Chad and I loved Red Square. It is huge and surrounded by larger than life, beautiful buildings. You cannot ever tire of seeing the colors of Saint Basil’s on one side or the great red walls of the Kremlin lining another side. It seemed everywhere we went we saw something big and beautiful. They have a mall on Red square that is also housed in a gorgeous and huge building. We spent Sunday evening roaming around the square. Later in the week I had rather embarrassing moment when a big bug decided to dive bomb into my cleavage. I thought it was a bee and was trying to discretely retrieve it deep down without getting stung. It turned out to be a big black beetle. I had to be quite the entertaining, frantic, peep show.

On Tuesday morning we went early to Lenin’s Mausoleum. I had to get up by nine. In Chad’s defense we had a two hour time difference against us so it was more like seven, which is awful early for Chad. It was a very different experience. I am glad I do not have the job to watch the corpse. I’m glad I don’t have the job to refresh the corpse. Cringe. That afternoon I headed to the Kremlin and enjoyed seeing the cathedrals and gardens surrounding it. I also did my best to prove that I was actually there. Great practice taking pictures of myself.

Wednesday we tried to go to an art museum. We got there just before closing. But they decided to close early. Bummer. So we walked through town. We saw the Cathedral of Christ the Savior and then walked up through the Alexander Gardens along the Kremlin walls. You can’t beat lying in the grass, eating ice cream with your best buddy in the whole world, in Russia. It was a great way to spend our evening.

I spent Thursday at a convent outside of town. I got miserably lost on the very ornate Metro and almost gave up. But it gave us great practice to make it to the RUSSIAN CIRCUS that evening!!! Daniel should be proud. We had a really great time. It was a good show for kids, so it was a good show for us. I think my favorite was the beginning act when these two guys did this amazing hamster run thing 50 feet in the air. I really cannot explain it–but it was awesome. Chad’s favorite was probably the lions roaring. I was also impressed by the poodles. No lie. They had some pretty incredible tricks. They were probably on steroids. We then went back downtown to find a Georgian restaurant. All the tourism books and things are totally dumb–by the way. Giving you the English transcription just messes you all up! We passed by a cool looking restaurant called “Генацвале на Арбате.” We searched for half an hour for one the guidebook called Genatsvale on Arbat. Finally we discovered they were talking about the same place. SO irritating.

Friday we finally made it to the art museum which turned out to be pretty lame. But we made it. Check the Tretyakov Gallery off our list. And we finished up our trip this morning wandering around the woods looking for a market that we barely caught a glimpse of before we had to hop back on the metro to our hotel. Now we are chilling in the Frankfurt airport waiting for our last leg to Zurich. Good times.