Magnets for 200 ₽ and Nevsky matryoshkas don't count as gifts. Seven real things to bring home from St Petersburg.
🐟 1. Smelt
Fresh spring smelt (May) or smoked/salted year-round. The city's signature delicacy, famously smelling of cucumbers. Buy at Apraksin Dvor or the Kuznechny market.
🍫 2. Badaev or Yeliseyevsky chocolate
St Petersburg's answer to Red October. At Yeliseyevsky on Nevsky — a bear-logo box.
🎨 3. Imperial Porcelain
Imperial Porcelain Factory (IPF) — services, figurines, plates. Nevsky 160 shop.
📚 4. Book from Podpisnye Izdaniya
Non-fiction about the city — Bannikov, Voronova, Semyonova. 500–1,500 ₽.
🖼 5. Hermitage or Russian Museum postcards
Museum shops print good-paper reproductions, 150 ₽.
🥮 6. Pyshki to take away
Pyshechnaya on Sadovaya or Malaya Konyushennaya — pyshki in a box last a day or two. 200 ₽ for ten.
🥃 7. Baltika Razlivnaya
Petrovskaya unfiltered brewery — rare bottlings. Pribaltiyskaya shop or Pulkovo duty-free.
🚕 How to collect them
Hermitage shop + Yeliseyevsky + Podpisnye are all walkable in the centre. IPF is further out — RideClu.
🛏 Where to stay
Apartments near Kazanskaya and Nevsky are bookable on Tutkakdoma.
If this is your first time in St Petersburg, bear two things in mind. Distances between the main sights are short, but autumn daylight is brief and rain arrives on no schedule. Plan your route around the lit half of the day, allow half an hour of buffer between stops, and bring a thermos and gloves for the evening. Carry a thermos of tea, an offline map and a charger; mobile internet in the centre is steady but can drop along the embankments.
On the ground, walking is easiest between adjacent blocks, with short taxi hops when it gets dark or wet. If you are travelling as a group or with children, arrange the evening transfer back to your flat ahead of time — late-night fares spike. Flats in the centre go fast at weekends: book a week ahead for Nevsky, the Petrograd Side or Vasilievsky.
St Petersburg rewards half-day visits rather than one long marathon. Pick a theme — a single museum, a district, a walk — and give it time. After the active part, a warm cafe, a bookshop or a swimming pool is as much part of the ritual as the sights themselves, especially in November.
Verified on 22 October 2026.
Cover photo: Совет Федерации, CC BY 4.0, Викисклад
