We took a bit of a chance on Google for dinner. We found a restaurant called Mayak, which sounded right up our street – bohemian, a favourite hang-out of writers and sundry ne’r-do-wells in an off-centre location. Our taxi took the pretty route but eventually got us there.
And the bill was 1000 roubles.
Picture a smoky interior and as your eyes adjust to the blur you see a scene out of a Claude Lelouch movie (remember, Un Homme Et Une Femme?). Well, that was the Mayak restaurant. We had another great meal – see photo for proof of pudding – and we didn’t need to take out a mortgage.
We did, however, need a mortgage for our taxi back to the hotel. Not wanting to roam unfamiliar streets in Moscow late on a Saturday night we asked the restaurant to arrange a taxi for us. We should have known something was up when our waitress followed us out to the car (a brand new Mercedes) and spoke to the driver. He seemed to know what he was doing at first but five minutes into the journey he asked us where the Savoy Hotel was. (I thought this only happened when you got a Russian cab driver in New York.) He had to phone his company to find out. On arrival, he announced the fare was 5000 roubles (£110/$170). Impervious to our requests to re-think his ideas I left Gail and Sue behind as hostages and made a beeline to reception. Waiting behind the desk was our knight in shining armour, Armat, who rolled his sleeves up and went to battle for us, muttering words to the effect of: Oh, no, not again... I won’t have this. It took ten minutes. Armat never raised his voice – obviously we had no idea what he said to the rapidly shrinking driver – but eventually he accepted our roubles. You guessed it – 1000 of them.
And that was the end of our Kremlin day.
It was not the end of the night though. At least for me. I spent most of it in the bathroom. I won’t go into details, I know you’ll get my drift, but it meant I lost most of Sunday too. In my absence, Gail and Sue visited an outdoor market – lots of antiques, crafts and fruit and vegetables – and both came back with little sets of Matryoshka or babushka dolls. In the evening, at Armat’s recommendation, they dined at the Library restaurant, a couple of blocks from the hotel, which was a huge success. Sue had her first Russian borsht - light and tomato-y with strips of beef in it - and a delicious lemon vodka.
I had sparkling water and two Nurofen.
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