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Saint Petersburg
THE St. Petersburg or St. Peter's Town (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, translated: St. Petersburg, pronounced: [sankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk]) is its second largest city and cultural capital Russia.
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At a glance
According to its Constitution Of the Russian Federation, is a federal city and one of the 85 federal units into which the country is administratively divided. It is located in the northwest Russia and very close to the border with Finland, at the point where the Neva River flows into the Baltic Sea. It is built on a complex of small islands, which are separated by natural and artificial canals and communicate with each other by bridges. Based on the Russian state organization, it is the administrative center of the Northwestern Federal District and the seat of the Baltic Fleet. It was founded by Tsar Peter I in 1703 as its window. Russia in Europe. Nine years later and until the October Revolution of 1917 it was the capital of the vast state. Today it has almost 5,000,000 inhabitants and is its second largest city Russia after the capital Moscow.
Ideal period of visit
How to get there
By air
By airFrom the airport of the city. The airport of Ag. Petersburg (international aviation code LED) is located in the Pulkovo area, a few kilometers south of the city. The largest international airlines have almost daily flights, while communication with Moscow is ensured by continuous flights of Aeroflot and Russian Airlines. Russian Airlines (successor to the local Pulkovo) also connects Ag. Petersburg with many European cities, including Athens and her Thessaloniki direct flights outside the winter months.
By train
By train
By road
By road
By boat
By boatApartments
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| Centre Located between the Neva in the north and the Obvodi canal in the south, it is crossed by the Fontaka and Moika rivers, the area has been the center of St. Petersburg since 1730. It includes the Hermitage Museum and the main boulevard Nevsky Prospekt, and is full of architectural monuments of the 18-19th century. |
| Vasilyevsky Island (Vasilievsky Island) It was the center of the city for a short time in 1720, and contained the port from 1730 until the mid-19th century, the east side has always been the center of the academic life of the city. Many monuments of architecture of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th shape the aesthetics of the area. The westernmost parts developed after 1850. |
| Petrograd (Petrograd) It includes the area where the city was founded in 1703 and includes the castle of Peter and Paul in the early 18th century, but the rest of the area was built in the late 19th and early 20th century, is rich in architectural monuments of this era. The islands in the northwestern part are a place of recreation and include parks, villas and sports facilities. |
| North St. Petersburg An urban area with monotonous and often ugly, Soviet-era apartment buildings. There are some important buildings, such as the Military Medical Academy, the Polytechnic. Otherwise it does not have many attractions. |
| South St. Petersburg Although reduced tourist traffic, the area includes very nice industrial architecture and magnificent Stalinist buildings. It was part of the demonstrations that preceded the 1917 revolution, and the area under siege of Leningrad during World War II. It contains some of the most important attractions of the city, such as the Arc de Triomphe of Narva, the church of Cesme. In 1930 the authorities planned to move the city center to the south. |
| Right bank In addition to tourist traffic, the area includes historic gunpowder factories, some beautiful churches and parks, the ice hockey stadium and Ladozski Railway Station. |
How to move
By road
Bus
Bus Subway
Tram
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By foot
By foot
Bike
BikeWhat to see
The public buildings
A trademark of the city is the polygonal Fortress of Peter and Paul on the fortified island that the city was founded in 1703. Another characteristic is the building of the Naval Administration, on the banks of the river.
Undoubtedly the biggest attraction is the Hermitage Museum. It is housed in one of the buildings of the Winter Palace complex, the so-called green or Greek Renaissance. In its huge interior you will find an ancient Egyptian, Greek and Roman exhibition, but also the largest gallery of pre-classical and classical painting in the world. It has been estimated that if the visitor spent half a minute on each of the main exhibits, it would take two years to see the whole, and if he spent the same time on all the exhibits, he would want four more! Other important museums are the Applied Arts, the Ethnographic, the Military and the Political-Historical.
The buildings that house the educational institutions of Ag. Petersburg. On the banks of the Neva is the School of Fine Arts, with Egyptian griffins and sphinxes welcoming the visitor by the river. On Vasilievsky Island is the seat of the city University - a complex of buildings with baroque features. The Smolny Monastery (now an institute) housed the first girls' school, and was used as a Bolshevik headquarters during the 1917 Revolution. The Catherine Institute (Library) and the Cavalry School, designed by the Italian Quaregi, are typical examples of neoclassicism.
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Turning to theaters, the "world capital of ballet" dominates: the Kirov Opera and Ballet Theater - today its official name is the Marinsky Theater, but few call it that. The palace theater is older, inside the Hermitage. Also worth mentioning are the Siniseli circular theater and the Conservatory. The Conservatory is named after Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov and included students such as Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev and Shostakovich.
Also to be visited is the last house of the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoyevsky, which was turned into a museum in 1971, on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the author's birth. The house of the novelist Nabokov also functions as a museum.
The statues
The trademark of Ag. Petersburg is the Bronze Horseman. This is a work of the French sculptor E.M. Falcone, by order of Catherine the Great, and depicts the Great Peter on horseback. It was placed in 1782 in the park in front of the church of Ag. Isaac, on the banks of the Neva.
The Square of the Winter Palaces, at the back of the Hermitage, is adorned by the unique Alexander Column, the tallest of its kind in the world. In the square of Ag. Isaac is the statue of Nicholas I - it is considered unique, because despite its size it rests only on two points, on the hind legs of the horse. The circular statue dominates Nevsky Prospekt
of Catherine the Great and in Sanagia square her monument-gift France to the city, when in 2003 three centuries have passed since its foundation. In the large park in front of the Smolny Institute, the seat of the Bolsheviks during the revolution, the walker is greeted by the busts of Marx and Engels, while in the courtyard of the building and at the Railway Station Φινλανδίας Lenin still points the way to the Winter Palace, in the classic figure with his hand raised.
In addition to the statues, the sculptures dedicated to historical moments of Russia are also important: In the triumph over Napoleon, two arches are dedicated - one to Narva and one to the "entrance of Moscow". In the same climate, Piskarevskoy Cemetery is the monument of St. Petersburg for the victims of the three-year siege of the city by Nazi troops. Also characteristic is the complex of engraved vertical slabs for the heroes of the October Revolution in the Marseille Pole - a monument that during the Soviet Union played the role of the Unknown Soldier. The cruiser Avrora (Dawn), permanently anchored on the banks of the Neva, which today is a museum of the Revolution, also has a monumental character.
In the end, the sculptural decorations of the bridges are remarkable - from large statues (with the most common motif being the horse) to small decorative elements. The most famous are the horses of the small Aniskov bridge, where couples are used to be photographed after their wedding.
Entertainment
What will you buy
Studies
Job opportunities in St. Petersburg
Today the population of Ag. St. Petersburg has close to five million inhabitants, or almost 3% of its population Russiaς. The average monthly salary is around 400 Euros - although it is considered one of the most expensive Russian cities, the cost of living is quite cheap for the western visitor. of the people. Dozens of people still live in the communalka, old noble houses in the city center, which were nationalized after the October Revolution. About 10% of the inhabitants live in them. Beggars and street vendors are often found, and hundreds of people roam the streets every day wearing full-length billboards to save a few rubles. Many people from the province do not have the permit and live in a semi-illegal status. These people are not included in the statistics, as listed below. Typically, the International Labor Organization (ILO) estimated in 2000 that 16,000 homeless children alone. Nevertheless, compared to the rest of Russia, crime in the city is clearly low - it is fully accessible, without "gray zones" or ghettos.
