travelingmcmahans
August 19th, 2004, 08:35 PM
We've been back nearly a week now, after extending our stay by 3 nights in Paris on our own. I haven't got my trip report completely done yet, but it is taking so long, I wanted to go ahead and share what I do have, which is up through Russia.
Quite long and rambling, just a warning ;)
I have lots of photos at http://photos.yahoo.com/travelingmcmahans
And if you really like pictures, and have about 8-10 minutes, here is a really fun photo show http://www.photoshow.net/redir_main.php?show=PSthKbHsd.
Here goes...
We set out for our latest adventure, centered around a 10 day Baltic cruise, ready to enjoy the cool weather, to be greeted with freakishly warm days and impossibly blue skies. We arrived at the Cinci airport Thursday July 29th and feeling like imposters, checked in at the Business Elite line (courtesy of 160,000 miles racked up on our AmX Delta credit cards). We were able to change our original flight to a later direct flight which would land us an hour earlier in Frankfurt. This gave us a lot of time on our hands, but fortunately we were able to while away the hours in the peaceful oasis of the business lounge. What a feeling to sink into those big luxurious seats in business class … champagne and mineral water were on hand immediately, my jacket was taken, we were welcomed on board and given a menu for dinner. Wish I could always fly like that.
Our flight was uneventful and we arrived about 8 hours later. Frankfurt airport was very clean and streamlined. We were at the onsite train station by 9:45 am local time. Day 1 was Luebeck. We arrived early afternoon and checked into the Baltic hotel, a simple but comfortable place. Our room was on the 3rd (hence 4th) floor, with, of course, no elevator. Lugging the suitcase the cruise necessitated was not fun for Brian!
We didn't have the energy that evening to do much more than wander around the old city center and admire the canals and architecture, and eat a hearty German dinner of fish and potatoes. A good night's sleep in our tiny sloped room did wonders for us and we set out early the following morning for the 8:15 train to Copenhagen. Our reserved seats ended up placing us with a very interesting fellow traveler - an Iraqi now living in Australia, now traveling through Europe. We passed the train ride conversing with him, and trying to determine who exactly the young men were who went through the train looking at passports, claiming to be German customs, but wearing Tshirts, and who jumped off the train just prior to loading on the ferry for the crossing to Copenhagen.
We arrived in Copenhagen to a very warm afternoon, checked into our funky little room at Chicken's Private Pensione, and set out to explore. We immediately noticed the very high prices - a basic lunch at a café was about $50 US. Copenhagen is a colorful and interesting city, and very walkable. We spent all afternoon wandering the cobblestone streets and squares, and enjoyed dinner in Christiania, the hippie enclave.
The following morning, a local MINI owner, Peter, called us at our Pensione, and volunteered to pick us up and show us around. We were excited to meet another MINI person, and get a local's perspective. We took another long walk before he arrived, along the Nyhaven harbor and to Ameliasborg Palace. Peter picked us and our bags up late morning and took us to see the Little Mermaid, a petite statue in the harbor. We stopped for ice cream and to admire the view of the sea, before heading to a charming little amusement park where we took a carriage ride through a park, and spent some time learning about Peter and life in Denmark. His MINI was horribly expensive, due to the remarkably high taxes of 180% on new cars. Peter drove us directly to the ship, which was very nice and certainly saved us a long trip on public transportation.
http://home.earthlink.net/~danamcmahan/images/MS-Noordam..jpgBoarding was quite quick and easy, especially because I had already filled out my immigration forms online. Our room was already ready, and our cabin steward managed to get us a fan and extra pillows. It was a new and interesting experience for me to be on board a cruise ship - I luckily did not get seasick, but the vibrations took some adjusting. We met up late afternoon with David and Linda, a couple we met on a cruise message board before leaving, and hit it right off with them. We enjoyed some champagne in our cabin, then went down for dinner. They had placed us a table alone, despite our request for a large table, so we spoke to them about that, but enjoyed our first night's 5-course dinner.
Monday was a full day at sea. I was quite restless, and prowled about the ship most of the day. Afternoon high tea was lovely - I do love scones and cream. Brian toured the ship kitchen, which he found interesting. Dinner was formal Monday night, so we dressed up in our "prom" clothes, and went for a drink in the "Crow's Nest" before going down for the Captain's champagne reception, and many photo stops. We joined our new tablemates, who were quite nice, but fairly quiet except for the vastly entertaining ship nurse and her husband. With her at the table wine was on the house. So it's not much surprise that we found it difficult to get up the next morning. We had also lost an hour the first night of the cruise, because Estonia is another hour ahead of western Europe, so Brian especially was groggy. We walked with David and Linda to the port gate, bypassing the higher priced taxis at the gate, and got a taxi with the sweetest taxi driver who told us a lot about Estonia. "It is a small country with a big heart," he told us.
http://home.earthlink.net/~danamcmahan/images/Nevsky-Cathedral-Tallin.jpg
We especially liked Tallin. A beautiful medieval city with the stunning Russian Orthodox Church, it offered intriguing views around every corner. Our highlights included a visit inside the Russian cathedral - stunning and exotic - and a climb to the top of the city hall tower for incredible 360 degree views of the city. Our legs were spaghetti by the time we climbed up and down that steep spiral staircase, but it was well worth it. The weather was perfect, the skies so blue as to not be believed, as they were to be for most of our trip.
