March of the Immortals

Out at 5.45 am to get the 7 am bullet train to St Petersburg. It took only 4 hours. Lovely sunny day but less leaves out here than Moscow and a cold wind. We had a 10 minute walk with our bags to this hotel, but as our rooms were not ready we got a quick bite in a bakery before setting off with guide Vera to do a walking tour for 3 hours. She took us past placed related to the siege of Leningrad which lasted 900 days, with the first winter being minus 40. Half the population died. Today was 9 May, the big day for the end of WW2 celebration. Everybody was out. Shops and cafes closed, streets closed to traffic. We were kept out of the crowds as we made our way round bits of the city, but eventually we met the marchers on the Main Street, Nevsky Prospekt. At first it was army people and bands which we couldn’t see as the crowd was so deep on the pavements. We headed to the main square outside the Winter Palace but couldn’t go in as it was full of the marchers finishing. We headed back for food and had to wait ages, but nice to rest tired feet.

When we went out of the restaurant 2 hours later, the crowds had depleted so Although we were tired we decided to go all the way back to the Winter Palace to see what was maybe going on there.

By now, on leaving the restaurants 2 hours later, the march was all the relatives/descendants holding the placards with pictures of family members who had either died in the Siege or in combat. It is a strange dichotomy- they are celebrating victory with big military pomp in Moscow, but here they seem to be celebrating the fact War was over, life goes on, but also paying respect to the dead, all at the same time. Everybody was out - old, young, families, soldiers, having a happy day. It was fun to chat to people if they could speak English. I asked an old man and his son if I could take their photo with their placards. They asked where we were from, and welcomed us to their celebration. Mr C explained his dad had been a prisoner of the Nazis in Poland and had been liberated by the red army. It was a nice moment.

We had walked miles and found the 3.5 miles back to the hotel quite hard going, despite the jolly crowd. We walked the whole length of Nevsky Prospekt from the end, the 10 minutes from the station back to the hotel, finally getting checked in 10 hours after arriving!