1967

At milage 9737 on our little British motor home and at 8:37 on July 8, 1967, we are at the border to the USSR. It had taken some doing to get there. It had never occurred to us to go to Russia, but when we ordered our motor home from the Wilson company in London while we were still in Cairo, they told us of a family who had gone through Russia with a motor home like the one we were buying, and they gave us their name and address. We wrote and learned about their experiences. We decided we could do it, too.

While in Cairo, I had also met a woman who had ridden a bus from Europe to India, and I said "If a bus can make it to India from Europe, we can, too." My husband, Burt, acquiesced, and since he was retiring when his contract with the UN-FAO ran out early in 1967, we were on our way.

The last two months of Burt's contract was spent in Rome where the International headquarters of the FAO is located, and while there we made our arrangements. Intourist, the Russian tourist bureau, was represented by an Italian company. We had to make out our schedule for each night that we were to spend in a camp ground in Russia. We had to pay for our campgrounds, and had to decide exactly where we were going to spend each night, difficult to do in a foreign country, not knowing the road conditions or the points of interest. Burt spent a whole day trying to work out a schedule for our stay in Russia. The least he could come up with was 39 days which seemed like a long time in the USSR.

Burt was also most anxious to visit some Universities and a commune farm. He asked for that permission and we received a confirmation telegram which was most useful when we got to Moscow. All arrangements were made and paid for in Rome except we could not get our visas until one month before we would be entering the country, which we did in Norway, another experience, many months later.

Our last night before entering the USSR was spent in a campground in Finland, where we talked to people who had just come out. They had been very negative about their experiences and Burt was apprehensive, and was almost ready to turn around.

We had to wait until 9:00 for the gates to open. Two buses and seven cars were ahead of us. Burt had to sign a simple form and then the customs men came in to the car. They looked at our books on a shelf, in the cubboards, but asked only to look in my cosmetic kit with mostly drugs and vitamins. We were so thankful we didn't have to open everything. They did seal our tape recorder, and said if the seal was broken, we'd have to pay $50. I cashed a $20 travelers' check, and got 17.90 rubles.

Viborg was our first town in the USSR, with perfectly awful streets with big pot holes. We found the tourist office and bought coupons for 100 liters of gas. This cost us 10.20 rubles, and was much cheaper than gas in other parts of Europe.

We reached the camp at Repino, which was still 25 miles from Leningrad in mid-afternoon. A number of cars, and several buses were here, but the camp became more crowded the three days we were there. The camp was minimal, but it had a kitchen with primitive equipment.

Common in all camp grounds, we discovered as we went along, were a large number of cabins. Here a framework about four feet high around a wooden platform is topped with a canvas cover. Other camp grounds had more substantial cabins. Five beds, a table and lights are in each cabin but the campers had to carry their own linens, bed covers, and cooking ware. The communal toilets were awful and the showers not much better although I was pleased to find hot water.

Most of the people here seemed to be Finns, but we saw one Australian family with three children and an American family with five children. They had a trailer with the fold-down top. We saw few trailers or motor homes, but a fair number of campers had tents.

The next day we drove the 25 miles to Leningrad. We had been given a coupon for a conducted tour with our campground and we joined a two hour bus tour at 11:00. It was a good tour and we found the Russian guides all spoke excellent American English, not with a British accent as Europeans often do.

Leningrad was begun in the early part of the 18th Century, and was first called St. Petersburg, then Petrograd, and now (in 1967) Leningrad because it was here that Lenin organized his October revolution. The name was changed to Leningrad in 1922 after Lenin's death. Now in 1993, (as I write) it is St. Petersburg again. We drove first down Nevsky Praga, the main street of Leningrad, then past the winter palace which is also the Hermitage. Catherine the Great started the first art collection in the palace, then built the Hermitage to display them.

