C4W

A group of students from my high school are taking a trip to St. Petersburg. What are some good sites that will interest teenagers when we are near St. Petersburg? Thank you!

Hiroshi

The Hermitage and its excellent collection of Matisse paintings is what St. Petersburg is famous for.

You should caution the high school students not to be tempted by the blond prostitutes near hotels. I believe there is a risk for robbery, but I cannot say for certain as I don't have any personal experience with these ladies.

Some people that I know will not eat any Russian food because of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. This was an accident where a nuclear reactor melted and all the highly radioactive compounds were spewed into the air and food supply. Many men died of radiation poisoning while bravely trying to put out the fire. There were reports of contaminated grain being mixed with good grain in order to dilute the radioactivity. Scary!

Garfield

You sure would have a bunch of hungry students if they did not eat any Russian food - at least they have Macdonalds. For the group leader watch out for the availability of alcohol, you can get it everywhere and drink it anywhere.

SpongeBob

Peterhof, the former royal estate founded by Peter the great, St Isaac's Cathedral, the Nevsky Prospect and Gostiny Dvor - a shopping mall (teens love malls, it would be neat to compare it to American ones.) Chernobyl happened almost 18 years ago and I think it's quite safe to eat the food, drink the water and breathe the air in Russia now. Have a great time with the kids, school trips are the best!

Hiroshi

Sponge Bob is probably correct in that the food is safe. I think it is not totally safe as the Russians are somewhat careless. However, the food is not so bad that it glows in the dark and you will only be there for a few days.

18 years is not long. Doesn't cesium have a half life of 50 years and some things have half life of thousands of years. The shelter that is covering Chernobyl is crumbling and the Russians are asking the donations to build another structure on top on that.

Garfield

The food is safe, but you should not drink unboiled tap water in St Petersburg. In addition to heavy metal pollutants and harmful bacteria, it contains giardia witch can cause stomach problems.

Some of the walking tours of St Petersburg offered by Peter's walking tours, at peterswalk.com, might be of interest. Also there are a wide range of river and canal boat cruises.

RDN

If this is a school tour, is it not organized through an educational tour company that is likely keeping the students pretty busy? Having done a few of these with high school students to Europe, keeping them busy all day long (and tired at night!) is the way to keep them out of trouble. On short trips like like this, there is so much to see and do, that it's not difficult to keep students active and interested.

C4W

Thanks for your help. We'll be careful about the food. This is a student run trip, and we will be implementing a computer lab in an orphanage, so we were not planning on taking any tours, in order to keep costs down (we'll be gone for 3 weeks!)But, we'll be carefull about drugs and prostitutes (of which many have AIDS.)

Vital

if you'l indicate interests and time of you visiting of St-Petersburg, I can recomend places (museums, restaurants, clubs etc) and interesting events.
my e-mail- [email protected]