Still scarred from
yesterday's 'eggs', we ate breakfast in our cabin this morning – some
oranges and pastries we bought yesterday. The ferry docked at about
9.30am and we joined the queue to disembark - and then joined the
queue to get through passport control. Not surprisingly, the
passport/visa-checking process was quite time-consuming and
nerve-racking. I had a worrying moment when the officials repeatedly
asked me for something I didn't have – an 'arrival card' – but it
turned out to be something they give to short-stay ferry passengers,
so all was okay.
When we had finally
passed through to the other side, we got some rubles from an ATM and
then headed outside. As our hotel was some distance from the port and
the public transport option looked disturbingly complicated, we had
planned to splash out on a taxi, but when we got outside, they were
pretty thin on the ground and those that we did managed to find
either flat-out refused to take us, suggested we had to call the
central booking office first, or quoted us a fare about twice what we
had been told by the hotel was reasonable. Eventually, we gave up and
Kate went back inside to find out where the bus stop was. As she
spoke to an official, a young man sidled over to offer his advice.
When she was finished, he followed her out and offered to guide us,
as he was heading the same way (I know, alarm bells ringing, but he
seemed really nice!).
After we had loaded
up, he introduced himself as Steve (Stephan) and told us we had two
options – a bus that would take us close to our hotel or another
bus to the metro station and then a short metro ride. He was taking
the latter, so we decided to accompany him. A fairly short bus ride
later we were at the metro station, where we bought some tokens and
then descended deep, deep into the Earth on an extremely long
escalator. Again, as Stephan had said, it was only a short ride –
just three stops. The metro station from which we eventually emerged
was wonderfully ornate, and the scene the greeted us at street level
was somehow just as I probably would have imagined had I ever had
cause to do so: the thoroughfares thronged with pedestrians on the
pavement and aggressive drivers in shiny SUVs on the tarmac, and
overlooked by unbroken rows of grand but grimy buildings in various
states of dereliction, decay and deterioration.
This dichotomy
between old-world grandeur and new-world grime was reflected in our
hotel. A nondescript brown door separates the street from a gloomy
but grand staircase decorated with moth-eaten mosaics and littered
with cigarette-butt-filled tin cans and glass jars. Wiring sprouts
randomly from the filthy walls; light filters greyly through the
filthy windows. Then, on the third landing, another brown door opens
onto an immaculate reception area, all polished wood and crystal
chandeliers. And our room is a revelation: high ceilings, tasteful
furnishings and a sparklingly clean bathroom.
After dropping our
bags off, we all went back out for a coffee at one of the local
chains. Although it was after 11am, Stephan had some breakfast as
well (late night last night). We sipped out coffees and chatted about
his time in the USA, his multi-lingual girlfriend who works too hard
and his hunt for a satisfying job, while exchanging social media
details. And then we parted, our faith in humanity well and truly
restored.
It was lunch time by
now, so we walked a few hundred metres up the street to a chain
restaurant Stephan had recommended for good cheapish Japanese food
(which it was). On the way back to the hotel, we stopped off at a
park overlooked by some reassuringly Soviet buildings and a really
lovely bakery/cafe. A bit later, we went out for a wander –
visiting a properly Soviet supermarket, with a limited selection of
unidentifiable foodstuffs and then a surreally Western version of the
same, with a range that would have made Waitrose blush. Here, we
bought some food for dinner in our room (including a bottle of
Bordeaux, a beetroot coleslaw that had Kate in raptures and some
smoked wild boar sausage that had the same effect on me and the
girls).
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