Constellation Baltics Trip Report and Lots of Pictures!

[Eddie's Girl]

Cindy...great review so far. Just whets my appetite for our Baltic cruise on the Silhouette next June. Can't wait for next installment!

[GinnyJo]

Cindy,

We are on the Aug 1 sailing -- I am loving your review and pics! Thanks so much. Any other restaurant suggestions for Amsterdam? We will have 3 nights there pre-cruise.

Ginny

[HelenREMfan]

Depends on what kind of food you like..... If you like to try authentic Dutch cuisine I can recommend the Schiller Brasserie which is by The Schiller Hotel in Rembrandtsplein.

 

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g188590-d697063-Reviews-Brasserie_Schiller-Amsterdam_North_Holland_Province.html

 

My fave Dutch eating place is a grill house where the ribs are yummy! Der Klos which is along from the Flowermarket

 

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g188590-d696918-Reviews-Cafe_De_Klos-Amsterdam_North_Holland_Province.html

 

For a plentiful and cheap Chinese there were some good places in the red light area not too far from Dam Sq. The fact of the matter is that there are lots and lots of restaurants and every kind of cuisine. Amsterdam is a fabulous city and so easily "explorable" on foot. I am sure you will have a wonderful time !

[Cindy]

There's going to be a delay in posting. :( Our aging DSL modem finally went to cyber heaven tonight, and I won't have wifi again until late Monday afternoon. Helsinki and Porvoo, Finland will be posted when I'm back on wifi and not cellular data!

[GinnyJo]

Depends on what kind of food you like..... If you like to try authentic Dutch cuisine I can recommend the Schiller Brasserie which is by The Schiller Hotel in Rembrandtsplein.

 

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g188590-d697063-Reviews-Brasserie_Schiller-Amsterdam_North_Holland_Province.html

 

My fave Dutch eating place is a grill house where the ribs are yummy! Der Klos which is along from the Flowermarket

 

http://www.tripadvisor.co.uk/Restaurant_Review-g188590-d696918-Reviews-Cafe_De_Klos-Amsterdam_North_Holland_Province.html

 

For a plentiful and cheap Chinese there were some good places in the red light area not too far from Dam Sq. The fact of the matter is that there are lots and lots of restaurants and every kind of cuisine. Amsterdam is a fabulous city and so easily "explorable" on foot. I am sure you will have a wonderful time !

 

Thanks so much, Helen! (Sorry, Cindy, to interrupt your trip report.)

[Iamthesea]

There's going to be a delay in posting. :( Our aging DSL modem finally went to cyber heaven tonight, and I won't have wifi again until late Monday afternoon. Helsinki and Porvoo, Finland will be posted when I'm back on wifi and not cellular data!

 

Looking forward to reading the rest of your review, Cindy. We are back from our beach vacation. While there, the 4 of us followed you on my Ipad. We enjoyed reliving the play by play of "our" cruise. We felt like we were on vacation within a vacation. :D

 

Thank you for the memories. Your photography is outstanding. I need to start going through my Baltic photos again and make my trip DVD before I get behind. ;) I was the official photographer for our group, and J & E have not seen the photos. I took almost as many beach photos and videos as I did in the Baltics, and have been looking through those pictures today. :)

[Cindy]

Thanks so much, Helen! (Sorry, Cindy, to interrupt your trip report.)

 

It's not a problem!:)

 

Looking forward to reading the rest of your review, Cindy. We are back from our beach vacation. While there, the 4 of us followed you on my Ipad. We enjoyed reliving the play by play of "our" cruise. We felt like we were on vacation within a vacation. :D

 

Thank you for the memories. Your photography is outstanding. I need to start going through my Baltic photos again and make my trip DVD before I get behind. ;) I was the official photographer for our group, and J & E have not seen the photos. I took almost as many beach photos and videos as I did in the Baltics, and have been looking through those pictures today. :)

 

Thank you! I have internet again, so I'm going to post a little more tonight before I go to bed, and try to finish by the end of the week. We boarded the ship two months ago...if I wait too much longer, I'm going to have to change the title to "Last Year's Cruise to the Baltics!":eek:

[Iamthesea]

:D

 

You are doing fine. Glad you have your net up and working. :)

[Cindy]

Monday, May 26 – Helsinki, Finland

 

 

 

We woke up to another spectacular day…it was hard to believe this was the Baltics, because it was just picture perfect! We had a great tour with Paulo of Paulo’s Tours. He took six of us through Helsinki then out to Porvoo in his comfortable van.

