Astana Days - July 6

On July 6 and 7 Astana celebrated Astana Days, and July 6 is also President Nazarbayev's birthday, so the celebrations were in full motion. There is usually a parade, concerts all over the city, dance competitions and many other things. Babushka, the girls, and I (Spencer had to do some work) decided to go look at one yurt village that they put together for display next to one of the city malls. Each region of Kazakhstan had its own yurt where they presented information about their region. It was pretty fun.

At the "village"

Babushka speaking with one of the presenters. 

I always loved the Kazakh national costumes... so festive!

Inside of one of the yurts

This one our kids loved the most because it had live animals!

Sophie with her new friend!

My girls didn't get the memo that during the picture taking it is advisable to look into the camera. Well, in their defense, there is a live snake in the spot where they are looking.

Another yurt.

This yurt from Aktobe region was pretty cool: it had different kinds of oil. Kazakhstan has a big oil industry on the Caspian Sea.

We had fun at the village!

It was a really hot day, and by the time we were done, we were really thirsty, so we decided to walk to another city mall and have some lemonade and possibly ice cream there. We ran into some interesting things along the way.

We found this exciting reptile bench.

The girls couldn't resist climbing on top of it.

This year Astana built the bike trails that go through a lot of the city. Too bad we do not  own bikes here because they are very nice! 

Enjoying the fountain mist on a very, very hot day!

Babushka

This plaza often has different art exhibits.  This time it was "Kazakhstan through pictures"

One of the pictures. It is very iconic. The two beauties Kazakhs value the most are horses and women; probably in that order :)

The twins are just unable to pass any fountain without getting wet.

We finally made it to the Keruen Mall and had some cherry lemonade and sundae ice cream.

When we got back home, Babushka and the twins were pretty tired but Nika, Lina and I thought we would go check out if anything else was going on at our own mall, and we were right... there was a a kids chess simultaneous game with one of the chess masters of Kazakhstan and a circus performance. We stayed and watch for awhile and then decided to check out the new playground. It was awesome! 

Simultaneous chess games

One of the circus performers doing a hula-hoop tricks

They must have been inspired by the circus performers.

Pretty impressive web on the playground!

As always we had a great time exploring the city and all it has to offer.

Summer Trip 2017: Day 2 - St. Petersburg Peterhof Palace

One of the things that Yulia and I missed on our visit to St. Petersburg 13 years ago was going to the summer palace at Peterhof outside of St. Petersburg.  We learned that it (along with the hermitage) were closed on Mondays, so we decided to go on Sunday.  Yulia has a friend from Krasnoyarsk that lives in St. Pete, and who she hadn't seen for 14 years, so we decided to meet there.  The trip out took quite a while - we had to go to a metro station more on the outskirts of the city and then take a van to the palace.  We ate breakfast first, at our nearby KFC and then headed out.

Riding the escalator in the Metro is always fun in St. Pete - deep tunnels. 

On the Metro

The station was beautiful.  Moscow generally has nicer subway stations, but some of them are nice in St. Pete as well.

We arrived at about 10:20 and bought our tickets and went inside.  The fountains - the main attraction outside in the gardens turn on at 11:00, so we got a good spot and waited.  Yulia's friend and her family met us at about 10:30 and we visited while we waited.  The fountains near the palace are beautiful, as is the canal that leads out to the Baltic Sea.  The canal was built to allow ships to sail right up to the palace.

The fountains turning on. With the view down to the Gulf of Finland

Yulia with the fountains and palace as decorations.

Looking back at the palace and at the canal

The Gulf of Finland.  

Looking out at the sea.

The seagulls in St. Petersburg have brown heads.

Yulia and I posing in front of the chess board fountain. 

Gardens with beautiful violets and tulips. 

Once the fountains were done, we walked through the park.  The kids especially loved two "trick fountains" that were designed to get you wet.  One of them was activated when you walked on certain rocks, and the other was turned on at random by a few attendants (it was designed by Peter originally, but rebuilt only within the last 15 or so years).  Peterhof had been very damaged during WWII and it has been rebuilt and restored since then.

This tree was a hit.

More pictures of the gardens.

Statue of Peter the Great.  People tried to throw coins in his boot.

Our girls trying to throw coins in his boot.  They spent more time picking up coins - making some good money in the process.

This group was playing near the fountain.  It was beautiful.

Showing the damage and the extent of the rebuild.

We opted not to go inside the palace, since we had been to the Winter Palace (Hermitage) the day before.  We spent about two hours walking around, and then it started to rain a bit and we had seen the grounds.  We said goodbye to Yulia's friends, and then took a "meteor" ship from Peterhof to the Hermitage.  The boat trip was really nice.  We got to see a number of large ships, the view of St. Petersburg, and the shipbuilding facilities at the mouth of the Neva river.  All in all, it was a fun trip.

Both families after a nice day at Peterhoff.

Riding the meteor!

The docks 

It was still drizzling when we arrived, so we walked toward the Metro station.  There was a McDonald's nearby, so we ate there - fighting the crowds to do so.  We went back to the apartment via the Metro, and were there for a few hours while a massive thunderstorm raged outside.  When it broke we went to a Pelmeni restaurant which was just down the street.  The food there was very good - the best Restaurant Russian food I've ever had and it was reasonably priced.  After we ate, we returned to our apartment - just in time to miss another massive rainstorm.

Walking out of Palace Square

Lunch!

Dinner at the Pelmeni restaurant.

Rain after dinner.  This wasn't the worst of it.

We really liked the day - it was full, but not overfilled, and we missed the worst of the weather. Our St. Petersburg adventure was shaping up nicely [1].
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[1] As an aside, when Yulia and I were there in 2004, it was my least favorite part of our trip.  It was cold and rainy in May when we were there and the people seemed sullen and rude.  This time it was sunny (except for the rainy afternoon on Sunday) and people were quite friendly.  It changed our opinion toward the city quite a bit.