Velikiy Novgorod and Staraya Russa

This past weekend we all went on an excursion to Velikiy Novgorod and Staraya Russa, two of the oldest cities in Russia. We're talking over 1,000 years old. I couldn't wrap my head around how old the buildings we saw were until our tour guide mentioned that Ivan the Terrible attended one of the churches we went inside of! I wish I could tell you more about our tours, but I chose to be in one of the Russian-speaking tour groups and therefore, only understood about 70% of what she was saying. Nevertheless, here are some of my favorite pictures from the trip:

Millennium of Russia Monument

It was so spacious and peaceful there.

We spent the night at a hotel in Staraya Russa, and there was a crazy wedding going on downstairs! Imagine half-naked men in tutus and other men dressed as pirates on scooters running around the main floor. The wedding guests were pretty amused at our foreign-ness and some students even got into the wedding! I held off this time but crashing a Russian wedding is definitely on my bucket list. It shouldn't be too hard considering that I see at least 5 brides a day in this country!

We had a tour of Staraya Russa too, and all I remember from this place was that Dostoevsky lived here, it was destroyed during WWII, and the water is really really healthy (but also kind of gross tasting). Nevertheless it was as beautiful and lovely as Novgorod.

What it looked like before WWII

People sit around this fountain to breathe in the air and to be healed by the water. 

Dostoevsky's House!

... and his backyard!

After Staraya Russa and a lunch at this veryyyyyy Russian restaurant (traditional cuisine, folk music and decor), we went back to Novgorod and saw an open-air museum of folk wooden architecture and some more churches. Again, I would say more but between not understanding everything and getting distracted, I didn't really get the most out of our tours.

The folk music performers.

The Open Air Museum

Overall, I really enjoyed the trip to these ancient cities. It was nice to go somewhere calmer and more spacious than St. Pete. I am a little disappointed that I missed out on a lot of the tour, though, simply because I didn't understand it. The language barrier is a problem I've been having to deal with every day, but I'll talk about that later.