 

The Sibelius Monument, Helsinki

 

 

The Rock Church, Helsinki

 

 

I found Paulo on Trip Advisor and booked a tour with him for the four of us plus two people from our roll call based on the many positive reviews. My group was glad we did! Especially after the quality of the tour we took in Stockholm, we really enjoyed Paulo!

 

Communication with Paulo before our cruise was easy. He answered e-mail almost immediately, and he took Pay Pal for a deposit.

 

Paulo's English is impeccable. He is very knowledgeable about his adopted country of Finland, and speaks with pride and enthusiasm about the history of the region as well as the current lifestyle and culture.

 

We all thought Helsinki was very stark, but enjoyed the quaint fishing village of Porvoo. In addition to walking around, we enjoyed lunch outside at a typical Finnish restaurant. Paulo told us the prices in Porvoo were much more reasonable then in Helsinki, but at 27 Euros for lunch for 2, I guess reasonable is relative!

 

Fishing Village of Porvoo, Finland

 

 

Restaurant

 

 

Jess at lunch in Porvoo

[Cindy]

The six of us really enjoyed Porvoo, so much so that we opted to extend our time in this charming, quaint fishing village and cut short our time in Helsinki. We enjoyed a leisurely lunch on a patio in the brilliant sunshine, chatting with Paulo and learning about life in Finland. For souvenir shopping, we also found Porvoo to be a great place to find crafts, art, jewelry, and clothing made by local artisans.

 

Mom and Jess

 

 

Porvoo

 

 

Porvoo

 

 

Can you pronounce the name of this street?

 

 

Porvoo Church

 

 

Porvoo Church

[Cindy]

Porvoo

 

 

Porvoo

 

 

Porvoo

 

 

Porvoo City Hall

 

 

Tiny wooden houses line the river.

[Cindy]

Even though we extended our time in Porvoo, we still had time to visit the Helsinki Olympic Stadium and the market down at the waterfront, which was a lot of fun.

 

Helsinki Olympic Stadium

 

 

Helsinki Olympic Stadium

 

 

Helsinki Olympic Stadium

 

 

Uspenski Cathedral -- "Magnificent Red Brick Cathedral"

 

 

Market

 

 

Waterfront

[Cindy]

Strangely enough, I don't seem to have any notes from what we did after we got back to the ship. I suppose we didn't do much because we were losing another hour that night and Tuesday was the first of our two long days in St. Petersburg.

 

We got back to the ship about 4:00, and saw this guy enjoying the sunshine on our way to our cabin...

 

 

This is just a guess, but since we're creatures of habit I'm sure we went to the Martini Bar before dinner, so I'll include a picture...

 

 

Maybe we went to the casino after dinner. You would probably question our combined IQ if you saw the results we were having there...

:rolleyes:

 

 

Since 20 cents won't buy anything on a Celebrity ship, or at the Dollar Store for that matter, I'm pretty sure we went to bed early. There are few things worth getting up at 5:30 for when I'm on vacation, but St. Petersburg, Russia made the cut!

 

Up next...palaces, art, crowds, churches, traffic, mosaics, and (liquid):( sunshine!

[Cindy]

I just looked at my Celebrity TODAY from Helsinki, and I remember what we did after dinner...we went to a production show called The Land of Make Believe. It was well-performed, but Jim and I thought it was more than a little bizarre. Think Alice in Wonderland meets Wicked, but not in a good way!:eek:

 

The Land of Make Believe

[TLCOhio]

We stayed at the Amsterdam Canal Hotel, which I found on the internet. In all, we enjoyed our stay, but we would also consider other small hotels if/when we return to Amsterdam.

 

Super enjoy and appreciate, Cindy, your details and reports, especially the pictures!! Loved seeing all of the details on Amsterdam. Looks great. Have not been there since way back in Dec., 1970. We are now working on our planned mid March-mid April 2015 Africa (Kenya-Zanzibar-Madagascar-South Africa-Zimbabwe-Botswana) adventure. We would use Amsterdam as the stop-over, rest-up point both going down and coming back from Africa. Had lunch last week with the retired director of the Columbus Zoo who has taken twelve trips to Africa and worked with Jack Hanna. Fun doing that future research!!

 

Will keep reading your fun report. Bring back nice memories, such as at Sibelius Monument and Rock Church in Helsinki.

 

THANKS! Enjoy! Terry in Ohio

 

Back from doing a 14-day Celebrity Solstice, Jan. 20-Feb. 3, 2014, Sydney to Auckland adventure on this ship and getting a big sampling for the wonders of "down under” before and after this cruise. Go to:

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1974139

for much more information and lots of wonderful pictures on these amazing sights in this great part of the world. Now at 67,746 views for this fun posting.

