Day 9-13, exploring Moscow

Day 9, Moscow by bicycle, 56 km

Irina and Michael live in a big apartment house about 15 km north  of the centre. Only some hundred meters to the Metro and with all kind of stores in the neighbourhood. Very convenient!

Irina loves Sweden (she did so since she was a little girl) and speaks fluently Swedish (!) although she has been in Sweden only for some weeks. She learned it by watching Astrid Lindren-videos and listening to Swedish songs, she told me.

On the cover of her laptop she had a large photography which was taken last summer when she was biking around Öland witch some friends.

They used fold-able bicycles, to be able to take them on the flight and the Swedish trains. She and her partner Michael work with software programming in the same company nearby their home.

We had a really nice chat in the evening I arrived. They told me, because on Tuesday there was the Day Of Russia, they were free from their work also on Monday. In the morning I told them I would like to go to the Mongolian embassy to get a visa.and make some sightseeing. Irina gave me the keys of their flat and said that she was not sure if they should be at home when I came back.

So I biked downtown. I rode on the biggest roads towards the embassy but although I wanted to go to the embassy first of all, I could not avoid the centre and took some pictures there. It was amazing to see at the huge buildings! Everything was clean and newly renovated..Especially the day before the Day Of Russia everybody was taking away litter and cutting lawns. The police were putting up fences and barricades on many places around the Kremlin and the Red Square.

I soon found the Mongolian Embassy but from there I was sent to the Mongolian Consulate. Of course it was closed for lunch and I had to wait for two hours. I spent my time on a pedestrian street called Abrat. There it was quiet and peaceful. Many street-artists were doing performances there and many painters were making portraits and caricatures. I sat down on a nice place and just watched people going along the street. I estimated how many of them were Russians tourists and I think it must have been around 97%.Moscow seems to be undiscovered all other nationalities! This might be the reason why nobody speaks English even in Moscow. Or is it the other way round, no tourists because nobody speaks English? 

At 3 pm I was finished with my visa-application and thought, since I had to wait three days, I might be a good Idea to apply for the Chinese Visa at the same time. I found out that it was only 9 km to the Chinese Embassy and decided to go there. On the way I passed an interesting old bridge which was covered with a modern glass roof.

I was fascinated of the design and looked inside this modern shopping gallery.

I really liked this bridge, called Bogdana Khemelinetskogo.

I also saw an interesting huge building far away:

Next day I came closer to it and found out it was the University.

It was much bigger than this picture, really HUGE.

When I found the Chinese Embassy south of the centre it already was closed. So I decided to go back to the centre. I wanted to see the Red Square but on the way I passed an old Monastery (New Maiden Monastery) and took some pictures there.

It was surrounded by a wall and many nice buildings were in the area.

Isn´t it nice?

I also passed the biggest cathedral of Moscow, the Christ the Savoir Cathedral

It was also huge.

Finally I came to the Red Square

I took some pictures and then I rested on a lawn

When i came home that evening I found out that my hosts were not at home. They had taken their backpacks, sleeping bags tent and so on and had gone for a hike in a nice area south-east of Moscow. It really felt luxurious to have a whole flat for myself! What a confidence!

I also found out that evening that I exactly had passed 1001 km from Stockholm. It is not the real distance because my bicycle computer does not work when it is raining too much, but it is the distance I could read on the display.

Day 10, More of Moscow, 54 km

This day I was thinking about to take the Metro to the Chinese Embassy. I googled how long time it should take and decided finally to go by bicycle anyway. The embassy did not like my papers. Although they were good enough to get a visa in Stockholm (I unfortunately got it only until the End of August but I am planning to be there in Sept or Oct), they demanded to see a ticket and the passport number of my inviter. I told them that I did not have a ticket yet because I did not exactly know when I should go there. I Stockholm they had warned me at the travel agency not to mention that I was planning to go by bicycle, because you need a very special visa for that, so I did not say anything about it. I sent an sms to China but did not get an answer. I asked for a application form in English but there was only one in Russian and Chinese. They could not help me to print an English one from the Internet but said I should come with all my documents next day.

Although I now (today) have got all documents I will not do it. Instead I will try to do it in Ekatrineburg or Irkutsk or Ulaanbaator. It takes another five days and I do not want to stay in Moscow so long.

On the way home I visited some more places and took many more pictures.

This are some water steps close to the Kremlin wall. The building to the left is a big shopping galleria-

Here is the same water in the other direction.

