We arrived in St. Petersburg the afternoon of Friday the 15th. We promptly took the public bus to the Metro in order to get to Nevsky Prospect (St. Petersburg's 5th Avenue). The metro is deep, cavernous, and aesthetically charming. It is signed in Cyrillic only (and poorly at that) which makes it a bit disorienting and confusing.
After arriving at our hostel, which is clean, new, and still under construction, we made our way to one of St. Petersburg's most famous theaters: the Marinsky Theater, home of the Kirov Opera and Ballet Company, for a performance of Eugene Onegin (based on Pushkin's novel of the same name). Tchaikovsky wrote the musical score which was fantastic.
There were three acts and it lasted 3 1/2 hours. (We thought we'd never stay for the whole thing.) As it turned out, the drama and intrigue of this aristocratic love narrative appealed to our bourgeois sensibilities.
The second day started with a glorious complimentary breakfast--3 pieces of white bread and instant coffee. This was followed by a brisk walk to the Palace Square (where the Decembrists were shot) in order to stand in line outside the Hermitage waiting for it to open.
When the museum opened its doors, the crowd stampeded to the ticket box office in a manner so obnoxious that it makes even Italians look like Germans in comparison.
Once inside we were prepared to be overwhelmed, and we were--by the obnoxious tour groups. But even without considering the annoyance, we were somewhat disappointed. This is a gallery that has all the pretense of the Louvre, London's National Gallery, the British Museum, the Uffizi, and so on, but fails to deliver. It is, I dare say, a second-rate first-rate museum. The collection is great, but it is not excellent. Nor is it properly cared for. Many of its best paintings are kept in rooms that are much too humid and too hod. Furthermore, the collections are poorly organized. It is not easy to get from one place to another. The experience borders on incoherence. I don't think anything of earth-shattering value has been added to this museum since Catherine II started collecting in the 18th century.
After that is said, the Heremitage houses two of the most fantastic paintings of all time--Rembrandt's Sacrifice of Isaac and the Return of the Prodigal Son. This latter painting is Rembrandt at his best. The spirit and genius of this work is seen in the execution of the father's hands which tend to the shattered son's wound. These are not the hands of God the Father in Masaccio's Trinity, which coldly support the weight of the cross, but rather the hands of reconciliation, reminding us that it is Christ's resurrection, and not his death and suffering, that is truly significant.
Other paintings of note are a pair of Madonna with child paintings by da Vinci, the Lute Player by Caravaggio, a 13th century Pisan cross by Ugolino de Tedice, a Peter & Paul by El Greco, as well as a few more Germans (Cranach), Italian (Beato Angelico), and Dutch treats.