Feeling Beat in Saint Pete

St. Petersburg, Russia

We arrived by overnight ferry from Tallinn last night. The ferry was very nice - a good quality of service at a reasonable price. We had a Nordic buffet, worked on some D20 characters (Juan will have a field day with this), and turned in. Jason had the bright idea of getting out of bed at 4 AM to catch the sunrise. We followed through with this plan and braved the cold to see the sun come up over the Baltic Sea. I got some good video and we both shot a bunch of stills. As an extra bonus, we met some Estonian girls on the sundeck who had been drinking straight through the night. The more talkative of the two, Anna, told us that she is performing in a show tonight in St. Petersburg. We have some clues as to where:

• in a church
• near a main streeet
• not far from The Hermitage

We have decided to try to act on these hints and have a go at making the show. Looking at the map, we already have several candidates in mind.

First impressions of St. Pete are not great. It's very grey and we are staying in a dump. It's a $40 a night dump, but a dump nonetheless. Nobody seems very happy here and not as much English is spoken, so we are relying a bit on my half-remembered college Russian to get around. It has come in handy here and there and I'm very pleased that we got any utility at all. Thanks to Erin L for talking me into taking those courses in the first place.