In St. Petersburg cultural life never stops for a minute throughout the year. In late August – early September theater and concert seasons open in the city, museums display new showpieces and youth entertaining subculture hurries back from their summer suburban platforms within the city walls of nightclubs. On days when summer meets autumn the participants of the Championship will have a chance to spend all their free time successfully for both body and soul.
When you return home to your country, city and families after the competition, your relatives will ask you what you have seen except the race course and the club bar in the second largest and significant city in Russia, the former capital of the Russian Empire? In St. Petersburg we strongly recommend you to visit its main theaters and museums – or you are sure to make a great mistake. Russian ballet and the Hermitage are an absolute “must” to be seen. And herewith we would like to introduce you to these landmarks of St.Petersburg.
In the course of the World Championship, evening opera performances and ballet shows will be held daily on the main stage of the Mariinsky Theatre, in its historic building. You can enjoy lyrical aria canta-biles from “Eugene Onegin” and assess the level of Russian ballet school, visiting one-act ballet “Carmen Suite. Youth and death”. Well, by a long stretch of the imagination just after the awarding ceremony on Sunday, August 24 the opera admirers will have time for “Iolanta.” All the performances start at 19.00, the billposter and ticket booking are available online, just click the link: http://www.mariinsky.ru/.
The city’s complete playbill is available on the following sites: http://www.bileter.ru/, http://www.afisha.ru/spb/theatre/, http://artis.spb.ru/.
The participants of races can take the only real chance to get into the Hermitage on Wednesday. On this day, the leading museum of St. Petersburg is open until 21.00, during the rest of the week until 18.30 and on Monday it is closed. Entrance tickets to the Hermitage are not expensive – 400 rubles (somewhat less than 10 Euro), and the memory and impressions remain for life. http://www.hermitagemuseum.org/
In the Russian Museum the art lovers can enjoy the national fine art of different eras up to the begin-ning of the XX century – permanent museum exhibitions are popped out in the Mikhailovsky Palaceand are open to visitors every day except Tuesday from 10 am to 18.00, Thursday – 21.00. http://www.rusmuseum.ru/
If you have a free day or a “gap” in the racing schedule, try to visit the so-called palace suburbs of St. Petersburg – Pushkin, Pavlovsk, Peterhof. In summer you can reach the Capital of Fountains from downtown by “Meteor” along the Gulf – a pleasure craft hydrofoils flying between the Hermitage and Peterhof marina. Essentially, you can arrange that with any of the motor boat owners in the yacht club – given the will.
You can find a good guide to museums and exhibitions in St. Petersburg and its suburbs on http://peterburg2.ru/.
In case after the race you are still full of power and energy to spend them, for example, at a disco, you can find a suitable place for this in the online review http://www.nightclub-spb.ru/ or in the “geometry” http://geometria.ru/blogs/authors/47189.
Our Organizing Committee hopes that in St. Petersburg all competitors will enjoy vivid and memorable days and have a lasting impression not only from the event, but also from the city itself. We look for-ward to seeing you!
