Well the market in SP bore good fruit, specifically: tomatoes. Huge deep pink fleshy beef tomatoes the like of which I have never tasted before. We ate them at Peterhof which we did go to by boat, and it was indeed splendid and in the same vein as Versailles. However we were so focused on the fabulous tomatoes that we didn't notice the supposedly impressive fountains and water features being turned off, which we therefore missed. Ah well. Oh - and I fell out of a moving bus. Nothing broken except my pride, fortunately, although Ellen rather ungenerously suggests that I cracked the paving slab that stopped my fall.
On Thursday we spend a good couple of hours in the hermitage museum in the afternoon, which was nowhere near long enough. Many visits are required for this amazing place, which is set partly in the former imperial Winter Palace. When it comes to lavish opulence the Tsars had certainly cornered the market - huge marble rooms with malachite pillars, lapis lazuli urns taller than I am dotted around, beautifully patterned floors and more baubles, trinkets and assorted Russian plunder than it is possible to count. I was quite awe-struck by the place and then spotted the arrow upstairs to 'Eurpoean Painters'. Well, I thought, I'm in Russia and the Russian stuff is pretty spectacular, but the Eurpoean art can't be up to much - its just an add-on. A couple of second-rate watercolours at best. So there I was a few minutes later speachless in front of Matisse's now-iconic 'Dancers' having just walked through 2 huge rooms stuffed with Picassos. Not any Picassos either, but really cleverly selected examples from each of The Master's main periods, so it was like walking through PP's life. It did occur to me that this is particularly unfair; I mean, how is one's mind supposed to cope with this? To be already dumb-struck by the sheer opulence that is The Hermitage, only to be hit with a collection of the finest 20th century masters at the end? It is not possible to remain sane after such a killer blow.
The evening was an emotional one for different reasons. We met again with Ellen's father's very lovely friend Elena who took us on a walk through some gorgeous woodland to the north of town up to Piskarevscoe Memorial Cemetry, where lay unnamed graves for those who dies in the war. Next to one of these I noted its size - about 25x10 yards. I was staggered to learn that in this space 20 thousand people lay, and when I looked up identical squares extended out to fill my field of vision in all directions. In some ways more horrifying even than Aushwitz, maybe becuase of the sheer anonymity of lifes destroyed. I was left thinking firstly of how much power so few men had that they were able to send so many - some towns here were utterly devestated of blood lines - to their death with just a few commands. Secondly that this told a different story to that of Hollywood or modern western media: the war was not won just becuase America graced us with their presence when it was almost too late; the victory was paid for in blood, and so much of it was Russian blood.