Making our way up the Volga towards Moscow, the side of the river was dotted with one beautiful Russian Orthodox church after another, their gold domes glinting in the sun. In the thousand year old town of Jaroslavl there was also a green velvet elephant and a Cinnabon store. We also had an intimate encounter with a refueling vessel. In even older Uglich, we went into the home of the engineer Tatiana and noticed the sign on her gate that needed no translation. She has an enormous garden that she tends herself and a very nice bathhouse, moss proving insulation between the logs.
Lots of churches seem to be built at the sites of assassinations, men’s choirs pop up near the exits of many churches, and tour busses have rest stops only where there are souvenirs for sale. Brides now come to pay respect on their wedding day to the fallen of World War Two in which Russia lost twenty million people. We couldn’t leave Russia, of course, without a photo of Lenin. Behind us is the Church of St. Demetrius on the Blood. As a son of Ivan the Terrible, the saint was a threat to Boris Godunov’s campaign to seize the throne and was likely assassinated on this spot by Godunov’s agents.