I had trouble sleeping that night, knowing we would be in Russia in the morning. We lost another hour, placing us now 8 hours ahead of home, and arose early for room service (some things I definitely like about cruising) and left the ship for Russia! Customs was a breeze, not at all like I feared, and we were very early outside the customs office waiting for our guide and car. We booked this service with Palladium before we left, and obtained visas so we could travel independently. We had no desire to be packed onto a tour bus and trundled around the city, and it was actually quite a bit less expensive to hire a private guide, car and driver. Just prior to 8:30, Lena came around the corner with Alexander, and we were off! The car had to stop at the port gate for the curious procedure of documents inspection and a barrage of Russian fired between the driver and the guard. Lena commenced with a history of St Petersburg as we made the drive into the city. Our first stop was at a gorgeous blue and gold orthodox church with those mystical onion domes. I soon had to venture into a Russian public restroom, which I had heard much about (and none of it positive). I borrowed 10 Roubles from Lena, took the paper from outside the stall after the attendant stopped me to point it out, and that was that. No better or worse than a rest stop on any interstate at home. We stopped at an ATM for roubles next, and headed out to Catherine's Palace, all the while gawking out the window and pinching ourselves to make the fact that we are in Russia real. Just outside the city we stopped at Chesma church, a birthday cake of a building - pink and white striped, with some lovely icons inside.
http://home.earthlink.net/~danamcmahan/images/Catherine's-Palace-St-Peter.jpgWe quickly learned the advantages of having a guide and car/driver. We were dropped off right at the entrance to Catherine's Palace and Lena took us directly to the front of the (long) line. She showed some papers, spoke a lot of Russian and got us into the courtyard of this fabulous blue palace crowned with a cluster of golden onion domes. As we toured the palace in our mandatory slippers Lena kept up a running commentary on the history, art, architecture and people of this palace. She was extremely well educated and we learned that in order to be a licensed guide, she was required to take a course on each and every major museum and church in St Petersburg. Upon leaving the palace, I bought a bottle of water, and a Coke for Brian, and was a little surprised to see how many roubles it cost - the equivalent of $7.00! This in a city in which teachers make around US $30 per month.
To be continued...
Quite long and rambling, just a warning ;)
I have lots of photos at http://photos.yahoo.com/travelingmcmahans
And if you really like pictures, and have about 8-10 minutes, here is a really fun photo show http://www.photoshow.net/redir_main.php?show=PSthKbHsd.
Here goes...
We set out for our latest adventure, centered around a 10 day Baltic cruise, ready to enjoy the cool weather, to be greeted with freakishly warm days and impossibly blue skies. We arrived at the Cinci airport Thursday July 29th and feeling like imposters, checked in at the Business Elite line (courtesy of 160,000 miles racked up on our AmX Delta credit cards). We were able to change our original flight to a later direct flight which would land us an hour earlier in Frankfurt. This gave us a lot of time on our hands, but fortunately we were able to while away the hours in the peaceful oasis of the business lounge. What a feeling to sink into those big luxurious seats in business class … champagne and mineral water were on hand immediately, my jacket was taken, we were welcomed on board and given a menu for dinner. Wish I could always fly like that.
Our flight was uneventful and we arrived about 8 hours later. Frankfurt airport was very clean and streamlined. We were at the onsite train station by 9:45 am local time. Day 1 was Luebeck. We arrived early afternoon and checked into the Baltic hotel, a simple but comfortable place. Our room was on the 3rd (hence 4th) floor, with, of course, no elevator. Lugging the suitcase the cruise necessitated was not fun for Brian!
We didn't have the energy that evening to do much more than wander around the old city center and admire the canals and architecture, and eat a hearty German dinner of fish and potatoes. A good night's sleep in our tiny sloped room did wonders for us and we set out early the following morning for the 8:15 train to Copenhagen. Our reserved seats ended up placing us with a very interesting fellow traveler - an Iraqi now living in Australia, now traveling through Europe. We passed the train ride conversing with him, and trying to determine who exactly the young men were who went through the train looking at passports, claiming to be German customs, but wearing Tshirts, and who jumped off the train just prior to loading on the ferry for the crossing to Copenhagen.
We arrived in Copenhagen to a very warm afternoon, checked into our funky little room at Chicken's Private Pensione, and set out to explore. We immediately noticed the very high prices - a basic lunch at a café was about $50 US. Copenhagen is a colorful and interesting city, and very walkable. We spent all afternoon wandering the cobblestone streets and squares, and enjoyed dinner in Christiania, the hippie enclave.
