6:00 am knock on the cabin door. It's breakfast. It is also the realisation that the alarm didn't go off because Anthony's phone went flat! Thank god we ordered breakfast or we would've missed our tour.

We left the ship and went through Russian immigration. Quite quick and easy actually: certainly wasn't as intense as the US.

We found our tour and guess what our guide's name was? Boris of course! We had a mini bus with 16 passengers so not too cumbersome getting in and out of the sites.

Our first stop was in central St Petersburg where we checked out a statue of one of the tsars and a gold domed church. After this we took the subway two stations which gave us the opportunity to view beautiful marble lined, chandelier hung stations. Not like any railway station I've seen before and the fare is about 75 cents to go anywhere in the city ($17 for a monthly pass).

After our public transport tour we took off to Peter The Great's Summer palace (Peterhof). This was an outstanding palace about 45 minutes out of the city with beautiful gardens full of fountains inspired by both Versailles and English garden styles.

The gardens were full of fountains that were all gravity fed and some "trick" fountains that soaked the occasional visitor who walked across the large pebbles. The canal and gold clad fountains leading to the palace were an amazing site to see. In the past barges travelled up the canal to arrive at the palace. Pretty fancy!

After walking around the gardens we stopped for some hamburgers and a rest overlooking the palace. Before leaving we had to spend a penny, or rather 30 roubles, to use the local toilet.

Next stop was another palace. Catherine's summer palace (Pushkin). Woah! This was an enormous place that was destroyed during the revolution, but has undergone significant restoration. The rooms were full of the obligatory gold leaf and art work and we saw a few uniforms and dresses of various tsars.

Now if we weren't tired enough we then visited another church. The Peter and Paul Cathedral is a Russian Orthodox cathedral located inside the Peter and Paul Fortress. It is the oldest church in St Petersburg.

The cathedral houses the remains of almost all the Russian emperors and empresses from Peter the Great to Nicholas II and his murdered family, who were finally laid to rest in St Catherine's Chapel in July 1998 (think Anastasia). Also buried here was Catherine the Great, Empress of Russia for 34 years.

This was a long day of walking with 17,932 steps accumulated on my pedometer. THAT is a record for me!