Beautiful Baltic

I have had another update on the holiday that is being enjoyed by Maria and John, the ship has been "out of range" for a while so there is a bit of catching up to do. Maria has broken her visits to the different places into little paragraphs. Enjoy! (I did!)

Dover, England - we spent the day there and visited a beautiful village called Rye which used to supply the King with ships and it's greatest trade in the 18th century was in smuggling.  Today this medieval town with its cobbled streets and narrow passageways revealed some beautiful little 'houses' where you can have a bite to eat or buy souvenirs.  Our Tour Guide told us that Paul McCartney still lives there.  We saw some wonderful Oust houses which were places to dry the hops for beer but today they are private dwellings and very prime real estate.

 Tivoli Gardens, Stockholm, Denmark. Toys for big and little boys.

Copenhagen, Denmark - the Tivoli Gardens was my biggest and best surprise as I was expecting it to be a garden however it was much, much more and thrilled all of my senses no matter where I looked!  It had the most thrilling rides with scaled down versions for the children.  I tried to get on one but literally ran out of time.  Beautiful restaurants by the dozen, pavilions with activities for the children and adults, sculptures, water fountains and art!!  Birds, seagulls, ducks, fish, sharks and even old vintage cars for the Boys .. big and little.  We were told that when Walt Disney visited the place it inspired him to create Disneyland.  Naturally we saw the "Little Mermaid" and now there is also a "Big Mermaid" nearby (cruise ship terminal) and as I was taking a photograph of it I overheard an American woman saying how this one offended her.  Yes the Big Mermaid is much larger and so are her breasts however still in proportion to her body.

The delight of sitting on verandah and soaking up the sun and cruising along.

Tallin, Estonia - we walked up to Toompea Hill on a hot day but we were rewarded with a magnificent view of the Old Town below with it's many beautiful church spires and listened to a medieval concert.  The people here can understand the Finnish language and visa-versa and often the Fins will get on a 2 hr ferry across the Baltic Sea to drop in and shop.  Stunningly beautiful wool products but very rough and scratchy to touch.  So far I have not come across any wool products that were soft to feel.

Saint Petersburg, Russia - I don't know where to begin because the iconic palaces and churches we saw were overwhelming with their grandeur and opulence!  You could never imagine the amount of gold that has gone into the trimmings, furniture, statutes, mirror frames, chandeliers, wall paper, dinner sets, door frames, ceilings, floors, door handles, cutlery, glassware, vases etc. etc.  It is phenomenal!!!  Just tons and tons of it!  Literally!  Everything is gilt-edged!  Nothing escaped.  And humongous in size!  There is nothing to compare.

  Catherine's Palace.  Just the tip of the Gold Iceberg.

It was here that I first saw people soaking up the sun anywhere they could find a place to sit.  In the city or countryside it was simply a case of taking of the outer clothes and lying back.  I mostly saw this in the city.  Sadly the Russian history has left it's mark on its people as the older generation are angry.  Fortunately the younger ones are far more optimistic and outgoing.  Let's hope that the political future of the country will be a lot more stable and not experience any of the dreadful upheavals of the past.

Passenger feeding seagulls off the back of the ship until he almost lost thumb.

Helsinki, Finland - not much to write about really as we only did a walking tour through the City and as everybody is on holidays - they get 5 weeks holidays during the summer - the place was deserted.  Pretty town with a lovely lake which they skate on in the winter.  A fire in the 18th Century wiped the town out so all construction after that had to be in brick.   Sailing boats are lifted and "garaged" during the winter because of the damage the ice creates.  The trams look exactly like our Melbourne trams.  Same colour and shape.

Street Entertainer having a fun moment with tourists.

Stockholm, Sweden - to reach this beautiful City we had to sail through it's Archipelago which was stunningly beautiful.  We got up at 3.30 am and it took another 3 hours of sailing to reach the Port.  There are over 32,000 islands but not all of them are inhabited.   We visited City Hall where the Nobel winners get together for their Banquet meal, the Royal Residence which is now a museum as the Queen way back in the 1980's wanted her children to have a back yard which they now have by the hundreds of acres and can ride their horses, and the Vasa Museum ... an incredible sight because it is literally a museum BUILT AROUND a ship that sank 15 minutes after it's launch in 1628 and it's still in its original shape due to the water being brackish.

One of the many glorious and rare ocean sunsets we saw from our Balcony.

Visby, Gotland, Sweden - I fell in love with this little Island as it was rural, it's paddocks chock full of wild summer flowers, and its beautiful town of Visby which still has a wall surrounding the town which once protected it's people.  It has the oldest Viking graves, it's wild horses were once exported to England and Ireland to work in the mines because of their temperament and size, the Island relies on fishing and agriculture today however the young people are often forced to move to find employment elsewhere.  The economic decline of the Island centuries ago,  resulted in the preservation of it's ancient buildings and monuments.

Warnemunde, Germany - we were so lucky to be here during one of it's annual festivals which made this seaside town into a fantasy, one that I have often read about in novels but have never seen.  The seaside walks were full of kiosks, each one selling something unique and colourful and once again we found ourselves walking on cobbled streets with narrow passageways and as a special treat, a huge lighthouse at the end of one of them.

Maria enjoying German Oom Pah Pah Band.  Yes it was a cold night.

  Later in the afternoon we went for a ride on the Molli Train which is quiet famous and had a ball all due to the locomotive being repositioned from the front (we were in the last carriage) to the back!!  So we copped it all, the sounds of the steam, the clanking of the bell and yes, even the black sooty smoke and laughed even though we were choking.   Later on that night on board the ship we were treated to a German meal of Bratwurst, sauerkraut and an Oom Pah Pah band so we danced, drank German beer and reluctantly crawled back home about 10.30 pm.

  Cruise coming to an end.  Second last pilot boat.

 (PS from AJ)  From one part of the world to another, Maria and John have now packed their cases and are on their merry way to Amsterdam where they will shortly start their next adventure - travelling down the River Rhine.