This green palace is on the Neva river, one of the 66 rivers in the neighborhood of Leningrad, some of which run through the city. The city is really built on a group of islands and is sometimes called the Venice of the North. Across the river is the Fortress of Peter and Paul which was begun in 1703 as a fortress, but later was a political prison, and now is a museum. There are supposed to be 50 museums in Leningrad. The University, which we saw, is supposed to have 20,000 students from 44 nations.

Among other sights, we saw the Cathedral of St. Isaac which was finished in 1858, but had taken 40 years to build. It is, of course, no longer a church but is also called a museum. We visited it the next day. It has much gilt, very fine copper cast doors, and much mosaic. A young woman guide told us this cathedral has the third highest dome in the world, next only to those of St. Peter's in Rome, and St.Paul's in London. One of the most interesting features of this building was a set of ten huge columns made of malachite, and two blue columns of lapis lazuli. I have only ever seen these stones before in inlaid work on tables or in mosaics, but never in such large columns.

Our bus tour lasted two hours and we saw most of the highlights of the city. We then walked down Nevksy Praga to find a grocery, a bakery, and a fruit market. The grocery was closed for lunch, but a meat market was open, and we bought 10 eggs for 1.30. That is about 14 cents an egg, and we decided we wouldn't be eating many eggs in the USSR. We didn't find a bakery until we came back to the car, where our car was undergoing an intense scrutiny. One of the women spoke a fair English, and she took Burt to find a bakery.

While Burt was gone, a young woman stopped by who spoke good English. She had lovely blue eyes, and her hair was done attractively. I asked if she went to a shop. She said her hair was naturally curly, but she did have it cut. I asked if she had a job, and she said she had lost her job, because she was corresponding with a British sailor whom she had met here.

On Tuesday, our third day in the Leningrad area, we finally saw the Hermitage. Being the middle of the summer, mobs of tourists were here, and we couldn't find a guide, so we attached ourselves to a group of American students who had been in school in Vienna. The Hermitage is a fabulous place. A huge room called the Italian room was built just to house Italian paintings of the 16th Century - Veronese, Raphael, and a sculpture of a BOY CROUCHING by Michelangelo. Another room was especially built for Italian art of the 16th, 17th, & 18th Centuries. A Spanish room had paintings by Velazquez, Ribera and other Spanish painters. One room had Rembrandts, of which this gallery had 25, an outstanding collection exceeded in number only by the gallery in Amsterdam.

Another section of this huge palace was called the Little Hermitage, built by Catherine II for her own enjoyment. This was the first art gallery in Russia. We entered first a very large and very beautiful room with white plaster reliefs touched with gold leaf, and tremendous crystal chandeliers. It was as beautiful as any room I have seen anywhere in our wandering around Europe. A beautiful parquet floor wasn't being taken care of. It was dusty and being walked on. I couldn't help but compare these floors with the highly polished floors in the Pitti Palace in Florence or in a monastery in Portugal. On one wall was a tremendous map of Russia set with Ural Mountain precious and semiprecious stones.

Another room had hundreds of Moderns and Impressionists - Monet, Rodin, Matisse, Van Gogh, and two whole rooms of Picasso. Another room called the Golden Room had even more gold than other rooms we had seen although not so large. It was quite dazzling but not really as beautiful as the rooms done in crystal and marble, or white plaster and gold. By now it was getting late, and the guide rushed us through the last rooms. I would have loved to have spent another day in the area and come back to the Hermitage, but we had to keep to our schedule at the camp grounds, or so we thought.

We had to learn to shop in Russia. Many stores closed from 12:30 to 2:30 or 3:00 as they had in much of Europe, and we often had to stand in line. Potatoes at that time of year were not available, but the breads were good. Fruits and vegetables were very scarce in this northern country so early in the year.

We also were surprised though shouldn't have been, about how long the days were. I say in my diary, "It is approaching ten o'clock now, and it is still daylight. It is so amazing."

After three days at the Repino camp we were on the road again. We had trouble finding the right road out of Leningrad until we approached an ambulance driver who gave us directions. We were finally on Hyw. #10 and on our way to Moscow.