MOSCOW, Russia - Red Square is one of the most historic places on the planet, and it more than lived up to its billing on Saturday.

Jason Bryant and I climbed aboard the Metro train system in historic Moscow - a great deal at 52 Roubles round trip (less than a Starbucks coffee, with a train ticket at $1.69) - and headed down to Red Square.

It was an amazing day, to say the least.

We started by hitting McDonald's. It was mid-afternoon, but the place was still packed. I got a No. 1 Value Meal with a Big Mac, french fries and a Coke for 180 Roubles ($6 U.S.). It tasted about the same as McDonald's in the U.S., plus I hadn't eaten all day so the timing of the trip there was perfect.

We saw Moscow's showpiece, the spectacular St. Basil's Cathedral, along with the Kremlin. The buildings are nothing short of impressive.

We walked nearly all of the way around Red Square before running into officials Rick Tucci, Tom Clark and Zach Errett, and Iranian native Ardeshir Asgari. We decided to walk around with them, and checked out the large outdoor market there.

I ended up buying a black, fur Russian hat, a Matrushka doll, and a few other items. We had fun negotiating with the merchants and driving the price down.

Tom was the master at driving the price down, walking away a couple times to get the man to drop the price. I was giving him crap for buying an Ohio State Buckeyes Matrushka with OSU quarterback Terrelle Pryor on it. I grew up near Iowa City and I am a big Hawkeye football fan.

After dinner, we did some more shopping and then started walking back to the train station.

There was a huge festival going on, with a Russian band playing Hip Hop music. It was amazing to see thousands of people singing along. The streets were filled with people. It was Moscow City Day. They were celebrating Moscow's 863rd birthday today. Around 3 to 4 million people were expected to be out celebrating. Russia is a city of approximately 10 million people.

We found our train and headed back to the hotel. We spent about seven hours at Red Square. On the way back, we spotted a familiar face in the subway. Photographer Tony Rotundo has arrived in town, and he rode back with us to the hotel.

It was a great day! The tournament is set to start on Monday afternoon at 1. Looking forward to seeing how the Greco-Roman boys from the U.S. fare. The first three U.S. Greco-Roman wrestlers - Spenser Mango, Faruk Sahin and Justin Ruiz - will weigh in and receive their draws tomorrow afternoon.