I couldn't find the time to go a shooting range when I was in Moscow and Saint Petersburg, so I popped over to Russia's neighbour to the West - Tallinn, Estonia - to fire historical Soviet and contemporary guns.

September 29, 2015

220 Years of Tradition. Palkin Restaurant - Saint Petersburg, Russia.


I bid farewell to Moscow on a high - literally - note, and Saint Petersburg was no different. 

Saint Petersburg is the historical, luxuriant counterpart to Moscow's gaudy new-money glamour, so Palkin was the perfect fit for my last meal in Imperial Russia's capital. There's nothing I love more than dining in high-end, historically-rich, slightly-chintzy, rose-hued ambience and enjoying dinner-table theatrics with exceptionally attentive service - in other words, dining like a Tsar. So when my parents told me to pick a restaurant for our last dinner in St P, my research told me that it had to be Palkin!

September 21, 2015



Hungry for more? Here are 4 More Restaurants to try in St Petersburg, Russia

All the lavish sights of Saint Petersburg does give one an appetite so its just as well that the city's gastronomical offerings are diverse. Vegetarian, traditional Russian, contemporary Eastern-Western fusion - I've tasted all those for your consideration (and for my own selfish reasons too, ahem)


September 17, 2015

Peterhof Palace, Saint Petersburg, Russia


I mentioned in my Moscow blog post that the Russian capital is a juxtaposition of Communist relics and nouveau-riche ostentation. The opposite seems to be true of St Petersburg - the city's contemporaries are decidedly more relaxed, while monuments to decadence and excess are firmly entrenched in history.

The Tsars and Tsarinas of Russia were the original Gs. Their subjects must've felt the same way - fed up of living under the thumb of their social betters, the proletariat revolted. By 1917, the Tsarist autocracy effectively dismantled when Tsar Nicholas II, the last Emperor and Autocrat of All the Russia abdicated. Only a year later, the Tsar and his family (the Romanovs) would meet a bloody end at the hands of the Bolsheviks. Before the tide of revolution washed away the last of the ruling class, the capital was Saint Petersburg (or Petrograd as it was briefly named between 1914 - 1924) - an imperial city whose fabulous palaces and grand cathedrals showcased the might and wealth of the Tsars. It still is, today - St Petersburg feels like a city frozen in a time of Imperial Russia. I arrived in Moscow by way of Sapsan (Russia's answer to Japan's shinkansen - bullet train) and was immediately impressed by how the city seemed eerily untouched by the ravages of modernisation. St Petersburg felt very much like a museum whose hallowed halls are haunted by the spectres of history.

September 13, 2015



The W's first and only Russian hotel is surprisingly not in flashy Moscow, but in chilled-out St. Petersburg.

THE W ST. PETERSBURG - W HOTEL'S FIRST RUSSIAN HOTEL

At first it seems quite the juxtaposition, as between the two Russian cities St Petersburg is the effortlessly-chic cousin (you know, the one who shows up your 'dress to impress' efforts by looking frustratingly hot in her messy top knot and last minute smudge of red lipstick - that b*tch!) - seemingly at odds with the W Hotel ethos ie. cool-chasers who push trends like the proverbial 15 minutes are nearly up. And such trends - ceramic creatures in bell jars, designer furniture, wire goldfish swimming through the communal area. From the dizzying smorgasbord of funky design in every corner of the 'Living Room' you'd be forgiven to think that you'd taken the wrong flight and landed in Moscow. I mean, the lobby, sorry, living room, had its own DJ.

September 11, 2015


 
Every international luxury destination needs an elevated perch for its capital's elite to survey their city from. In Moscow, that happens to be the shiny new O2 Lounge - the rooftop bar of the Ritz-Carlton

I wanted to see out Moscow in style. On my last night I hurriedly packed for St Petersburg, left the calm of my hotel and braved Tverskaya Ulitsa - the busiest street in Moscow - for all of a five minute walk. I only had to pop next door to the Ritz-Carlton. Past the fleet of supercars parked outside (and admirers snapping away eagerly) myself and present company (family and friends) made a beeline to the lifts that would take us up to Moscow's most glamourous observation deck.

September 08, 2015



Party like it’s the 19th century - dine the Russian gentry way, as if the revolution never happened.

Don’t be lulled by the seemingly-casual ‘café’ prefix - Cafe Pushkin is really a 5* star restaurant that operates the ‘face-control’ standard of upmarket Moscow establishments ie. ladies in heels and dresses, gentlemen get away with casual clothing if they wear elegant shoes. That’s no reason to dismiss Cafe Pushkin as snooty and elitist, even if the premise is that this elegant Moscow café, with its gorgeously presented Russian-French dishes served by staff who beautifully speak pre-Sovietized Russian, is the place to dine in 19th century style. This restaurant never sleeps, and like Duck & Waffle in London, is the refined watering hole for night-owls and party people who want their haute bites at silly o’clock. The service is impeccable, the surroundings are sumptuous, the food is exquisite (and has the prices to match, but you say potato, I say poh-tah-toe).

September 06, 2015

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