Wednesday 26th October

A relaxed breakfast this morning followed by a planning meting for the sessions over the next two days.  We still need all the resources we have been carrying until the last meeting on Thursday evening.  Once the resources had been prepared 

We again set off in different directions to see some of the life in St Petersburg which is set across a number of islands. 

Under Faith’s guidance some of us set off on the underground which is said to be the deepest in Russia taking 3 minutes to go down from ground level to the train!! We thought we were never getting down. A bracing walk along the Embankment set us up for a few more cultural visits before the evenings programme.

Susan stumbled on a film set, Muriel and Elizabeth climbed the 230 or so stairs up into St. Isaac's

Cathedral Colonnade for the most amazing views of the city, others visited the Kazan Cathedral finding themselves in a lovely service in Russian. 

We were met at the hotel by Rimma, a Guiding friend of Marina who was our interpreter for the sessions this evening with the scouts of St. Petersburg and our guide through the city streets to find the quite obscure location in a hidden courtyard.

The group we met with included leaders and leaders in training.  They were very welcoming and participated actively in the activities looking at the history of guiding and scouting, the promise, five essentials and group activities to encourage team work.

There was a lot of very frank and serious discussion about the appropriateness of having girl only organisations, this was seen by this group of our Russian colleagues as a backward step and not very appropriate for them.  They were eager to know about our organisation and membership and to tell us about  how things work for them in Russia and the history of their part of scouting in Russia.  There was an exchange of gifts of badges before some of the young people went off. 

The conversation went on late into the evening, we then retrieved our shoes and Rimma managed to get us away to catch the bus for the journey home! walking the last 20 mins.  The end of another busy day.

Thursday 27th October and our last full day in Russia.  We decided this was the day for a special visit for the whole team and headed off to Visit St. Catherine’s Palace in Peterhoff. Some of us had quite scary journeys as the vehicles weaved through the heavy traffic but we did get an idea of the size of St. Petersburg as we travelled through the industrial edge of the city, high rise blocks of  accommodation with very little in the way of parks here.

On arrival we started by visiting the palace, we were invited to wear the suitable footwear of paper overshoes to protect the lovely floors, or perhaps policy them!!   As we walked through the rooms it was difficult to take in the opulence and glory of the contents, wall coverings, ceiling painting and lavish gold leaf which is so typical of such buildings here in St. Petersburg. 

One room had silk fabric on the walls and matching fabric on chairs and couches.  When we visited the Church it was good to find only a few people there, a quiet moment to absorb the surroundings.

We had a little time to walk in the gardens to see the layout of the fountains but the water was closed off for the winter but we did see all the god figures set around the fountain park and down towards the river.

Another journey took us back to the city and into preparing for the evening programme with young scouts, prospective scouts and young leaders.

The young leaders liked the team building sessions and the ideas for activities which they will take  back to their groups.  The others participated with energy and enthusiasm in the  fun activities, tangrams,  Memory games edible campfires etc.  They loved the parachute games and we have promised to try to sent one out for the group.  

We have lots of good conversations, one young intense young man asked lots of questions about how we ran our units in UK, management activities etc.

We were again lat in finishing and were led back to our hotel by Rimma and we packed up all the remaining resources including the parachute for Rimma to send to Marina for use of RADS in future trainings. 

We have been made so welcome by the scouts in St. Petersburg and Rimma has looked after us so well, we will miss them all, but it is nice to be returning home.

Friday 28th October

Up early, last packing, last visits before the minibus takes us to the airport.  Special farewells to the hotel staff who have looked after us well.

Getting overweight bags through the customs was the next challenge!!  but we got through and are now all arrived at Heathrow safely after an amazing journey in mies and friendships made.

Thank to all have helped us on our way!!

I have one last plane to catch before getting to Scotland and home.

Elizabeth and the team.