LIVE from Scandinavia on the Voyager of the Seas July 31-August 10, 2022 with Dragon of the Seas

[John&LaLa]

1 hour ago, DragonOfTheSeas said:

Tonight we had the Top Tier Party.  I already wrote a post for this event--so, if it shows up later you will know why there is a duplicate.

 

Also, I am not going to try to load the pictures.  That is where I think I had the issue. The internet is glitchy again. ugh! 

 

They did not announce the total number of guests, but I got that from guest services. [1368]

 

There are 558 Crown and Anchor members:

 

247 gold

96 platinum

60 emerald

104 diamond

37 diamond +

14 pinnacle

 

The top cruiser had 2,256 points and was on the 5th cruise in a row and was top cruiser on all of them.  

 

There seem to be many newbies.  The Guest Services manager [Tim] has been with Royal only a few weeks. 

 

The Loyalty Ambassador was new to Voyager but had been with Royal for more than 4 years. 

 

Etc. However, the service has been very good.  Our cabin attendant, Irene, may be the best we have ever had. It has been a good cruise and we are at the halfway mark. 

 

 

Thanks for details. If you get a chance, can you ask concierge how many expected next week.

 

Our suite is 3 or 4 doors forward of you. I'll be on lookout for Irene 

[DELTABLUE]

9 hours ago, DragonOfTheSeas said:

Yesterday I didn’t get any pictures of the Riga Castle. Which is the home of the president. Here it is. 

 

 

On the front side facing the canal they have earthworks that were originally a defense for the castle and for the city. I think it’s interesting they’ve built some things including a parking garage into these. 

Love how the curly "W" watermark managed to show up in some of today's pictures!

[DragonOfTheSeas]

11 hours ago, John&LaLa said:

 

Thanks for details. If you get a chance, can you ask concierge how many expected next week.

 

Our suite is 3 or 4 doors forward of you. I'll be on lookout for Irene 

Sure I’ll be glad to.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Last night was not a very exciting night for entertainment. The headliner were to circus acrobats. I’m not diminishing their talent it’s just not something I’m gonna go see on a cruise.

here are the pictures of the top tier event that I wasn’t able to load last night.
 

Katie the Cruise Director. 

 

And here is the Royal Caribbean orchestra doing jazz as we entered.

 

We did stop by the Schooner bar earlier in the evening and listen to a classical pianist. 

 

 

 

 

we had a beautiful sunset

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Today we are in Tallinn, Estonia. I plan on doing a DIY walking tour. I’m taking the city provided shuttle that cost €10 and takes us from the ship to a location beside old town. It’ll save me a good long walk. And today is full of walking incline and cobblestone streets. None of that is my favorite. Ha ha 
 

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

After the shuttle dropped us off I entered the old city through the Viru Gate. 

 

 

 

look at what was just on the other side. One guy that was passing by referred to it is the American embassy.

 

 

I headed to the Town Square in lower town. 
 

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Well that’s unusual. I just did two postings both of them which disappeared but you can see the pictures now above.

 

it put in the text up to the town hall. But then it dropped the rest of the text. So the picture you see are the cobblestones in the street in most of upper town they’re rounded their random sizes and they just kill your feet so where are your most comfortable shoes. Then you can see two pictures of stairs those are the stairs I had to go up to get to upper town. 
 

you can read the labels for the other two buildings

[DragonOfTheSeas]

I’m at a restaurant in old town so I’m depended on their Wi-Fi. I just felt out there be too many pictures to post once I get back to the ship. 
 

This is the Saint Alexander Nesky cathedral in upper town. The dates to around 1900 in the spill by the Russians it’s directly across from the parliament building. It was a poke in the eye to the Estonians. They even took down the statue of Martin Luther when they built it. 
 

 

 

this is the parliament building. You have to arrange a tour in order to go in here.

 

 

Here is the tower from nearby

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

There are two viewing areas in the upper area when you get a city map and you get off the shuttle make sure that you check them out. 
 

 

 

 

It seems that every street corner have one of these women juice vendors.

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

This is Saint Olaf‘s Church. 
 

 

in the next block are the KGV cells. there’s not really a lot that I can give you for photographs I’m not sure but I was reading the stories of the people who are there is very interesting.

 

 

The Russian embassy was near here there was a lot of graffiti along the way in front of the building

 

 

 

 

 

I saw this sign next to a restaurant in the town Square

 

Russian flag over the door at the embassy

[kh76sp]

Love the commentary! What can you tell me about ballroom type dancing on the Voyager? I'm looking at a cruise in October from Boston to San Juan (we live near Boston) but our two must have activities on cruises are PingPong and good dancing. How does it look on the Voyager, please?

[John&LaLa]

Bump

[DragonOfTheSeas]

6 hours ago, kh76sp said:

Love the commentary! What can you tell me about ballroom type dancing on the Voyager? I'm looking at a cruise in October from Boston to San Juan (we live near Boston) but our two must have activities on cruises are PingPong and good dancing. How does it look on the Voyager, please?

I haven’t seen any ballroom dancing noted so far on the ship. But in the Caribbean there’s usually a lot more activities than on the ship. We are in a different port every day everyone’s usually off the ship for 5 to eight hours and there’s just not as much activity.