[suometar]

I am enjoying your review and love the pictures! As someone who was born and raised in Helsinki I was very interested in reading your impressions of my old home town. I'm sorry that you did not like it.

[Happy Cruiser 6143]

I am enjoying your review and love the pictures! As someone who was born and raised in Helsinki I was very interested in reading your impressions of my old home town. I'm sorry that you did not like it.

 

My friends and I absolutely adored Helsinki. Our only disappointment was that the Church of the Rock was closed for repairs when we were there.

 

[england1]

We also enjoyed Helsinki. We thought the architecture was beautiful. We didn't indulge, but the shopping area was very inviting.

[micruiser12]

I am enjoying your review and love the pictures! As someone who was born and raised in Helsinki I was very interested in reading your impressions of my old home town. I'm sorry that you did not like it.

 

We also really liked Helsinki! Market Square, Senate Square, Stockman's, etc. Such a clean city too.

[TroubleT]

I am enjoying your review and love the pictures! As someone who was born and raised in Helsinki I was very interested in reading your impressions of my old home town. I'm sorry that you did not like it.

We also LOVED Helsinki! It's so clean and peaceful! Loved Senate Square and market not far from it! The fried salmon with young potatoes and veggies! Mmmm good!:)

[StartrainDD]

Cindy,

We are on the Aug 1 sailing -- I am loving your review and pics! Thanks so much. Any other restaurant suggestions for Amsterdam? We will have 3 nights there pre-cruise.

Ginny

 

Cindy, great review/log! We visited most of the same ports a week after you on Prinsendam.

 

Ginny, in Amsterdam, for an "Inexpensive" meal with an incredible view - go to the top floor of the main public library. Seriously. The library is two blocks from the central train station.

 

On the top floor is "LaPlace," a cafeteria-like restaurant with outdoor seating, moderate prices (low for Amsterdam), better than average food, beer and wine are available too. The view is more than worth the trip and even just as a place for coffee and apple cake, you will likely take 10 photos from there!

 

Hope this helps!

[Cindy]

I am enjoying your review and love the pictures! As someone who was born and raised in Helsinki I was very interested in reading your impressions of my old home town. I'm sorry that you did not like it.

 

We didn't dislike Helsinki...we enjoyed our visit! In general, the architecture didn't appeal to me as much as some of the other cities we visited, but we still enjoyed the sights we saw. I thought Market Square and that whole area was just beautiful as well as interesting and a lot of fun to explore. I also thought Helsinki was incredibly clean, as was Porvoo. The citizens obviously take a great deal of pride in their home towns.

 

Sorry I left everybody with the impression we disliked Helsinki. I probably should have elaborated a bit more in my post than I did.

[notsodesperatehousewife]

Great review and gorgeous photos! You have a gift for fine photography. I would love to do this itinerary and am awaiting the next installment.

 

You have a beautiful family. Your mom looks like a sweet, classy lady.

[Earlybirds2]

There's going to be a delay in posting. :( Our aging DSL modem finally went to cyber heaven tonight, and I won't have wifi again until late Monday afternoon. Helsinki and Porvoo, Finland will be posted when I'm back on wifi and not cellular data!

 

Cindy,

 

A quick tech question if you have time please … What sort of internet are you using to transfer your photos?

 

On last year’s trip I posted photos on my blog for six weeks and then when our cruise started, nothing – a huge void. It took so long to upload the photos I gave up rather quickly as I realised how much it would cost using the ship’s Internet.

 

We embark August 25th on Connie for our Baltic cruise so we’re eagerly following your wonderful entries. Thank you so much.

 

Lea

[Cindy]

Cindy,

 

A quick tech question if you have time please … What sort of internet are you using to transfer your photos?

 

On last year’s trip I posted photos on my blog for six weeks and then when our cruise started, nothing – a huge void. It took so long to upload the photos I gave up rather quickly as I realised how much it would cost using the ship’s Internet.

 

We embark August 25th on Connie for our Baltic cruise so we’re eagerly following your wonderful entries. Thank you so much.

 

Lea

 

 

I'm using my regular home internet. I wish I knew a good way to do a "live with pictures" review, but I don't.:(

 

The pictures I'm using here post very quickly, but they've been "Saved for Web" on Photoshop Elements, then uploaded to my SmugMug photo site. From there I select a picture to share, and get a code that I copy and paste to Cruise Critic. One of the things that's making writing this so slow is getting all the pictures hosted and ready to post.

 

You are going to love the cruise! I hope you share when you get back!