We're due to leave for our trip this coming Tuesday.
The first three days will be in Marburg, a short drive from Frankfurt. Our next-door neighbor and travel companion, Karin, grew up there right after the end of World War II in a 500-year-old house with her mother and grandparents. We'll stay at a small, country inn to give us all some time to recover from the flight.
Then, on Friday the 17th, we are due to fly to St. Petersburg, where we'll be met by our guide. Over the next six days, he'll take us to the cemetery and memorial for those who died in the siege of Leningrad, St. Catherine's Palace outside the city, and the Hermitage. (We decided to have him take us to the latter for an overview tour, since it has 22 miles of space to explore. We'll stay on by ourselves for a while afterwards to return to items we missed or want to see again.) Then, on our own, we have a series of places we want to go to including Peterhof with its thousand or so gravity-fed fountains (modeled after Versailles).
On Friday the 23rd, we're due to fly to Berlin for another five or six days, and there, Karin will be our guide and native-speaker. (Definitely want to visit Nefertiti.) Since almost all the city has been built since 1945, it will be quite a different experience from St. Petersburg.
Due home on the 29th.
