I need a vacation!!

[Earniel]

Very pretty photo's, RÃ*an.

Maybe if mine get printed I'll scan one or two from Corsica.

[Rían]

please do - it looks like a very interesting place!

[Valandil]

Oooo I hate that! I just did a big post about my vacation and it didn't take!

Maybe I'll try again later.

[Rían]

Argh! *sympathy to Val*

hope you're having a nice time

[Artanis]

Lovely pics RÃ*an!

Tip of the day to Val - write large posts in a text editor and SAVE your work - before you post.

[Rían]

thanks - I wish I could get the img tags to work, tho!

[Spock]

I still have problems with them.

[Rían]

dumb image tage...

[Artanis]

I have been on a trip around the Baltic Sea/Bay of Finland this summer. Tallinn, St.Petersburg, Helsinki and Stockholm.

St. Petersburg is a lovely city with its canals, bridges, cathedrals, and all the monumental, historical buildings. But bring mosquito protection! Those evil insects were a true plague at night.

[Spock]

How was St. Petersburg and Tallinn. We're looking at a cruise that goes to both for next summer. You can post or PM, I'd really appreciate your input.

[Rían]

Arty, your link put me to Gmail (Google mail) and it wanted a password

[Artanis]

Originally Posted by RÃ*an

Arty, your link put me to Gmail (Google mail) and it wanted a password

That's what I was afraid of. I'll have to remove the link.

[Artanis]

Originally Posted by Spock

How was St. Petersburg and Tallinn. We're looking at a cruise that goes to both for next summer. You can post or PM, I'd really appreciate your input.

I'll come back to you Spock, right now I'm a little busy. I'll post a report from Tallinn and St.Pete's later.

[Spock]

thanks.

[Artanis]

Let's see if this link works better ... this is mostly pics from the old town.
Tallinn July 2005

We spent 3 days in Tallinn and they were good days. Our hotel host met us at Tallinn airport and gave us a perfect start of our vacation with his jovial and yet effective appearance. His name was Romeo, though his looks did not suit that name, poor guy. His son and daughter were waiting for us outside the hotel (this was a small family run hotel). They all offered us their very best service during our stay. The son resembled his father, but the daughter was young and pretty, and she was dressed in a way that revealed more than it covered, to my husbands great pleasure. The apartment was a pleasant surprise, much larger than we expected and with a big bubblebath which made the kids scream of joy.

We expected Estonians to look like Slavs, but most of them were surprisingly resembling Nordic people. Their language is very similar to Finnish, so my small Finnish vocabulary turned out to be quite useful. But I did not have to speak Finnish on many occasions, most people spoke English fairly well, especially the younger, and they spoke a decent German also. That's not more than we expected, in a city like Tallinn with hords of tourists every summer. We asked our Romeo about how many people were living in Tallinn, and he said with a little wink: 500,000 and the double during summer. He was exaggerating of course, but there really was a LOT of tourists around in the old town.

We spent one day at the Piriti beach, which was large and nice, but perhaps a tad too crowded to our liking. There was a playground for the children, and there was also a parallell bar, a high bar and rings which offered the local young men the opportunity to show off their muscles and gymnastic abilities, to the great pleasure of all the ladies around, including me. There was also a large pier at one end of the beach, from there one could look across the bay to see Tallinn skyline, with its modern square buildings to the left and the old town with its cathedrals and church towers to the right. A nice and rather uncommon sight, I think.

On my birthday we explored the old town, which is very well preserved. Tallinn is an old medieval city, a fact which the Estonians have not failed to display to the tourists. In the old town there were numerous people selling souvenirs and postcards, all dressed up medieval style. There were medieval restaurants, medieval food and medieval music. It was a little too much - nice to begin with but after the first day it gets tiring. There were also a lot of ateliers and small shops where one could buy artsy glasswork and other sorts of handicrafts. We did not explore any of those shops because we didn't dare to bring 3 kids in among all this fragile goods.

Tallinn was also once a Hanseatic city, just like Bergen was on the west coast of Norway, and we could see numerous references to this strong German influence in many historical buildings. The old town was well preserved, with its old houses, churches, and part of its surrounding wall and towers of stone. We had a closer look inside at both the orthodox Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, the catholic St. Michaels's church (Niguliste) and the lutheran St.Olavs church (Ulemiste). Orthodox churches are always such a pleasure to be inside, with their colourful mosaic, fragrances and candle-lights. I think it was a funny detail that the catholic Niguliste was built in connection with the city wall and did originally also serve as a fortress. The lutheran Ulemiste had once the highest church tower in Medieval Europe, a tower that is now open to the public. Of course we had to climb up there. :-) (Hear that Gordy? One just has to climb up! ) The view over the sea and the city was great.

We often heard Russian be spoken around us. These people were not tourists but Russian citizens of Tallinn. 25% of the people in Estonia are Russians, they are thus the largest minority there. Russians and Estonians seem to live together peacefully today, which is quite impressing when we know that it has only been 14 years since the occupation by the USSR came to an end. But the reseptionist at our hotel was concerned when she heard that we were going on to Russia. I think she had some belief that every Russian was a crook. The last thing she said to us was: "Be careful in Russia".

[Artanis]

Here are pictures from St. Petersburg.

St.Petersburg July 2005
The State Hermitage

The journey from Tallinn to St.Petersburg was an experience in itself. We went by coach - a night trip - I didn't expect any sleeping comfort. But in the end we ended up with almost no sleep at all. First it was the roads, they were of the humpety-bumpety type. It didn't make things any better that the coach itself was constantly swaying from side to side, well helped by the driver who seemed to be trying to break the speed record and didn't miss any opportunity to drive past other cars.

