St. Petersburg, founded by Czar Peter the Great is a beautiful city. It is the cultural capital of Russia and is the home of the Hermitage, one of the great art museums of the world plus innumerable palaces, cathedrals and monuments.

We had two days to see as much of this as we could, a tall order since there were 10 other cruise ships in port with some 20,000 passengers all trying to see the same things. We could have taken the 2-day tour package — two 10 hour days of sightseeing — but we decided not. Instead we went to the Hermitage Sunday morning and to the ballet in the evening. On Monday we went to the Catherine palace outside the city and on the way back took in two cathedrals and the Peter and Paul fortress.

The highlight of our trip was the performance of Swan Lake at the Alexandrinsky Theater. It was classical Russian ballet at its best, no superstars but a superbly trained company gorgeous sets and costumes in 19th century theater.

We started day one by taking a bus to the Hermitage — along with 10,000 passengers from the cruise ships in port. The museum was so jammed with people that there were some things we just couldn’t see. But even if the museum was empty it would take a month to see all the Hermitage has to offer and we did get to see some of the masterpieces.

Our guide, Olga was excellent, she really knew her subject and did a very good job explaining what we were trying to see. The only problem was we really couldn’t see it because of the crowds.

Instead of scheduling an afternoon tour, Laura and I decided we would rest before seeing the ballet. It was a very good decision.

On the second day we went on a tour of the palace of Catherine the Great originally the summer palace that Peter the Great built for his czarina Catherine I. The palace is outside St Petersburg in in the village of Pushkin. The palace, in fact almost all the palaces were designed in what I can only describe as baroque on steroids.

We were again beset by crowds but it was not nearly as bad as the crowds at the Hermitage. We again had Olga as our guide and again she did a superb job.

After leaving the palace we returned to St Petersburg where we had lunch in a restaurant and then stopped at the Cathedral on the Spilled Blood, so-named because it was built on the spot where Czar Alexander II was assassinated in 1881. We also stopped at St. Isaac’s cathedral one of the largest in the world and then toured the Peter and Paul fortress. This was an eight-hour tour and we were exhausted by the time we were finished.