Language barrier in Russia

The confusing lockers

On Friday, we took a train from Helsinki to St. Petersburg. St. Petersburg is a city of canals and grand architecture. As the city is considered Russia's 'window to the West', it's good we're starting our trans-Siberian trip here -- a smooth transition from Scandinavia to Siberia. But the first thing we encountered when we got off the train was the language barrier. We wanted to put our backpacks in lockers, but we couldn't read any of the signs and no one spoke English. We literally stood in front of the lockers for 30 minutes trying to figure out how they worked. In the end, we somehow managed!

We spent one night in St. Petersburg. We stayed with Olga, a very nice girl we met in Iceland. It was so nice to have her show us around. We would have been so lost! Thank you, Olga!

The Church of the Savior on Blood

Hermitage

One of the many bridges we saw

Olga and Sahe