I finally made it to Russia! Yeay!

I was feeling a little worried that the bus driver wouldn't know that El Salvador was visa free for Russia so I made sure to be prepared with at least 5 documents that said I didn't need a visa and even a letter in Russian with the whole El Salvador- Russia agreement just in case they asked me for anything.

I got into the bus and the driver asked me for a visa and I said I didn't need one so he said ok and let me go to my seat. At the border crossing I was also nervous because you never know how the officer will react but luckily I had no problems, got back in the bus, and at 10am I had arrived in St Petersburg!

Before getting there I had googled my way to the hotel on public transport and getting to the bus and off was easier than what I thought! Actually, traveling in Russia and communicating with the people was totally fine! Of course it was a little challenging like in any other place but not as much as other travelers had said. 

I think it helped learning how to read Cyrillic since many signs don't have translations but because of fifa2018 Russia has started to translate many signs therefore making it a little bit easier for tourists to find their way around.

I arrived at my hostel and I was very impressed by it, maybe one of the most charming hostels I’ve stayed with amazingly kind staff.

My five full days in St. Petersburg were very very very busy, there are so many things to do and definitely so little time! I walked the streets of this beautiful city every day for 12-15 hours and still probably didn’t even get a glimpse of it.

The St. Petersburg tourist info has made an “amazingly good”  guide for 3 and 5 days itineraries so I took advantage of it and followed their guide most of the time.

My first stop the day I arrived was at Palace square, where all emperors once lived  and now holds one of the most amazing museums in the world: The hermitage.

Then I strolled through Nevsky Prospect, the main road, looking at all the architecture and the beautifully colored buildings. Nothing about St Petersburg screams Soviet, in fact it is called the Venice of the North due to its high number of canals and beautiful buildings all around.

Really?!?! "For a trip to Cambodia?" how about you work for what you want?

For the rest of my time I never got tired of walking around the city and finding new streets, sitting in parks with locals, and taking it all in!

What I loved the most about traveling on my own is that I can go anywhere, at any time, I can wonder the streets any way I can. In St. Petersburg I found myself walking for hours and hours, even at 3-4am in the morning on my own and feeling super safe. It was crazy to see how this city is the most 24/7 city I have ever seen. Many people say New York is 24/7 but trust me, if you want a pizza at 4am in NYC you have to cab somewhere but not in St. Petersburg, even Starbucks was open at 4am! It's incredible! Maybe because I went there in the middle of summer and the sun barely goes down for like 2 hours that people feel the need of being outside and enjoy every last second of good weather. At 2am there were street performers, people dancing on the street, street vendors, it was so crazy. The sky never got completely black, it always turned dark blue and then  dawn started to happen... it was incredible! I can't even imagine how people behave and how the streets of St Petersburg look like during the white nights.

The metro in Moscow and St Petersburg are amazingly beautiful so I decided to go on a self-guided tour of the metro and checked it out. During soviet times the government said that kings had palaces and the metro was the people’s palace so their  decoration is very beautiful. The most beautiful line is the Red one, which was the original metro line.

Cool fact… The admiral station is the 3rd deepest in the world after Ukraine and North Korea.  It’s 86 meters below ground level and takes about 6 minutes to go all the way down!  Going down the stairs is hilarious for people watching; a lot of people are on their phones, most are reading, and couples just make out for the whole six minutes! haha

One afternoon I decided to take a cruise on the neva river and I really enjoyed it although I did not learn anything as they don’t have the commentary in English, only Russian, but the views were amazing!

On my 3rd day I woke up early and decided to go to the St Peter and St Paul fortress for the 12pm canon fire. I took the metro for the first time to Gorkovskaya station and before heading to the fortress I stoped by the park behind the  station to look at the miniature landmarks of St Petersburg! I think everybody should go, it was so cute!

Walk by St Isaac’s cathedral. I did not have time to go up to the top but they say the view is very nice!

Kazan Cathedral

And right before I left St Petersburg I visited the Church of the Savior of the Spilled Blood. The church is no longer a church but a museum and it is a MUST SEE!!! The whole church’s inside is covered by mosaics, probably the most beautiful mosaics I have ever seen in my life!

The only thing I could compare it to is Rila Monastery, which I thought was beautiful but this church is a thousand times better, it really does blow your mind!