Short bus ride in the rain to the Hermitage Museum where we encountered everyone else in the city. We were supposed to enter at 10:30, but due to a breakdown at the turnstiles, we didn't enter until after 11:30. By then it was wall to wall people pushing and shoving with everyone wanting to get in at the same time. The orderly queues I read about didn't happen today. So after this frantic set back, our group of 40 with our receiver headsets in place (so we could hear our guide without her yelling) started our two hour tour of a museum. The Hermitage Museum is one of the largest and oldest museums in the world. We were told that it would take a person 10 years to see everything if you only spent 30 seconds at each exhibit. The museum was founded in 1764 by Catherine the Great and has been open to the public since 1852. We needless to say saw only the highlights and they were well worth the wait. My personal favorites were the peacock clock, the many Madonnas and child, and many of the sculptures. I did find an app for the museum that I checked out at the hotel after the museum and found it very interesting.
Only 12,000 steps today, we had 18,000 yesterday and we once again visited the street vendor market by the Church of the Spilt Blood. The vendors have a great memory for faces as they not only remembered us, but also the prices we bartered back and forth.
Lunch was at the museum and dinner at the Italian Restaurant down the street from our hotel was excellent. See photos of some of the food.
Tomorrow we will leave the hotel and travel to the Peterhof Castle and then on to the ship for the beginning of our cruise on the Neva river. As we have been told there will be no Internet access for the next nine days, or ATM access in the villages we'll be visiting, this will be my last post until we get to Moscow.