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Walking routes in Saint Petersburg

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      Two banks of the Neva: from Petrogradka to Kolomna

      ⏱ 10 h🚶 9 km🍽 3📍 10 stops
      🏃 A lot — over 7 km

      The fortress, the Strelka, the sphinxes and New Holland — the whole historic centre on foot.

      🏛 History and architecture🌳 Parks and nature
      🗺 Open in Yandex Maps
      1. 1
        🧺 Sytny Market
        Сытнинская пл., 5
        ▮▮▯▯▯
        Breakfast at the farmers’ market
        🍴 The city's oldest market, in a building of 1913: meat, dairy and fruit rows, a café on the second floor. What to order: chicken Kyiv at the “180°” (Kotletnaya) stall, plov with flatbread at Plovnaya, farm cheeses and curd cheese.
      2. 🚶 on foot
      3. 2
        🖼 Kshesinskaya Mansion
        ул. Куйбышева, 2–4
        🎟 ticket
        Museum of Political History of Russia
        The ballerina’s Art Nouveau mansion
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Kshesinskaya Mansion
        © Florstein · CC BY-SA 4.0
        Kshesinskaya Mansion
        © Potekhin · CC BY-SA 3.0
        • The mansion was built in 1904–1906 for the ballerina Mathilde Kschessinska to a design by Alexander von Hohen.
        • The facades combine red and grey granite, brick and majolica — a textbook example of Northern Art Nouveau.
        • In spring 1917 the Bolsheviks settled here: Lenin worked in the mansion from 3 (16) April to 4 (17) July.
        • Kschessinska filed an eviction suit, naming among the defendants the “candidate of law V. I. Ulyanov”; the judge ordered the party organisations evicted.
        • In 1920 the ballerina emigrated to France.
        • In 1957 the mansion was joined to the neighbouring Brandt mansion for the Museum of the Revolution.
        • Since 1991 it has housed the Museum of Political History of Russia.
      4. 🚶 on foot
      5. 3
        🏛 Peter and Paul Fortress
        🎟 partly ticketed · The grounds are free; the cathedral and museums are ticketed
        The noon cannon shot — at 12:00
        The noon gun at 12:00
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Peter and Paul Fortress
        © Andrey Korzun · CC BY-SA 4.0
        Peter and Paul Fortress
        © Godot13 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The fortress was founded on 16 (27) May 1703 — this day is considered the founding day of Petersburg.
        • The fortress never took part in military action.
        • From 1706 the earthen ramparts began to be replaced with brick ones; the bastions are named after Peter's associates — Menshikov, Naryshkin, Trubetskoy.
        • The Peter and Paul Cathedral was built in 1712–1733 to a design by Trezzini; the bell tower is 122.5 m high, and inside is the Romanov burial vault.
        • The Peter Gate is dedicated to the victories over Sweden; Trezzini designed its Baroque facade in 1708.
        • Until the early 1920s the Trubetskoy Bastion held a prison for political prisoners; Maxim Gorky was held there in 1905.
        • In 1991 a monument to Peter I by Mikhail Shemyakin was placed on the central alley.
      6. 🚶 on foot
      7. 4
        🍽 Petrovskoye café in the Peter and Paul Fortress
        Петропавловская крепость, 3Т
        ▮▮▯▯▯
        Lunch in the fortress
        🍴 An inexpensive canteen-style café right inside the Peter and Paul Fortress: soups, pastries, lunches. What to order: borscht, pasta, pirozhki, tea in a pot.
      8. 🚶 on foot
      9. 5
        🌅 Strelka of Vasilyevsky Island (the Spit)
        The Rostral Columns and a view of the Neva
        The Rostral Columns
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Strelka of Vasilyevsky Island (the Spit)
        © A.Savin · FAL 1.3
        Strelka of Vasilyevsky Island (the Spit)
        © Kora27 · CC BY-SA 3.0
        • Until 1885 Petersburg's seaport worked on the Spit, then it was moved to Gutuevsky Island.
        • The 32-metre Rostral Columns were put up by Thomas de Thomon in 1805–1810; until 1885 they served as lighthouses.
        • The columns' name comes from the Latin rostrum, “ship's prow”: they are decorated with metal ship prows and anchors.
        • The version that the figures at the base of the columns are the Volkhov, Neva, Dnieper and Volga is recent and not confirmed by documents.
        • The Exchange building, shaped like an ancient temple, opened in 1816; since 2013 it has been handed over to the Hermitage.
        • From 1937 to 1989 the square on the Spit was called Pushkin Square.
      10. 🚶 on foot
      11. 6
        🖼 Kunstkamera
        Университетская наб., 3
        🎟 ticket
        A turquoise building with an openwork tower — Peter's anatomical rarities and the ethnography of the world's peoples.
        Russia’s first museum
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Kunstkamera
        © Никонико962 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The founding date is considered to be 1714, when Peter's collection was placed in the Chambers by the Summer Palace.
        • The present Petrine Baroque building was built from 1718 to 1734, begun by Georg Mattarnovy.
