Travel Log – Star Date 3

It’s currently Sunday, May 7th and we are

scooting across the Baltic Sea on the

way to Estonia, Russia and Finland. I’m

falling behind on the log, and we have

six straight days of touring coming up.

We made our much anticipated first

stop in Copenhagen (we’ll be back two

more times). Getting into the city was

easy, after we were tortured with about

a dozen explanations of the options,

most of them contradictory (which was the

norm for the trip). We were dropped of at

the city center where we wandered onto

the maze of streets that zigzagged through

the older section of town, known as the

Storget. Mainly shops of all kinds and price

levels along streets that prohibited cars and

trucks (unless they had business there). The

streets were cobblestoned and most of the

buildings were old and picturesque. Here

and there were historic buildings worth a

photo or two. We found a Synagogue

(closed) and the library (open and with Wi-

Fi). We passed a charming restaurant that

called out to me and I made a note of it to

return for lunch. We did get back there, but

after many turns, it was like maneuvering

through a corn field maze to find it again.

Worth the effort. A bit too chilly to enjoy

the inviting outside seating, but dropping

down the few steps to the inside revealed

even a more delightful setting. I can’t

remember what I had to eat. Judy had an

assortment of treated herrings that was scrumptious, and the dark beers hit the spot.

We recommenced our

walking tour and headed

down to the Nyhavn area,

which is highly touted as a

place to walk, or hang out

with a beer or food at the

half-kilometer long street

that faced an active inset of

the harbor. Very

picturesque and very

crowded. We then took a

different vector to head

back to the general area

where we had started our walk,

and amazingly, found our

intended destination. There was

a unique-looking coffee kiosk

sitting in the plaza and the head-

covered young lady of Indian

descent, who spoke English

without an accent, ground up a

handful of chocolate chips to

make two fresh cups of hot

chocolate, which we consumed

at a table on the plaza (mine

accompanied by a chocolate

croissant).

With re-usable transit tickets, we braved the Copenhagen transit system, taking a subway-type train to

the city’s immense central train station, weaving our way through, and emerging, as intended, across

the street from the famed Tivoli Gardens (a Disney-like park). We’ll save that for our return stop. We

again correctly found our way onto the subway and to a bus stop that was to get us back to the ship.

However, the bus driver (against my doubting his response) told us that his bus was the one to take,

leading a large group of returning passengers to end up at the wrong terminal and wait for another

connecting bus. Not being in a hurry, this was not an issue. Just part of the adventures of wandering out

on one’s own in strange places and foreign-speaking bus drivers.

It seemed a bit strange getting back on the ship, since about half of the passengers had disembarked

and a new assortment of cruisers joined for the next segment. Among them more than the usual

number of younger people and a lot more people from Europe (as one might expect). We are still

continuing to have very interesting and pleasant people at our evening meals. Mostly American or

Canadian, so far. As we scrutinize the menu, there are the usual introductions of names and city of

residence, often with notations of previous areas of habitation. We soon dive right into discussions very

freely, with some early avoidance of political persuasion. It usually doesn’t take too long to get into

depth on several subjects, as if the parties had not been strangers just minutes ago. Working our way

through four courses, deliberately served with delays between each, stretches the meal and discussions

to about two hours. Just part of the typical evening enjoyment.

* * * * *

On Saturday, at 10 AM, we docked at Kiel, Germany. Why? I don’t know. Kiel has a nice port, but it’s not

known for anything of interest tourists. About 90 minutes away is Hamburg. This is a major city, but also,

not for tourists. A couple from Orange County, which I met on-line in planning the cruise, wanted to

share a car rental with us. He made arrangements with Avis and our plan was to drive to Lubeck, a

UNESCO historical city. We did

make it to Lubeck, but not

easily. It took us over 90

minutes to pick up the car and

well over two hours to reach

Lubeck. For some reason, all

the signs pointed to different

areas around Lubeck, but not

to the Centrum, where the old

city was located. After an

unintended diversion to a

neighboring town, we got

directions and stopped at a

small café for lunch. We finally

found the hidden town, which

somehow the rest of the world

had found with ease and the

place was flooded with tourists.

There were several interesting

buildings. But mingled in with

the buildings were all sorts of

modern edifices, primarily

stores for expensive and fancy

merchandise. That surely blew

the atmosphere. We walked

about for a couple of hours,

checking out the old buildings

and observing a horn-blowing

raucous Turkish wedding party, including dancing in the streets. More raucous stuff was going on all

over the area about Kiel, with hundreds of police cars around. Apparently there was a big soccer match

and hoards of drunken fans were letting loose. We eventually made it back to the ship, with only one

wrong turn.

We are in luck. They changed out the piano/violin duo at Adagio and we have a new, delightful couple

(who recognized us from our five-day cruise up to Vancouver last spring). This twosome is really great,

thank goodness. Our new evening schedule is to catch the duo at 6 PM, go to dinner at 6:45 PM, and

return for the duo at 9 PM. That gives us two music sessions and time for a leisurely dinner with

discussion.

Sunday was an “at sea” day, our last for a while. We will be in ports for the next six days. Still trying to

catch up with the log.

At the 2nd music session last night, I got to talking with a woman from the autoharp group (a few are still

on board). She claimed to have won an international competition, twice, and wants to show me how to

play. I’m going to get together with her when we get some time.

* * * * * *

On Monday morning, we pulled

into Tallinn, capital of Estonia.

Tallinn has not one, but two old

towns, and they competed with

each other for several centuries.

We beat another ship into port by

about an hour and for a while, it

wasn’t very crowded. Then, it

seemed, that a few hundred

guided tour groups landed on the

beach and attacked to city. Nevertheless,

both old town sections had an exceptional

array of buildings and our cameras were

busy. We were able to walk to and from

the old towns from the ship and we

headed back after about three hours of

touring. We had our first sunny day in over

a week. With this came some really crisp

air, down to 3 degrees C. That’s a brisk 38

degrees F. Luckily; we had both anticipated

this and brought our winter jackets. There

is a chance of snow at St. Petersburg

tomorrow.

Here’s a few photos of

the highlights. The

outstanding church, in

the upper town is the

Alexander Nevsky

Cathedral. Named for the

Estonian folk hero who

saved the country from

being overrun by an

enemy force over the

frozen turf. The story was

made into a movie and

the music is very

powerful. The first few

photos (pervious page) were

taken from the ship. The last

photo was taken of a guy

with the hand-made broom,

sweeping up in from of his restaurant. The broom shot

is for our family broom expert, Deb.

We are about halfway through the combined cruise,

and head for our furthest east port, St. Petersburg.

We’ll cover our two-day stop in section 4.