Author: robin-bell.com

Between Christmas and the New Year, we headed to San Francisco to get a break before the start of the New Year. I previously have only been in San Francisco briefly, stopping at a few attractions whilst driving through. So, this trip allowed a slower paced opportunity to explore more of the city. We hired bikes for 24 hours to help us get around more of the city. We started the morning by visiting the Coit tower, and viewing its views over San Francisco, before heading down the hill to the Piers and visiting the Pier 39 sealions. After a lunch of chili inside sourdough bridge we cycled along the coastal parks and crossed the Golden Gate bridge and headed for Sausalito. Sausalito was a little bit of a tourist trap plus the line to get a ferry back to San Francisco was nearly an hour long, so we decided to cycle back and visit the Golden Gate Park.

Thankfully, we had our bikes for a full 24 hours so we could get up and visit the Pier 39 sea lions again in the morning before the crowds arrived. They really are a sight and noise to behold, so many of them and some of them are so big, all bathing in the sunlight and playing in the water.

On our way (going the wrong direction) to Napa we visited the Winchester Mystery House, which is situated just above San Jose in Silicon Valley. The house was built by Sarah Winchester the wife and heir to the Winchester gun company and its fortune. Being ‘haunted’ by back luck, her young daughter and husband dying, she built a house to appease the spirits. Plus, in order to support the good spirits and hide from the bad spirits she kept employing workers to built and develop the house 24 hours a day until see died. This led to a house with 160 plus rooms, which contained doors to nowhere and fake cupboards and many other interesting features. The house also had many other quirks such as low riser steps to allow Ms Winchester to move around the property with bad arthritis and many features built around the number 13, such as adding additional holes in sinks and lights on chandeliers. It was a very interesting place to visit and with a new filmed based on the story starring Helen Mirren set for release in February, it was an interesting time to visit.

This weekend as the cold really starts to bite in Moscow, I had the opportunity to go to the Kristall №1 Distillery and Museum for a tour and tasting. Both the tour and tasting were fascinating, even with the tasting of 8 different straight vodka starting at midday, which made the first couple a little challenging.

The Kristall distillery has a lot of interesting history which the museum explained. At the beginning of the 20th century when Russia was transferring all production of vodka to public ownership, to guarantee the quality (and no doubt support the public purse) the Kristall distillery in Moscow (originally founded as Moscow State Wine Warehouse №1), was founded as the first state sanctioned distillery. This gave it the name №1. During the second world war the factory started producing Molotov Cocktails to fit into specially built launchers to attack marauding German tanks. Both the Molotov Cocktails and the launchers were on display in the museum as well as vodka in space packaging, which was provided to Russian cosmonauts.

The Kristall brand which I was most familiar with was Stolichnaya. It was explained that when Stolichnaya started exporting to the US, they agreed a distribution agreement with Pepsi, distributing each other’s products in their respective countries. As Americans were not drinking vodka straight and using it in cocktails, the strength of Stolichnaya for export was increased to 50% abv, so people could taste it. Having tasted a range of their vodkas I would suggest that Stolichnaya Sever Special Soft is the best. It contains a gram of sugar (per bottle) and a subtle taste of honey to take some of the bitterness away.

After being in Moscow for nine months the time has come where I have finally been forced to take an Aeroflot flight from Sheremetyevo (SVO) and all the challenges which come with it. This weekend I am going to Nanjing to work with a vocational college regarding their enterprise education offering, and at the same time meeting colleagues at Southeast University regarding research. The trip is only for 3 days, so I didn’t want to spend too long travelling. Plus, it is the Friday after the big Chinese holiday of Golden Week, so many of the flights are at capacity. Maybe unsurprisingly one of the only options which is not fully booked is Aeroflot. I am not expecting a comfortable trip and their will undoubtedly be much hassle much hassle at the airport. So the three days on the ground in Nanjing could be a struggle. But hopefully, after this trip I can say I have flown Aeroflot and never have to do it again.

The highlight of the journey was finding a couple of pigeons at the departure gate SVO. Of course what kind of quality airport does not have pigeons drinking on a drinking fountain.

The last weekend I got to attend my first ever Oktoberfest event. Whilst it was not in Germany, it was at the German Embassy in Moscow. My theory is, this is probably pretty close to the real thing. A range of German beers were served ranging from lagers to wheat beers. I focused on the wheat beers as this is always my preference. Generally, the less hops the better. There was also the option to try one of the meal selections, which included pork knuckle, roasted chicken and bratwurst. I went for the bratwurst as it was easy to eat and supplemented the beer well. Maybe my experience wasn’t the real authentic German Oktoberfest experience but it was good fun and maybe in the future I will get to Germany at the right time of year to experience Oktoberfest actually in Germany.