        • Peter bought the anatomical collection of over 2,000 items in 1717 from the Dutch anatomist Frederik Ruysch.
        • Peter's decree of 1718 promised a reward for delivering “monsters” and unusual things and threatened a fine for hiding them.
        • In the fire of 5 December 1747 the tower, the observatory and the interior finishes burned; the building was restored by Savva Chevakinsky.
        • Mikhail Lomonosov worked in the building — a separate exhibition is devoted to him, with the Academy of Sciences' meeting hall.
        • The tower is crowned with an armillary sphere — a model of the celestial sphere made of rings.
      12. 🚶 on foot
      13. 7
        🏛 Twelve Collegia (St Petersburg State University)
        Университетская наб., 7–9
        A long red-and-white Petrine building across Vasilyevsky Island — the university's main building.
        The city’s longest corridor
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Twelve Collegia (St Petersburg State University)
        © A.Savin · FAL 1.3
        Twelve Collegia (St Petersburg State University)
        © Екатерина Борисова · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • Construction began in 1722: the overall design is by Domenico Trezzini, the upper floors by Theodor Schwertfeger.
        • It is the largest monument of Petrine Baroque: 12 identical three-storey sections, one per collegium, the prototype of a ministry.
        • The first session of the collegia in the new building was held in 1732.
        • In 1830 the whole building was handed over to St Petersburg University.
        • Only the Petrovsky Hall has kept its authentic 1735–1736 finish — with the monograms of Peter I and Anna Ioannovna.
        • Scenes of Georgy Danelia's “Autumn Marathon” (1979) were shot here.
      14. 🚶 on foot
      15. 8
        🏛 Sphinxes by the Academy of Arts
        Университетская наб., 17
        A pair of granite Egyptian sphinxes on the steps down to the Neva by the Academy of Arts.
        Egyptian sphinxes
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        Sphinxes by the Academy of Arts
        © Alex Fedorov (Florstein) · CC BY-SA 4.0
        Sphinxes by the Academy of Arts
        © GAlexandrova · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The sphinxes were made under the pharaoh Amenhotep III for his mortuary temple in Thebes; in 1825 they were found by the antiquities hunter Giovanni d'Athanasi.
        • Each sphinx, of pink Aswan granite, weighs 23 tonnes and is 5.24 m long.
        • Buying them was proposed by the traveller Andrey Muravyov, who had seen a sphinx in Alexandria in 1830.
        • The sphinxes had already been sold to France, but the July Revolution wrecked the deal — and Russia bought them for 64,000 rubles.
        • While being loaded onto the ship ‘Buena Esperanza’, one sphinx fell and damaged the headcloth.
        • The sphinxes arrived in May 1832, but for two years stood in the courtyard of the Academy of Arts while Konstantin Thon finished the landing stage.
      16. 🚶 on foot
      17. 9
        🌳 New Holland Island
        наб. Адмиралтейского канала, 2
        🚪 entrance from the Admiralty Canal Embankment
        🆓 free entry · The island is free; some exhibitions and events are ticketed
        An 18th-century artificial island with brick timber warehouses, lawns, cafés and a pond.
        Across the Annunciation Bridge to the island
        📖 More about the placeCollapse
        New Holland Island
        © Florstein · CC BY-SA 4.0
        New Holland Island
        © Anders98en · CC BY-SA 4.0
        New Holland Island
        © Ludvig14 · CC BY-SA 4.0
        • The island appeared in 1719, when the Kryukov and Admiralty canals were dug for shipbuilders; its area is 7.8 ha.
        • The name comes from the warehouses of ship timber, which was dried the Dutch way — standing upright.
        • Vallin de la Mothe's arch over the canal to the inner basin was built in 1779–1787; it is 23 metres high.
        • The round naval prison building from the 1820s was nicknamed the “bottle” — it is said to be the origin of the Russian idiom for flying off the handle.
        • In the 1894 experimental basin, the shipbuilder Alexey Krylov carried out experiments on ship unsinkability.
        • During the First World War the most powerful radio station in Russia, belonging to the naval staff, worked here.
        • Until December 2004 the island was occupied by Baltic Fleet services, and it was closed to the public.
      18. 🚶 on foot
      19. 10
        🍜 Restaurants and cafés in the “Bottle” (New Holland)
        наб. Адмиралтейского канала, 2, лит. Т (Новая Голландия)
        ▮▮▯▯▯
        Dinner at Butylka
        🍴 The ground floor of the round “Bottle” building on New Holland Island is filled with cafés and street food from different cuisines, with tables in the courtyard in summer. What to order: shawarma on a plate and hummus at Bekitzer, udon and fried bananas with ice cream at Hagao.

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      Data: © OpenStreetMap · DB-IP · weather — Open-Meteo
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