Kronstadt is a fortress town on Kotlin Island, put there by Peter I to close the sea route to his new capital. For three hundred years it was a closed military town: civilians were not admitted until 1996. Russian round-the-world expeditions sailed from here, the Baltic Fleet was based here, and the revolt of 1921 broke out here.
Today it is a miniature St Petersburg — with its own Gostiny Dvor, Blue Bridge, Admiralty, Bypass Canal and Summer Garden — except that in place of palaces there are harbours, docks and warships. The drive takes about an hour: we go along the northern arm of the dam, the flood barrier that protects St Petersburg, past the forts standing out in the gulf.
St Nicholas Naval Cathedral — the principal church of the Russian Navy and the landmark of the town. Vasily Kosyakov built it between 1903 and 1913 in the neo-Byzantine style, following the structure of Hagia Sophia: a dome 26.7 metres across and a height of 52 metres. It was conceived as a memorial to every rank of the fleet killed in the line of duty — the walls carry black and white marble tablets with their names. Closed in 1929 and turned into a cinema, it was returned to the church in 2005 and restored for its centenary in 2013. The decoration features anchors, ropes, starfish and fish — and also herons, hares and peacocks: your guide will explain what they are doing in a naval cathedral.
Anchor Square — paved with cast-iron blocks in front of the cathedral, with the monument to Admiral Makarov, an Eternal Flame in a split granite pyramid, the gun of Petty Officer Tambasov, who saved a battleship at the cost of his life, and the Makarov Bridge over Peter’s Ravine, assembled using shipbuilding techniques.
The Kronstadt tide gauge — a measuring staff by the Blue Bridge, in service since 1840. Every absolute height and depth in the country is reckoned from its zero mark, fixed by a copper plate in 1886 — orbital altitudes included. Beside it stands the pavilion housing the recording tide gauge that Yuri Gagarin called “the navel of the Earth”.
The monument to the stickleback — a small fish on the wall of the Bypass Canal: during the Siege it was the stickleback, dismissed before the war as an inedible pest, that kept the town’s people alive.
Peter’s Dry Dock and the Dock Bridge — a remarkable structure of the first half of the eighteenth century where up to ten ships could be repaired at once, and a rare bridge that was not raised but swung aside; the mechanisms survive.
The harbours, the Admiralty and the ships — the Merchant Harbour, where all trading vessels put in before the channel was deepened, the Bypass Canal with its provision stores, the Dutch Kitchen where crews’ food was cooked so that no fires need be lit aboard, and serving warships in the Middle Harbour.
Scenes of the town — the Vladimir Cathedral, the Andrew Garden on the site of the church where John of Kronstadt served for more than forty years, the monument to the cauldron from the legend of the island’s name, the Wishing Tree, Menshikov’s Italian Palace, Peter’s Park and the Summer Garden.
You can drive through Kronstadt in an hour and understand nothing of it. Half the town is stories you cannot see: why the island is called Kotlin, why Catherine II moved the admiralty here from the centre of St Petersburg, how John of Kronstadt became the unofficial patriarch of the Russian church, what happened here in March 1921, and why the bridge was swung aside rather than raised.
The tour is private: you travel as your own party with your own guide and driver, and are collected from your hotel or apartment. On request we call in at the Island of Forts park, with its view over the gulf.
We collect you from your hotel, apartment or similar
| People | Price per person |
|---|---|
| 1 | $450 |
| 2 | $224 |
| 3 | $155 |
| 4 | $123 |
| 5 | $104 |
| 6 | $92 |
| 7 | $84 |
| 8 | $77 |
| People | Price per person |
|---|---|
| 9 | $73 |
| 10 | $69 |
| 11 | $66 |
| 12 | $64 |
| 13 | $62 |
| 14 | $60 |
| 15 | $58 |
| 16 | $57 |
The essentials of St Petersburg in three hours: Palace and Senate squares, the Summer Garden and the Field of Mars, the Spit of Vasilyevsky Island and the place the city began — told through stories rather than dates.
An hour along the rivers and canals with your own guide: the Venice of the North from the water, the bridges and their superstitions, Chizhik-Pyzhik, and the floods that reshaped the city.
Jewish St Petersburg: the Grand Choral Synagogue in the Moorish style, the history of the community in the imperial capital, its bankers and philanthropists — and how it lives today.
On foot through the imperial capital: Palace Square, Nevsky Prospect and Gostiny Dvor, the well-yards behind the grand facades, and doughnuts in a historic cafe — two hours through the heart of St Petersburg.
