Vanessa and Blake's World Trip: Moscow

We had four days in Moscow which isn't much for a sprawling city with 15 million people and a rich history. We had a busy four days.

Our first stop was Red Square. It's surprising to look around the square. On one side is Vladimir Lenin's tomb - a symbol of the Communism days. Across the square from Lenin is a luxury department store called GUM - a symbol of the shift to capitalism and a place that must make Lenin cringe when he looks out from his tomb. On the third side of the square is St. Basil's Cathedral - a symbol of Russia's religious history.

Blake in front of Lenin's tomb

Vanessa inside the GUM department store

St. Basil's Cathedral

We had our fill of Russian churches by the time we reached Moscow but we did go inside St. Basil's Cathedral. It's unique - it's not one church but 10 smaller churches linked together.

One of the churches inside the cathedral

It's like a maze when navigating between churches

The Kremlin is a fortress next to Red Square. Within the Kremlin's walls are several cathedrals, palaces and government offices. We took in the "guard mounting" ceremony in the Kremlin. It's a ceremony performed by the Kremlin Regiment - a special unit of the Russian military that guards the Kremlin and high ranking government officials. The precision in the movement of the men and horses was amazing.

Here's a video from a Russian news website with clips from the ceremony:

http://en.rian.ru/video/20100419/158652188.html

Another cool part of Moscow is their metro (subway). The metro trains are remarkable - they're very fast (over 40 km/h) and arrive every two minutes. The metro stations are even more amazing. There are 182 stations. The most memorable ones were built in the 1930s, 40s and 50s under the direction of Joseph Stalin who wanted the stations to be bright and ornate as a symbol of the Soviet Union's bright future under Communist rule.