Then I went to my favourite pedestrian Arbat and took a power-nap listening to the music of some artist:

On the way home I decided to test the Metro next day. I had heard it was very beautiful. And to cross all lanes with my bicycle caused often problems. There were some tunnels under the road but you never could now where they ended. Since it was the day of Russia. the town was very crowded and it was almost impossible to move with a bike. I considered to stay and watch the celebration but since it was impossible to get information about what should happen and where, and since it was raining and I had become wet and dirty I decided to go home.Despite the fact that there were thousands of cops and military staff I thought of risk for some terror attacks and found out that I did not like crowds. 

Everywhere there were police- and military-vehicles.

The military had taken on their raincoats and looked  like death. 

Instead I rode home and had another peaceful evening in the flat. First late at night my hosts came home from their hike.

Day 12, testing the Metro 

Next day I did not ride at all but used the Metro. Irina told me that you only have to buy an entrance ticket and that it was valid as long as you did not go out of the system again. So it was possible to see all stations with one ticket that costs 28 RUB  = 6 SEK.
I travelled around and took a lot of pictures. Here are some:

Most often everything was covered with marble, different colours for different stations. 

 Often there was also Icons and mosaic in the entrance halls. And on the floors there were beautiful patterns.

My goal was to find the only Waldorfschool of Moscow. 

It was not difficult to find but when I came there I found out that almost all pupils already were on vacation. When I said that I was a Waldorf teacher from Stockholm the math teacher passed by and said she could show me the school.

It was a quite big building. In Russia all schools have numbers and no names and this is called Moscow 1060.Already in the year 1991 it became a waldorf-school. It is Russias oldest waldorf school and has a very good reputation. 

This is the entrance hall where the math teacher found a key-ring with about 50 different spare-keys, all for different classrooms. It seemed as if for each room only the right teacher has got a key.

She began to show me class 1a. She told me that there were eleven grades and several of them had two parallel classes. In all there were about 400 pupils in the school.

 Here you can see the wall painting in class 1a. It is about a fairy tail.

Here you can see the schedule. If somebody of your readers would like to get a translation, please let me know. But there are instructive symbols!

 This is the birthday calendar of class three. If you read it clockwise it starts with summer, fall winter and it ends with spring. Like the year in the school.

In class three I also found Nis Holgersson and a big housebuilding-project. Like a doll-house but many floors.

 This as a play- and restroom in a corridor in the middle of the school

And this is an exhibition of different clay craft, made by different classes. In the staircases they had hundreds of photos from plays and all the seasonal feasts they celebrated through the years. I got a feeling this was the speciality of the school. I think the maths teacher could tell me about at least six different feasts.

These pictures are from the spring carnival in the beginning of march.

The year of school starts in the beginning of September and ends on the 24th of May. All teachers continue to work until Midsummer. They sat in different classrooms and were planning for the next year. In some classrooms there were also pupils when we looked in. I think it must have been two categories: Some were children of the teachers, some were there to improve their grades.
My guide only spoke Russian and because said with a convinced voice that I certainly could speak Russian, she made me speak Russian more than I knew I could. She must be a good teacher.
I really liked the school and the atmosphere there. Everybody was happy and optimistic.

I the afternoon I walked around in the city and took some more photos.

Another subway station.

I had heard that Moscow was very beautiful at night So I waited until it became dark. It was the wrong time of the year but finally it became dark anyway. 

 This is the famous and very old department store ГУМ (GUM). It is placed next to the Red Square.

 A church next to it.

 And these buildings also are close to the Red Square.

It was as I had been told, Moscow was even ore beautiful by night.

Day 12, I got the Mongolian Visa!

The last day in Moscow I also used the Metro. Although I do not like crowds it felt safer than to cross all the highways with my bicycle. In Moscow the prospects have may lanes (I counted up to 12 lanes at some places) and there are no bicycle paths and almost no pedestrian crossings. That makes it to a very hostile city for bicycles and that's why everybody takes the tube. All people know exactly how to walk in a gorgeous system of tunnels and underpasses but for a bicycle it is too crowded there and all staircases are impossible if it is loaded with 45 kg luggage. Many of the tunnels are almost as shopping gallerias, in several floors under the earth, and people look strange at you when you come with your bike.

I went to the Mongolian Embassy and filled out some more forms and left my passport there. In the afternoon it was ready and I got my Mongolian Visa! Actually it is valid for 30 days and I have to enter before the 30 of September, which is MORE than three months ahead (in Stockholm it was impossible to get a visa more than 90 days ahead).

I did not do so much that day. I took some more pictures of thing I thought were beautiful but which I had missed all other days.

I really liked all flowers in Moscow!

And I also liked the beautiful fountains and sculptors!

Then I walked "home", oiled my chain and wrote my blog.

During  the last days I tried to contact some more warmshower-members and even WWOOF-members in the Jaroslavl region NE of Moscow, but I have not got any answers. 

So tomorrow I will go further east, towards Nizhniy Novogorod (430 km). I think it will take me four days until I write again.