Home at Last

On our last full day in Moscow, we toured the Kremlin, with a very special stop at the Armory Museum, which holds an incredible trove of Imperial treasure. I could have spent a whole day just in the room of costume and tapestry. There were the coronation gowns of Catherine the Great and of Alexandra, the last Czarina. There were items of clothing of Peter the Great, including a shirt he made himself - he was a genuine Renaissance Man, who wanted to learn everything about everything. There were tapestries and embroideries, and ecclesiastic finery of the Patriarchs of the Russian Orthodox Church, many of which rivaled the Imperial clothing in majesty (and gold and pearls).

This is one of the outer walls of the Kremlin (which by the way, means "walled city" or "fort" and most of the old cities have one - it's just the one in Moscow that has other connotations to most people):



And a map of the place:


The trip home was sheer hell. We got up just past midnight on Thursday, which was 1pm Wednesday in California, and were in transit until 7pm Thursday (California time), of which 15 hours were on airplanes and the rest in airports.

I'll have more to say about Russia, and the very welcoming Russians, later - after I've had time to wade through the piles of laundry.