7 oct 2026

petersburg in october

spb

location: saint petersburg
camera: phone

a moored tour boat behind the iron railing of the fontanka, pastel palaces lined up along the far bank

a pale yellow mansion and a stone gateway across the river, a red tour boat passing below

the fontanka from a bridge straight into the sun, the water breaking into glare between moored boats

an empty granite embankment with bare trees, a pleasure boat crossing toward a row of facades

a long run of nineteenth-century facades along the river, a granite post of the railing in the foreground

a narrow street of red and pink houses in low sun, a green church dome closing it off at the end

a covered market passage, camouflage trousers and jackets hanging from the awning over the stalls — apraksin dvor. you can still buy anything here, as long as it's camo

a grey stone building with red arched shop signs for coats, jackets and shoes along the ground floor

the carved stone front of an old trading house, small shops tucked into its arches

a wide avenue in morning fog, the far end of it already gone, a big tree leaning over the pavement

a wide square around an equestrian statue, a curved glass hotel and a blue trolleybus behind it

a white cathedral dome rising over a block of autumn trees across an empty road

a cobbled lane between two low yellow walls under autumn trees, a cathedral dome at the far end

the nave of a classical cathedral, a black iron chandelier hanging under a coffered vault, the altar screen covered for restoration

white fluted columns and an arch over a side aisle, a few people standing at the icons

a bronze memorial plaque with a gilded coat of arms and laurel branches on a white wall

two hooded crows perched on a granite column and an iron cross in a churchyard

two dark cats on a bare flowerbed, one in front by a shrub and one watching from under a tarp at the back

a black and white cat sitting in a flowerbed next to pink sedum, a lawn and leaf piles around it — the lavra has more cats than monks, i'm fairly sure

new apartment blocks along the neva, mirrored almost perfectly in still water

broken granite slabs on the riverbank in the foreground, a long low skyline across the water

a wild grassy bank of the neva in hazy sun, factory chimneys and steam on the far shore

october, and the city had one last week of proper sun in it. the fontanka
first, from both banks and from a bridge straight into the light, then the
streets behind it down to apraksin dvor, which hasn't changed in about thirty
years and doesn't plan to.

the rest is the lavra and around it: the lane up to the cathedral, the inside
of the cathedral with the iconostasis wrapped up for restoration, the crows
on the old crosses and the cats under them. and then out to the neva,
where the water was so still the new blocks on the other side came out twice.