The Daily Life of Siege Leningrad

There is no city in the world that has given so many lives to win.

Its history is the history of the entire Patriotic War:

If we went to Berlin, that’s why.

The Germans did not enter Leningrad.

Ehrenburg

Friends! I invite you to a walking tour of the memorable places of besieged Leningrad. During the tour, you will learn why the Germans did not enter Leningrad, how the city lived in a daily struggle against hunger, cold and bombing. You will walk along 25 October Avenue – modern Nevsky Prospect, visit the main squares of the city, pass by cathedrals and along the embankments, which will tell about the daily life of the besieged Leningrad.

At the end of the tour you can visit the museum in the Rumyantsev mansion on the English Embankment, which presents all the main events related to the heroic defense and life of the city in 1941-1945. It occupies 12 halls and includes more than 2000 exhibits.

Our excursion will begin at the Rebellion Square with the monument “Hero City of Leningrad”, where you will learn about the first days of the siege of Leningrad. On the way, the main squares, palaces and parks of the city will tell you how they survived the shelling and bombing:

• Anichkov Palace - about besieged Christmas trees and New Year mandarins;
• the embankment of the Fontanka River - about the blockaded polynyas;
• Public Library and Alexandrinsky Theatre – about the cultural and spiritual life of the city;
• Palace Square - about plans to build an airfield on it;
• Winter Palace - about excursions to empty halls;
• Klodta's Horse, Admiralty Needle and the Copper Rider - about masking and saving monuments.

On St. Isaac's Square:

• You will see the scars of St. Isaac’s Cathedral, learn what was stored in the temple, who lived and worked in the basements and on the main dome of St. Isaac’s Cathedral during the blockade;
• hear the story of saving the most valuable seeds of agricultural crops at the cost of your own life by the staff of the Vavilov Institute of Crop Production;
• find out where the main headquarters of the Leningrad MPVO was located, and who of the famous people extinguished the lighters on the roofs of Leningrad;
• In which hotel was the hospital for cultural figures.

On the tour you can imagine the life of the city during the blockade:

• how frozen trams and buses stopped on the streets;
• How radio saved the lives of ordinary Leningraders
• listen to the loudspeaker with the voice of Levitan at Malaya Sadova, the Blockade Symphony of D. D. Shostakovich at the Great Hall of the Philharmonic and the performance of the “blockade muse” Olga Bergholtz at the memorial at the entrance to the House of Radio on Italian Street;
• What signs on Nevsky Prospekt warned residents about the most dangerous and safe sides of the street during the shelling.

During the tour you will hear stories of residents of Leningrad, quotes from the diaries of children-blockaders, stories about pets, songs and poems of the war years.
After a walking tour, you can visit the exposition “12 blockade halls” in the Rumyantsev mansion. Here you will get acquainted with the chronicle of the blockade, visit the communal apartment and bomb shelter of those years, hear the air alarm and metronome, see the food cards of the blockaders and the diary of Tanya Savicheva.

The tour is pedestrian or on the transport of the customer. Entrance tickets to the museum are paid separately. Museum at the request of the customer.