... Moscow

I had just quitted my job.

I was moving to another country.

 I was leaving everything behind and starting a new live…

…and I was going to Moscow to celebrate it, that and my B.day!

After 6 long hours travelling, from Lisbon to Frankfurt and then from Frankfurt to Moscow, I had finally arrived to the Russian Capital. It was cold as I suspected…

Moscow takes its name from the Moskva river, this river passes right by the Red Square, which I dare saying is the symbol of Moscow. And, obviously, I was dead curious to see.

We made our way from the hotel, through old churches, big plazas and all the ostentatious displays of wealth parading everywhere, to the Kremlin.

You enter this huge fortress into a mini village, very clean, where you cannot pass beyond the thin white marks on the floor without being yelled at in Russian – Уже Идет В Очередь  – which means – GO RIGHT BACK TO THE LINE!

After we visit the amazing museums, including a show off of Catherine the Great treasures and dresses, the funny shaped churches and all the wonders the fortress has to offer, we went down to the gardens for a walk.

The gardens, right in front of the Kremlin, are the place to be if you just got married. You can easily play “where´s Waldo?”, but instead of Waldo you had brides, and you´d be winning all the time!

There is a little bridge where the brides and groom’s queue to get the perfect album picture.

You see all kinds of brides from the poorer – freezing in their half torn dresses – and the richer – with dazzling furs and diamonds.  

Moving on to the Red Square, and I must confess I was somehow disappointed with St’s Basil Cathedral (the big psychedelic spiky colored Cathedral): I really thought it was bigger! The square is really big so when you stand at the far end it looks really small. But without any doubt an outstanding architectural wonder.

Facing the red square there’s this massive building that looks like an old train station, but is actually a shopping mall. But not just any, it’s a girl’s dream… there’s everything you may want from diamonds to furs to a LV or a Chanel bag. (I got lost in it!)

For my B.day feast we went to Café Pushkin, it’s a haute-russe cousine (a mix of French and Russian) in a cozy high class bistro. Afterwards to shake things up we went to Soho Rooms which is considered the coolest club in Moscow, a uberexclusive nightclub. We end up having a surreal night with crazy mafia taxi drivers, and after finding a friend from London, we went on hitting a couple more clubs (which names I don´t remember), to finally getting home to some vodka and caviar that were waiting for us in the room!!

In the following days we went on exploring the many galleries and museums that Moscow has to offer - Modern Art Museum, Winzavod – which means wine factory - , Museum of Aviation and Astronautics and the State Tretiyakovskaya Gallery (my favorite).

Unfortunately the Bolshoi Theatre was closed; I would have just killed to see a Tchaikovsky piece at the Bolshoi.
5 days it’s too long just for Moscow, as you can always take a one day trip to the countryside and visit some wonderful castles and old villages. Looking back, one of the greatest surprises of the trip was the kindness and helpfulness demonstrated by the Russians, they are lovely and very easy people.

TO...
...SEE: St Basil’s Cathedral; Kremlin; Kitay Gorod; Upper St Peter Monastery
...EAT: Drova; Botinika; Mayka; Café Pushkin    
...DRINK: Road House; Soho Rooms, Petrovich, Probka 


Key object of the trip: 



B.