Hello again friends,
I am back to blog about this past weekend. On Friday I left Moscow on a bus with my buddies Steve and Graham to a "small" city about 150km southeast of Moscow (I say "small" because it is still home to about 25,000 people). The city we went to is called Zaraisk (Зарайск). A couple of the Russians that we have met in Moscow are from Zaraisk and they invited us to come see what a real Russian city looks like. Moscow is not like a Russian city, although it is in Russia. It is the largest city in Europe and thus not really like most cities is Russia. As the pictures below will show, Zaraisk is nothing like Moscow, and at the same time, it is nothing like the small cities in the US that we are used to (IE: Saline, Struthers, Sylvania, Avon Lake, New Philadelphia, etc).
It was a very nice and relaxing weekend. It was great to get out of the hustle and bustle of the big city and go into the calm countryside. We didn't really do too much besides relax, explore the city, grill out and of course drink some vodka :-)
So here is a mini-photo tour of Zaraisk. I hope you enjoy seeing the difference between Zaraisk and Moscow.
Map from Москва (Moscow) to Зарайск (Zaraisk).
A tower in the center of Zaraisk. Most certainly older than our country. Ha.
View down one of the main streets in Zaraisk.
House on the side of the road.
Another view down a street.
Inside the Zaraisk Kremlin. For all of you who don't know, Moscow is not the only city with a Kremlin. Many of the ancient cities in Russia have Kremlins. Moscow's Kremlin is just the most well known one...and actually most Americans only know about the one in Moscow.
Entrance to the Zaraisk Kremlin. It was constructed between 1528-1531. Very old.
Church inside of the Kremlin.
View across the Kremlin. The Zaraisk Kremlin is quiet small and much less intricate than the Moscow Kremlin.
Us "Entering" into the walls of the Kremlin. Just pretending like we owned the place :-)
On the second story of the Kremlin wall.
View of the city and countryside from the second story.
The four of us inside the wall. (Left to Right) Steve, Graham, Dima (our Russian friend) and yours truly. We look good right?? Ha.
View along the inside of the Kremlin wall.
Another view along the inside wall.
View across the Kremlin from the second story of the wall. You can see church towers in the background behind the wall.
View across the Kremlin. Church on the right.
The street where we hung out and grilled out.
Roman grilling Шашлыки (Pronounced Shashlyki. Basically like shishkabobs). Awesomely delicious!
View of the beautiful countryside of Zaraisk towards night fall.
Hope you enjoyed the mini-photo tour of Zaraisk. Love the comments so keep 'em up! Talk to you all later!
Hope you enjoyed the mini-photo tour of Zaraisk. Love the comments so keep 'em up! Talk to you all later!Товарищ Бен
Just before I saw the picture of the "Awesomely Delicious"Shahlyki, I was going to ask, where are all the people? The food does look very good. I'm always ready to try "Local Food" no matter where I am. Variety is the spice of Life! Send me the recipe, or better yet, the next time all of us get together you can cook it up! What ever works.
ReplyDeleteHave a good time,
Perry Bell
Okay, Ben, what is a Kremlin? I kind of thought there was one Kremlin in the whole world. And I thought a Kremlin was for the police, the military, the secret police. How close am I?
ReplyDeleteThese pics are great - needless to say my favorite is the one with you four guys.
I agree with Perry ... 25,000 people and the streets seem so quiet. Definitely different than Moscow, and so very different than Saline.
Now, who is Roman, your chef? He looked like he was enjoying himself. Very fun to see Dima.
Keep your eyes open,
Love,
Mom
Dear Ben-
ReplyDeleteI think your mom covered all the qeustions I was going to ask. Scary how we think alike, huh? And yes, you get extra credit for a picture with you in it! That was my favorite, too. I did wonder, whose feet is that climbing inside of the wall?
Love, Aunt Patti
PS 1 more posting to go.