Vladivostok

       Our seven weeks of travel has begun.  I met my dad at the Moscow airport on November 1st.  He was nervous that somehow we wouldn't find each other in the massive airport, but we managed to meet up at the gate to our flight to Vladivostok. Not long after we met up, it was time to board our 9 hour flight from Moscow to Vladivostok, in the eastern most part of Russia.  We arrived at about noon on Wednesday.  There was a long cab ride from the airport to the city, including a traffic jam, which our taxi driver navigated with ease.  He safely deposited us at our hotel.  Our hotel was a weird structure that has been built into the side of a cliff.  All you can see from street level is the doorway inside.  Each room has a balcony overlooking the Amursky Gulf.

The view from our hotel room.  Construction site and then the gulf.

 We spent most of our time touring the streets, looking at statues and architecture.  We also admired all of the improvements they are making for a summit of world leaders to take place in September of 2012.  Yesterday, we took a tour of Fort Number 7.  It was one of 16 underground forts the Russians built from the late 1800's to the 1920's.  This particular fort housed about 400 soldiers and allowed them to patrol the nearby waterways from the coast.  Our guide, Gregor, was a character in every sense of the word.  He gave us lanterns to light our way through the dark and damp tunnels in the fort.  He pronounced America and Russia to be friends and we left there with a new buddy.

The view of the bay from Fort Number 7

Dad and our guide Gregor at the entrance to the fort.

Inside the one of the fort's many underground passageways.

Dad at Nicholai's arch.

Today, we walked around some more.  Saw the World War II monument, took the funicular up a hill to get some nice city views and ate some really terrible pizza.  It started to rain a bit, so we headed to the hotel to get some wi-fi and plan other legs of our trip.  We leave on the train tonight to Khabarovsk and will send another update the next time we get internet.

Wall listing names of soldiers who died in WWII from the Vladivostok area.

View of the city.