We are now in Finland, but I haven't had the opportunity to write about Saint Petersburg. People had told us that if we liked Moscow we would love St Petersburg, and we did but for different reasons, but we also liked things about Moscow. Moscow has a population of around 15,000,000 and St Petersburg is only around 5,000,000, big difference. Moscow is over 500 years old, St Petersburg is around 350 years old, so you have to expect differences. Peter the Great had a lot to do with St Petersburg so he pops up everywhere, and there are so many churches, museums and gardens you could spend a lifetime looking around, but everything costs and you could spend a small fortune, which we did, looking at places. I won't go into everything we did or tell you all about the place, you can Google that, but Alexander's Column is the largest structure made from a single piece of granite in the world and it is not held in place by anything, just its weight! We stayed in a hostel while there and met a lovely lady from Dubai, born in Kuwait and studying in England and a young man from Turkey. We stayed there for five days and then headed for the border where the only problems we had were self inflicted. Russia had been quite an experience and the west was very different to the east. We think the people were happier and more friendly in the east, but they were all very helpful when needed and naturally the west is more European than the east, so there is a lot more of everything, which can have its drawbacks. We had a great time in Russia, but we are glad to be in Finland where there is an obvious change in mind set and we look forward to seeing more of it.