We left the hotel and walked to the Helsinki Central Station – it was a much easier walk when it's not raining. We located the money exchange and changed some Euros into Roubles before checking out what platform our train would be leaving from.

We arrived at platform 5 to find the gleaming white "Allegro" already waiting for us . This was the most impressive train so far – she was sleek, classy and very modern. It wasn’t long before we could board and settle into our very comfortable 1^st class cabin that would provide us with everything we could possibly need for the 3½ hour journey – even Wi-fi!  

The Allegro left Helsinki at 10am and we immediately put our watches forward an hour as it operates on Russian time. It didn’t take long as we sped through the countryside for the Allegro to reach her maximum speed of 220km per hour.

We had no sooner left Helsinki when our friendly hostess appeared with the food and drinks trolley and after introducing herself proceeded to wait on us hand and foot for the entire journey.

It is possible that our hostess over attentiveness was partly due to her only having 6 passengers in 1^st class to look after – we three were in one cabin and another three passengers in the next cabin .

There was no comparison between the train to Stockholm and the Allegro –  as far as we were concerned, The Allegro was train heaven!      

As we sped through the countryside we did have a few official visitors including the Customs and Immigration officials who stamped our passports and checked our Visas before entering Russia. Had we only known, there was also a money exchange officer who provides this service at your seat.  

The officers processing us on the train were all very pleasant and conducted their business in a very orderly and civilised manner which was unlike the intimidating experience we had with the Hungarian border patrol officers during our last trip. 

All too soon our Allegro experience was drawing to a close as we entered the outskirts of St. Petersburg. We watched with interest as the first houses and factories came into view and were surprised to see that like all other cities around the world St . Petersburg is not immune to attack by the dreaded Graffiti artists – who would have thought!

We alighted from the train into beautiful sunlight and headed down the platform to enter what we thought was the Metro station to catch a train to the boat station. We were quickly redirected down a ramp by an armed guard and it was here we ran the gauntlet of the taxi drivers waiting to pick up fares.

The driver of a rather dilapidated looking van offered to take us and our luggage to the boat for 25 Euro – we had no idea if that was a good price or not! This was not something we had planned on doing however we made a spur of the moment decision and accepted his offer.

The driver loaded our luggage into the van, we climbed on board and were off. The van bumped along over the rough roads and we held on to Sal for dear life as she didn't have a seat belt to restrain her. The driver weaved in and out of the traffic as we tried to take in the sights as well as click away at the odd photo opportunity. As we sped through the crazy traffic, we were all just hoping against hope that the driver was taking us to where we wanted to go.

Along the way we had the opportunity to form our first impressions of St. Petersburg. We observed that some of the buildings were very impressive while others were so badly in need of repair a bulldozer was the only solution . We also observed the influences of the west with billboards advertising KFC, Ikea and many others.

Our driver continued along the Neva River for what seemed a very long time and we were starting to think 25 Euro wasn’t such a high price to pay after all. Eventually on the opposite bank of the river we sighted what looked like River Boats so we heaved a sigh of relief.

We arrived at the boat station only to find the "Lev Tolstoy" (our boat) wasn’t among the dozen or so moored there. Our driver jumped out while beckoning us to remain in the van while he went to investigate where our boat was. The poor man ran from place to place trying to locate our boat only to be told it was moored at a different location. (Not a good advertisement for Eastern European Travel who booked our cruise and provided us with the mooring details.)

At this stage we were just relieved we hadn’t followed our initial plan to catch the Metro as it would have meant dragging our cases a fair distance from the station only to arrive at the wrong place . (We later discovered we weren’t alone – other Aussies who had booked through the same company were also given the same incorrect docking information.)

Our helpful driver soon returned to drive us back across the river where we eventually found the correct boat mooring station. By this time we were starting to think our driver was worth his weight in gold.

When we arrived at the dock we thought our driver’s job was done however he had other ideas. He unloaded all our bags from his van and proceeded to carry the two heaviest suitcases through the office, down the embankment and onto the boat moored adjacent to the wharf then through that boat and onto our boat which was moored alongside.

Our driver had certainly gone above and beyond the call of duty in making sure he delivered us safely to the boat. This man deserved a medal however as we didn’t have one handy - we rewarded him handsomely with euros instead. So, our first introduction to Russia and its people was a very positive one indeed.