Saint Petersburg - Part One - Church of the Resurrection

There are many times in my life that everything seems just too good to be true!  This week has been one of them.  After seeing such incredible sights in Moscow I felt like there's just now way that anything could top it.

And then we arrived in St Petersburg!

Mrs Every had hosted a 10th grader from Dubna in her home this summer, and so this student's father helped arrange a trip to Saint Petersburg for us - complete with his assistant as our personal guide for three days!  I don't know what we would have done without Tatiana (probably we'd still be trying to find our first stop on the subway!)

Our first stop was the Church of the Resurrection.  It's also called The Church on the Spilled Blood, because the entire building was built around the spot where the tzar that abolished the peasant system (like our slavery) was murdered.

This Cathedral was built after the style of St Basil's in Moscow.

Here is the first view I saw as I came around the corner from the hallway.  It's stunning!

Every inch of the walls are covered, and the colors are vivid - especially the gold.  I then found out that there is not one painting in the entire Cathedral.  It is all mosaic tile!  If you look closely at the pillar to the right of this picture you can see the individual tiles.  Every tile was at least smaller than an inch!

A close up of some of the mosaics.

The iconostasis.  This separates the main alter from the rest of the Cathedral in all orthodox churches.  The golden doors remain shut, and only a priest can enter.  The only day of the year that the doors open and the alter is visible to anyone else is Easter Sunday.

Another view of the iconostasis.  I wish my photos could show more clearly how incredibly huge this was!

Inside the main dome, looking up

Also looking up.  One of the random things I've fallen in love with on this trip is lighting fixtures as seen from the bottom.  This is a giant chandelier.  

A view from at night with the moon.