"Afanasiy Nikitin" Tver' by jorgejuansanchez

I traveled to Tver by train in one day excursion from Moscow, only for one reason: to pay homage to one of the greatest Russian travelers of the past, called Afanasiy Nikitin.
Afanasiy Nikitin was a XV century merchant who went to India before Vasco da Gama. He wrote the book •A journey beyond the three seas”.
He made a long journey through the Caucasus, Persia and India. In his way back he returned to Russian through the Arabian Peninsula and Crimea, but died in the way before reaching his native Tver. He suffered many misadventures with thieves and bandits.
The three seas mentioned in the title of his book refer to Caspian, Arabian and Black.
I admired the monument devoted to him (see picture) on the banks of the River Volga.
Not far from that statue I saw another one representing Alexander Pushkin.
But there were some other pleasant surprises in that historical town of nearly half a million inhabitants, that during Soviet Union times was re-baptized Nikitin. One of them was to learn that in Tver lived several years, when he was a child, the famous writer Ivan Krilov, the Russian Aesop, who wrote many fables satirizing the humane behavior with examples of animals’ tales.
But the best one was to discover my favorite Russian beer when I entered a supermarket and at random bought a bottle of Afanasyev unfiltered beer, which is produced in Tver. It was exquisite and since then I always try to buy it in any kiosk when I travel to Russia.
When it was dark and I had already drank two bottles of unfiltered beer Afanasyev, I returned by train to Moscow.