My favourite Moscow Sites

1. Lenin's Mausoleum (Мавзолей Ленина)
Lenin's marble Mausoleum stands in Red Square and the embalmed leader has lain here since 1924.
The next photo is of Lenin and is the only one shown across my Russian posts which I did not take as you are not allowed to take pictures actually inside the mausoleum.)


His body is of waxy yellow appearance.

As I walked down into the tomb to see him, I thought to myself that I was going to resist my Catholic upbringing and not make the sign of the cross (which you do when you see a dead person.) So I stuck my hands in my pockets. One of the sombre guards stepped forward and gestured for me to remove them from my pockets. Ooops - didn't mean to be disrespectful.

2. Wall of Peace
The wall of peace was completed in November 1990, less than a year after the Berlin Wall fell and is composed of hundreds of individually painted tiles on a theme of international friendship.


I saw very little graffiti in Moscow; for me the graffiti on this wall added to the charm and indicated the freedom felt by the youths who did it (would this of happened 30 years ago?)

By the wall was a project "Our Names" where Muscovite's can order the laying of the nominal stone for the birthday or in the memory of something, or whatever ... and it will laid down in the pavement.

3. The Kremlin (Московский Кремль)

Synonymous with politics and power, the Kremlin includes four palaces, four cathedrals, and the enclosing Kremlin wall with 20 distinctive towers. For me, the red brick walls were imposing and the golden domes of the cathedrals glistened in the sun.

4. Red Square (Красная площадь)
Entering the square through the Resurrection Gate, to the south the square is commanded by St Basil's, to the west the Kremlin walls and Lenin's Mausoleum and to the East the GUM building (state department store.)
When we first visited Red Square in the day, it felt cold; I could smell in the air and imagine the slaughtering of Cossack rebels.

However when we visited the Square at night, if felt magical and Christmas like.
I also count myself lucky. After visiting Red Square on the first occasion, I read in a tourist magazine that "this area has an iconic, almost sacred status to the Russian people, and the various state forces deployed there enforce strict rules about respecting the place. ... recently a British sports journalist was arrested and taken into custody for putting out his cigarette under his foot here." Oops.

5. Tomb of the unknown Soldier (Могила Неизвестного Солдата)

The flame illuminates a bronze inscription saying "Your name is unknown, your deed is immortal" (Имя твоё неизвестно, подвиг твой бессмертен).
To the left of the tomb, there is a granite wall with an inlay saying "1941 - To Those Who Have Fallen For The Motherland - 1945".