TravelswithCharie

  Alexander Sergeyevich Pushkin, 1799-1837 Alexander Pushkin was born in Moscow to an old noble family. His maternal great grandfather, Abram Petrovich Gannibal, was of African origin and was kidnapped by the Ottomans in what is today, Cameroon. The Ottomans later offered Gannibal to Peter the Great who raised the child in his own household as his godson. Gannibal studied in France for several years and upon his return to Russia in 1723, he was banished to Siberia by Prince Menshikov who was suspicious of him. It wasn’t until the reign of Elizabeth of Russia that he ascended to Chief Military Engineer in 1756 and General in Chief in 1759.  Gannibal’s second wife and Pushkin’s great grandmother, Christina Regina Sioberg, descended from noble families in Scandinavia and Germany. Pushkin is considered the father of Russian literature and its greatest poet. His most famous works include the play, Boris Godunov and the verse novel, Eugene Onegin , both of which were adapted into o...

Cricova Wine Cellar Who knew that the largest wineries in the world are in Moldova? I had no clue though I heard about these cellars from a friend. These cellars that stretch for 120 kilometers (75 miles) and hold over a million bottles of wine! In this underground city, there are warehouses, tasting rooms, event venues, a chapel, a museum and a wine store. Naturally there are street names and signs to help the drivers find their way in these labyrinthine depths.  Classic sparkling wines produced in the traditional method are kept here during the second fermentation process. These bottles are turned manually every day to dislodge dead yeast cells which collect at the neck of the bottle until it is removed through a separate process. This is the traditional method of fermenting sparkling wine. We toured the galleries underground in a mini train. Our first stop was at the cinema where we watched a documentary film about the history of Cricova Winery. After watching the film, we were ...

Cathedral Park Moldova is one of the least visited countries in the world according to the   United Nations World Tourism Organization. It received 174,000 visitors in 2019 and the pandemic effectively slashed the number of visitors to 29,000 in 2020. It’s too bad because Moldova has a lot to offer, especially to wine enthusiasts. But it won’t be long before Moldova will be “rediscovered” by intrepid travelers and then we will whine about how crowded it is. Already the traffic in Chișinău is a growing pain for the country. Thankfully, there are many beautiful parks in the city when you need a break and a cup of coffee. Cathedral of Christ’s Nativity The Nativity Cathedral was built in the 1830s in the Neoclassical style after the design of Adam Melnikov, its chief architect.  It lost its bell tower in 1962 after it was destroyed by local communists. The zinc dome and cross are additions from 1997. Religious worship was banned during the Soviet era and the Cathedral was convert...