The journey was scheduled to 8 hours, which hubby and I thought was far too much for the distance. But we hadn't taken into account the Procedure Of Crossing The Border. The whole thing took at least two hours. Collecting all passports, handing out immigration forms, getting our passports back. In between there was waiting, waiting and more waiting. At last everyone had to get out of the coach, collect all our luggage and walk through another passport, visa and customs control. Hubby and I was carrying one large rucksack and one sleeping child each, along with a couple of handbags. The police officers were smiling at us. I think we looked pretty much like ... foreigners.

St.Petersburg is perhaps the most western-oriented city in Russia, but in spite of this there are very few people who speak English there. Even the sight-seeing trips on the river Neva and the canals were held in Russian only. Also, all street names, metro station names, signs and maps are written in Russian, with Russian letters, so in order to find your way it's a good idea to learn at least some letters of the Russian alphabet before going there. It is easy to get confused, because some of the letters look like ours but denotes another sound. Thus, the name of the river Neva as we would write it, the Russians would write Heba, and Russia is written Puccna. We managed well because my husband had once been in the USSR many years ago and he knew how to read the letters. Now I have learned them too.

I had heard people tell that St.Petersburg is a beautiful city, and I agree if we are talking about the city centre. From what we could observe from the coach trip into the city, the suburbs still are the same as in the time of the old USSR, with grey, depressingly boxy and badly kept houses, dirty streets and poor people. But the city centre is full of huge, monumental buildings, parks, beautiful cathedrals and churches, the lovely canals and the river Neva with its bridges that are lifted every night.

We stayed in St.Petersburg for 4 days which I felt was not enough, partly because we spent one day at an amusement park some way outside the city to please the children. Fair enough since they had endured to them boring visits to the Hermitage and cathedrals and such stuff. The Hermitage, the winter palace of the Tsar family, is really a must for every tourist, and for locals too for that matter. I did not know, but it is like the Vatican Museum or Louvre, you can spend the whole day there and still not be able to cover everything you want to see. I had quite a few precious moments looking at paintings of van Gogh, Monet, Cezanne, Renoir and more.

I would recommend a visit to St. Isaac's Cathedral, the interior is lovely, also the dome is open to the public and a climb up there is absolutely required. The stair is long and steep (think about the stairs of Cirith Ungol ) but it is worth the labour. The view is fantastic! I would also recommend the boat trips, even if they only speak Russian there. It is a comfortable way to get around and see as much of the city as possible, and equipped with a map you can be your own guide.

I also had the utter pleasure of watching a ballet performance at the Mariinsky theatre (Kirov). That is something I have dreamed of since I was very young, to sit in that beautiful theatre, feeling the atmosphere and watching the scene that has fostered such great dancers as Pushkin, Nureyev and Baryshnikov. I can now confirm that they are still producing excellent dancers there.

Another nice thing to do is to walk down the Nevski Prospect, the main street. There you can go shopping, admire the canals on your way, take a coffee or a quick bite in one of the cafes or just sit and watch all the different people passing by. I was amazed by some of the Russian women, especially the younger, who dress up with short skirts, fluffy blouses and high heels, and plenty of makeup. Even mothers accompanying their small kids to the playground or in the amusement park were dressed like that. In my eyes they were all looking as if they were going to a party. In Norway, women are dressed much more according to the situation.

We had an interesting experience just on the Nevski Prospect. A group of perhaps 12-14 people, mostly elderly women, were demonstrating outside one of the largest department stores. These people were communists who seem to want to get back to the old times, which I can understand because many Russians are much poorer now than before, and the demonstrants' appearance suggested that this was indeed the case with them. But they were carrying large posters of Josef Stalin, and were paying homage to him, and I find that a little horrible. But Russia should be a democracy now, so they are entitled to express their views, of course.

Then there is the two-prize-system. Just because you are a foreigner you will find that you have to pay up to 3 times more than the Russians when you are buying things like tickets to the theatres or museums, or photo permissions and so on. This is not an attempt to cheat you, it is founded legally and one just has to accept it. After all, the majority of the tourists are much better off anyway than the average Russian.

At last perhaps the most important thing: Bring mosquito protection!!! Especially if you're staying near a canal, or any water. It cannot be enough emphasized. St.Petersburg is built on a swamp. It is the ideal environment for those evil, evil insects. Without protection in the summer nights you either close your bedroom windows and get your sleep ruined by bad air and the heat, or you open the windows and get your sleep ruined by buzzing, biting mosquitos.

(This must be the longest post I've ever written )

[Lenya]

Wow! Stunning pictures. I love the Orthodox cathedral by the Griboyedova canal, it's beautiful.

[Rían]

Originally Posted by Artanis

I also had the utter pleasure of watching a ballet performance at the Mariinsky theatre (Kirov). That is something I have dreamed of since I was very young, to sit in that beautiful theatre, feeling the atmosphere and watching the scene that has fostered such great dancers as Pushkin, Nureyev and Baryshnikov.

I've always wanted to do that, too! Wow!

Nice pictures, Arty - and you are just so cute!

[Spock]

Artanis, you wrote: The lutheran Ulemiste had once the highest church tower in Medieval Europe, a tower that is now open to the public. Of course we had to climb up there. :-) =how high, how many steps, if you remember. I want to compare it to some sites I've climbed in other countries.
BTW thanks so much, the photos tell of marvelous cities and your narrative implores me to visit.

[Artanis]

Thanks Lenya and RÃ*an.

Spock, the tower was 120 metres high, but the platform to where we could climb up was only 60 metres. I don't know how many steps it was, but lets say each step was about 25 centimeters, then it would be approximately 240 steps.