Adopting from Russia (2003)


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Aug 15
Ekat Final Day

Ekaterinburg
to Moscow and tour

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Bailey Venera Orphanage Ekaterinburg Moscow
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Aug 17
Homeward Bound

Saturday August 16, Ekaterinburg to Moscow

3:30 arrives early when you can't sleep, so up and at it 15 minutes before we had planned. Nice hot showers, quick bite of Nestles corn flakes and yogurt and Slava was calling the room at 4:10. Dark, cool, and no traffic made for a calm departure to the airport, with all of Sergei, Slava, Lena and Vlad in attendance. At the airport we handed out the tips and Toronto souvenirs and before we knew it, the flight was called through the gate, and we were now in the waiting room for our Aeroflot departure. The time went very quickly, and reversing the procedure of arriving, we were driven to the plane on the tarmac by bus.

The flight to Moscow was very uneventful, but a decent snack/breakfast was given, and Russian Pepsi was drunk and a few pictures were snapped out of the window. At the luggage carousel in Moscow, a cute kitten was wandering about, but not wanting to get in any trouble, I didn't snap any pictures. Our luggage eventually came (but the Russian travelers do not know how to stand back, so that all can see what luggage is going past on the belt. When my view was blocked, except for the 1/2 second before a bag was in front of me, I decided to go around to the far side, when I could at lease get 30 seconds of warning before my bag went past). Olga was again waiting for us, and glad to see that we had bags this time.

She drove us right to the hotel, where we checked in, and got to hang out for a few hours before she returned to give us our tour. Since we'd miss our "included" breakfast on Sunday morning, we took advantage of the all-you-can-eat buffet, to have a big breakfast today, and a few left-overs (a couple of hard boiled eggs and some yogurt) for breakfast the next morning. That all worked out, and we were stuffed. After a 45 minute nap, we met Olga in the lobby, and continued our final full day in Russia.

We toured around and saw "Christ the Saviour" church, Russian victory monument and park, souvenir shop (on request because we had a few more to buy), outdoor art sale, and many "drive-by" sights. It was a good tour, but we were exhausted and ready for a late afternoon nap, to prepare ourselves for a night at the ballet.

After that big breakfast (10am) who needs supper, so we napped, and dressed for the evening.

The theatre was right beside the Bolshoi, and Olga and Olga (her daughter-in-law) accompanied us to "Don Quiote". We both marvelously stayed awake, and both really enjoyed the show (a little ice cream refresher at intermission helped me stay awake).

We got back to the hotel around 9:30 pm, with just enough time to go to a corner store to buy milk and pop and hit the sack. (this hotel had 1 English channel on the TV, BBC news and it did help us get up-to-date on the world happenings).

... next page: Homeward Bound

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