on which Napoleon fled Russia
Icon carried by inhabitants of Bryansk which allegedly forced French army to retreat
French retreat from Moscow
Tsar Aleksandr 1
Russian peasants executed by French army during retreat from Moscow
French army retreating
French corpses during retreat
Napoleon waiting outside Moscow for surrender by Aleksandr 1 which didn’t come
Moscow was burned by Russians. Fire-raisers being executed by French soldiers
Church at corner of Red Square
Bear outside shop in Ilinka Street
Entrance to GUM store
Historical toilet in GUM
Russian Jemima Puddleduck
Famous Russian goalkeeper Lev Yashin making save in GUM window