For those of you familiar with St Petersburg; this is a miniature version of the Spit of Vasilievsky Island. It is part of the huge Grand Maket layout which is a miniature Russia. I’m straying today from writing about craft beers to write about one of my other loves : model railroads!!
Grand Maket in St. Petersburg opened its doors in 2012 and just celebrated its 5 year anniversary. It is a spectacular layout showing Russia in three zones (West, Central, East) with countless trains, moving cars and trucks, many buildings and beautiful landscapes.
Grand Maket is located on Tsvetochnaja str. 16 near the Moskovskiye Vorota metro station. Being old fashioned I always look on a map before I go somewhere in a city I don’t know. I probably could just use my phone to guide me towards my destination but I have no idea how that works. So I look at a map before I leave, write down streets or memorize them and go. Of course this always leads to some problems as signage in Russia is not exactly perfect. Missing street signs, or signs placed in a completely illogical location quite often lead to an extended expedition finding your destination. I’m sure this is one of the reasons both the French and the Germans weren’t able to conquer Russia: they simply got lost.
One rusty sign I just happened to notice half way down the street I was supposed to take but that was all they had put out there. Once you get to the building though everything is super modern and beautiful. The layout covers an area of 800 square meters and is the second largest train layout in the world after Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg, Germany.
Every 13 minutes the day turns into night which lasts for 2 minutes and you see a beautiful night scenery with lit buildings and trains and trucks running with their lights on. Wireless cars and trucks move around and stop for traffic lights and even use their turn signals. There are about 2,5 kilometers of track and 250 locomotives pulling 2500 cars.
And yes, they even have Darwin award candidates as we unfortunately do in real life as well…..
Grand Maket is a great place for everyone. Young, old, male, female, I saw everyone walking around with a smile on their face. If you go to St. Petersburg be sure to put this place on your list!!