The following morning, a local MINI owner, Peter, called us at our Pensione, and volunteered to pick us up and show us around. We were excited to meet another MINI person, and get a local's perspective. We took another long walk before he arrived, along the Nyhaven harbor and to Ameliasborg Palace. Peter picked us and our bags up late morning and took us to see the Little Mermaid, a petite statue in the harbor. We stopped for ice cream and to admire the view of the sea, before heading to a charming little amusement park where we took a carriage ride through a park, and spent some time learning about Peter and life in Denmark. His MINI was horribly expensive, due to the remarkably high taxes of 180% on new cars. Peter drove us directly to the ship, which was very nice and certainly saved us a long trip on public transportation.
http://home.earthlink.net/~danamcmahan/images/MS-Noordam..jpgBoarding was quite quick and easy, especially because I had already filled out my immigration forms online. Our room was already ready, and our cabin steward managed to get us a fan and extra pillows. It was a new and interesting experience for me to be on board a cruise ship - I luckily did not get seasick, but the vibrations took some adjusting. We met up late afternoon with David and Linda, a couple we met on a cruise message board before leaving, and hit it right off with them. We enjoyed some champagne in our cabin, then went down for dinner. They had placed us a table alone, despite our request for a large table, so we spoke to them about that, but enjoyed our first night's 5-course dinner.
Monday was a full day at sea. I was quite restless, and prowled about the ship most of the day. Afternoon high tea was lovely - I do love scones and cream. Brian toured the ship kitchen, which he found interesting. Dinner was formal Monday night, so we dressed up in our "prom" clothes, and went for a drink in the "Crow's Nest" before going down for the Captain's champagne reception, and many photo stops. We joined our new tablemates, who were quite nice, but fairly quiet except for the vastly entertaining ship nurse and her husband. With her at the table wine was on the house. So it's not much surprise that we found it difficult to get up the next morning. We had also lost an hour the first night of the cruise, because Estonia is another hour ahead of western Europe, so Brian especially was groggy. We walked with David and Linda to the port gate, bypassing the higher priced taxis at the gate, and got a taxi with the sweetest taxi driver who told us a lot about Estonia. "It is a small country with a big heart," he told us.
http://home.earthlink.net/~danamcmahan/images/Nevsky-Cathedral-Tallin.jpg
We especially liked Tallin. A beautiful medieval city with the stunning Russian Orthodox Church, it offered intriguing views around every corner. Our highlights included a visit inside the Russian cathedral - stunning and exotic - and a climb to the top of the city hall tower for incredible 360 degree views of the city. Our legs were spaghetti by the time we climbed up and down that steep spiral staircase, but it was well worth it. The weather was perfect, the skies so blue as to not be believed, as they were to be for most of our trip.
I had trouble sleeping that night, knowing we would be in Russia in the morning. We lost another hour, placing us now 8 hours ahead of home, and arose early for room service (some things I definitely like about cruising) and left the ship for Russia! Customs was a breeze, not at all like I feared, and we were very early outside the customs office waiting for our guide and car. We booked this service with Palladium before we left, and obtained visas so we could travel independently. We had no desire to be packed onto a tour bus and trundled around the city, and it was actually quite a bit less expensive to hire a private guide, car and driver. Just prior to 8:30, Lena came around the corner with Alexander, and we were off! The car had to stop at the port gate for the curious procedure of documents inspection and a barrage of Russian fired between the driver and the guard. Lena commenced with a history of St Petersburg as we made the drive into the city. Our first stop was at a gorgeous blue and gold orthodox church with those mystical onion domes. I soon had to venture into a Russian public restroom, which I had heard much about (and none of it positive). I borrowed 10 Roubles from Lena, took the paper from outside the stall after the attendant stopped me to point it out, and that was that. No better or worse than a rest stop on any interstate at home. We stopped at an ATM for roubles next, and headed out to Catherine's Palace, all the while gawking out the window and pinching ourselves to make the fact that we are in Russia real. Just outside the city we stopped at Chesma church, a birthday cake of a building - pink and white striped, with some lovely icons inside.
http://home.earthlink.net/~danamcmahan/images/Catherine's-Palace-St-Peter.jpgWe quickly learned the advantages of having a guide and car/driver. We were dropped off right at the entrance to Catherine's Palace and Lena took us directly to the front of the (long) line. She showed some papers, spoke a lot of Russian and got us into the courtyard of this fabulous blue palace crowned with a cluster of golden onion domes. As we toured the palace in our mandatory slippers Lena kept up a running commentary on the history, art, architecture and people of this palace. She was extremely well educated and we learned that in order to be a licensed guide, she was required to take a course on each and every major museum and church in St Petersburg. Upon leaving the palace, I bought a bottle of water, and a Coke for Brian, and was a little surprised to see how many roubles it cost - the equivalent of $7.00! This in a city in which teachers make around US $30 per month.
To be continued...