 

there is a silent dance party tonight where you wear headphones and select your style of music. But in the past that has always been different types of modern music. But it is dancing.

 

there’s a ping-pong table right by the ice cream stand on deck 11. I’ve seen shuffleboard and cornhole.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Sorry to check out on you yesterday. I was really whipped when I got back from Tallinn. You remember I said that I can’t walk with so far. Yesterday I had over 14,000 steps.

 

and it was very hot in the city. It was 85° we were all about to melt! 😁

 

it was nap, shower, dinner, and bed. There was no posting for me yesterday. 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

I’ll try to add a few  More pictures from Tallinn now before we go out on our tour. 
 

I think I posted one picture of Townhall yesterday. But here’s a few more. Townhall was always the center of any city or town in the middle ages. 
 

it anchors the town Square.

 

 

I need to go down the stairs to enter.

 

you can see from this map how large it is.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

8 hours ago, John&LaLa said:

Bump

John, I asked Irene what cabins she had and she told me she goes down to 1320. I can’t remember which road she said she started I’ll check that out tonight.

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Our first stop was the park to honor the Finnish composer Sibelius. 
 

it is made up of 600 stainless steel pipes. The interesting thing is he never composed anything for the organ. There’s always a crowd now so it is impossible to get a picture without people. 
 

 

 

there is a marina and café nearby this was our morning kayak or in the rain

 

 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Our longer stop was the rock church. The guide said it’s a 45 minutes stop, but it was almost an hour. It is a beautiful church.
 

 

there is a dome at the top and then a series of glass panels all the way around the circular church. I’m sure they’re beautiful on a sunny day.

 

It is supposed to have some of the most incredible acoustics. They have a huge organ.

 

 

The church was carved out of solid rock.

 

 

unfortunately our bus had to park really far away it was quite a slog in the liquid sunshine to get to the church.😊

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We did a drive-by of the Olympic stadium in Helsinki. Unfortunately I chose to sit on the left side and it was on the right.
 

 

Actually a couple of other things have been on the right too. FYI-if you choose to do this tour, it’s called the “City of Helsinki” a sit on the right side of the bus.

 

our guide said that this is a typical style and coloring for traditional houses in Helsinki.

 

Then we drove along the waterside where the rich have villas. These are old traditional villas 

 

 

 

The current president‘s house is in the same area and is a traditional villa. But you can’t see it from the road

 

This is part of the Helsinki university and hospital complex.
 

 

And the round building is the Children’s Hospital.

 

Edited August 6, 2022 by DragonOfTheSeas

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Here’s just a bit of information about Finland. 
this map shows you all the countries we are visiting on this cruise

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Here are pictures from the Senate Square. Which is the center of the city. 

 

Here is the cathedral that dates from 1852. 

 

This building actually is just off the square. It is the Estates building. Back in early days Helsinki had four estates— the nobles, the priest, the burgers, and the peasants.

 

This statue is in the center of the Square. In front of the Senate building. 

This building which looks white in the picture, is actually a light blue. It is the oldest stone building in Helsinki.  70% of the country is covered in forest. So the city was originally built only with wood. But they had so many fires they changed to using stone

[DragonOfTheSeas]

We could have stayed in the city and taken the ships shuttle bus back. It was included in the price of our tour this morning but it was raining too hard for us to enjoy taking a canal boat ride. And that was what I thought I might do this afternoon.

 

The irony is that now we’ve gotten back to the ship been here about an hour and the sun is beginning to come out.🤣

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Then we headed back to the ship along the waterfront. These next two pictures are of the central market. You can see that they are ready for rainy weather. Our guide says that it rains here about 120 days a year and the other days you get whatever she said. There has to be some snow in there. So, it must be a pretty wet climate.

 

 

I took this picture of the scooters. We have encountered them everywhere. They are a really important mode of transportation for a lot of people. And you better get out of the way when they’re coming. Ha ha

 

this is a sauna. The guide said people come here and use the sauna and then jump into the sea. She said most Finnish people use a sauna about once a week. Many modern apartments have mini saunas in the bathroom. (ignore the raindrops on the window)

 

we passed some condo buildings along the waterfront and the guide said that they are selling for €10,000 per SQ M. 

[DragonOfTheSeas]

The guide says that the Finish archipelago has more than 1000 islands and about 300 of them are here near Helsinki. While it is salt water, it’s not very salty. She says it does not support crabs and lobsters. But there are a lot of fish in the Baltic Sea. 
 

here are some scenes from this morning‘s sail in. You can see some of the smaller islands near the port. . . And of course the sunrise. 
 

 

 

Edited August 6, 2022 by DragonOfTheSeas

[DragonOfTheSeas]

Helsinki doesn’t really have a terminal. These two trailers sell souvenirs and the word Helsinki is written on the port  area.

 

this other building looks like it might be a terminal but I haven’t seen anyone go in it all day long so I didn’t walk over there.

 

there is a U.S worship thats just on the other side of this large pier

 

The HoHo buses came right to the pier

 

 

There some pax that rented scooters 

 

 

Here is a bike tour returning 

 

Edited August 6, 2022 by DragonOfTheSeas