Russia

The inside of the church was incredible. All the “paintings” on the walls are actually mosaics. The church was built on the site where Emperor Alexander II was fatally wounded in March 1881 and was built between 1883 and 1907. The construction was funded by the imperial family.

After a quick rest in the apartment, we headed out to see what was around us. About an hour into our walk, we stumbled upon the Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood. And again as luck would have it, the grey skies parted for about an hour and we were able to get a few great photos of this fantastic church.

This place is right in the heart of the city, like the other places we’ve stayed at. Luckily our Airbnb host picked us up and showed us how to get here otherwise I think we’d still be looking for it. We pulled into the inner courtyard-ish area, used a fob to open a non-descript door and began our climb up, what has to be close to 100 stairs to the top of...

At 7:30am, we boarded the Tallink Megastar ferry and headed back to Helsinki. The only reason we went back is that the train schedules to St. Petersburg were much better for us. Upon arriving at the terminal, we hopped on a tram and 15 minutes later we were at the central train station. We had about an hour before our 11am departure to our first stop in...