Claire left today to fly back to California. On Sunday, we went to CHBC (our church in Washington, D.C.) to say goodbye to our church family and update them on the next phase of our lives. Monday and Tuesday we were in New Jersey with Kristen swapping photos, hanging out, and getting Claire's car. Claire has been a huge help in getting our house unpacked and put together. We still have over a week before Ivan starts work, so we're doing some shopping to get situated in our new place.

Labels: NY

Finally - Homeward Bound! The last 5 weeks have been wonderful - certainly a worthwhile experience - but our next vacation is definitely going to be shorter and more relaxing... a cruise would be nice.

We woke up, had breakfast, got ready to go, and waited for the airport shuttle that we had ordered. It came a little late, but we had planned plenty of time to get to the airport so we weren't worried. We checked in at the hotel (after a small amount of confusion regarding the tickets we had gotten) and were happy to find that, again, we were upgraded to the world traveller plus class! What luxury! I don't think you need business class or first class if you have the large, comfy seats of world traveller plus with the footrests and individual tvs with unlimited movies on demand. The flight from Zurich to Heathrow was short and sweet. The layover in Heathrow was much better than our first time. And the flight to JFK was in a 747 (apparently, Ivan has *always* wanted to fly in a 747 - the big, double-leveled airplanes).

We landed in JFK, caught a cab to get home, and spent our first night in our new apartment in New York. The next few days will be filled with unpacking, going to New Jersey and Washington, D.C. to get our cars the the rest of our belongings that we left behind, and getting settled in.

Labels: Europe 2008, NY

Our last full day in Europe. Man, we are so ready to get back home. We were tired of doing the traditional "tourist" things (museums, looking at architecture, learning about history), so we just took a leisurely stroll through Zurich with Eduard (who had, again, taken the day off work). We walked along the "5th Avenue" of Zurich - where all of the expensive shops are and then got to the main shopping area of the town. We were still on the hunt for Birkenstocks, so we stopped in several stores to look for them. Unfortunately, most stores didn't carry them. In one store, we approached the sandal section in search of the shoes, but didn't see them. Susan asked the sales clerk if they carried Birkenstocks. The woman apologetically said that they didn't carry them and then Claire noticed them on the shelf. When the woman saw what Claire was pointing at, she said: "Oh, 'Byer-kin-shtocks'." - Yeah - apparently we don't pronounce it correctly in English!! They only had one style, which we weren't keen on, so we still didn't end up buying a pair, but we ended up with a good story at the end :)

We walked along the river and went to a few elevated spots with great views of the city. We stopped for lunch at an outdoor biergarten and by mid-afternoon were quite tired. Although we had planned to spend the evening with Eduard again, we were just too tired and decided to call it a day. We returned to the hostel and took naps and then got ready for our big day tomorrow: our trip home!!

Labels: Europe 2008, Switzerland

Susan has decided - she hates Italy and would be perfectly content to never return. Well, maybe that language is too strong, but today we had several misadventures, so that's what's on her mind right now.

The day started out great with a nice buffet breakfast at our hotel. We wanted to get on the road by 10am, but when we went to check out we encountered a problem. We had already paid PriceLine for the hotel, but somehow PriceLine had failed to transfer the money to the hotel, so the hotel was charging us again - and charging a rate that was WAY more than what we had agreed upon via PriceLine. Eventually, after an hour of checking our account on the internet and being on teh phone with PriceLine, we understood what caused the problem, but PriceLine's cusotmer service department wouldn't be open for another 3 hours. We were already getting a later start than we had hoped, so we weren't going to wait around in Milan for PriceLine to open, so we paid the bill and left - hopefully things will go smoothlyt with PriceLine and we'll be refunded later.

The next misadventure was with the toll roads. Unline America, it's not clearly written how much you'll have to pay, so it's a scramble at the last minute to get the right money available. We went to pay one toll and the woman had a problem that we couldn't understand (she didn't speak English) but the end result was that she took an extra 0,55 Euros that she shouldn't have. It was so lame. By the time we realized the error it was too late. At least in Switzerland you just buy a vignette and don't have to worry about paying tolls every few kilometers. And the lines to pay the tolls in Italy are far too long!

Anyways, we arrived in Zurich much later than expected and Ivan's friend, Eduard, had taken all day off work to hang out with us! He was waiting for us when we arrived and helped us return the car. Thankfully, the agent spoke English and we didn't have any problems. Then, we went to Eduard's house for dinner - a traditional Swiss dinner of macaroni, 2 types of Swiss cheese, potatoes, and onions - in a casserole - so delicious!! After dinner we retunred to the hostel and went to bed.

Labels: Europe 2008, Italy, Switzerland

It's official - Susan has her first grey hair. We're calling it the "Europe Hair" as it was no doubt caused by all of the stress that went into planning this trip that we're on right now.

We wanted to leave Venice early today (we're driving to Milan), but we didn't get on the road until about 10:30am. We thought it was supposed to be a 5 hour drive, so we were happy when Daniel said we would arrive by 1pm. However, we hit traffic and then Daniel told us to exit the toll road only to re-enter 3 km later (that's right, slowed down by driving on surface streets AND we had to pay two tolls). In the end, we arrived in Milan around 2pm. We checked into our very nice 4-star hotel (found via PriceLine) and set off for the Duomo. We went inside and Ivan got the audioguide to learn more while Claire and Susan explored some shops (and Susan bought a souvineer notebook). Around 4:30pm we joined up with Ivan's old classmate, Azamat, who showed us around the city and treated us to the typical Italian evening snack: "Macchiato" - a tiny cup of coffee with frothy cream and sugar to taste. It was better than "typical" coffee, but Claire and Susan, with their decidedly "anti-coffee" mindsets weren't won over.

We bid farewell to Azamat, who drove off in an interesting enclosed BMW motorcycle (Ivan thinks he'd like one of those) and then went to a pizza place for dinner. On the way back to our hotel, we bought some ice cream bars for dessert and returned to the hotel to relax and retire at a decent hour.

Labels: Europe 2008, Italy

Last night we had a few interruptions which disturbed our sleep. First, a phone call after we were already asleep from the front desk telling us to be quite (apparently someone had complained about the noise someone else was making and somehow concluded that it was us being too loud). Then, early in the morning a woman came knocking on our door for no apparent reason. However, with all of the shutters closed it was quite and dark, so we were able to sleep in. Susan was the first to wake up and decided to find a market to buy breakfast food. Quite close to our hotel (about a 5 minute walk) is a great little market so we were able to eat a quick breakfast in our hotel room.

After breakfast we went back to St. Mark's in search of an audioguide of the city in English. Unfortunately, they were all sold out, so we just went to the Doge's Palace to learn more about the city. We returned to the hotel for lunch and then went back out to explore the city. Susan was starting to feel under the weather (headache and dizziness) so we concluded she was dehydrated and needed to return to the hotel and call it a day. So, we spent a restful evening in the hotel.

Labels: Europe 2008, Italy

Since we had limited time in Salzburg yesterday due to our late start and last minute scrounging for a hotel, we spent 1/2 of today wandering the streets of Salzburg and discovering new history. Howevr, we had a 5 hour drive to Venice ahead of us, so we left around noon. We drove through the Alps (literally... there's probably 30 km of tunnels between Austria and Italy) and met with a few delays: for 20 minutes we had a read light for one of the tunnels (no idea why) and then in Italy we had to wait in line at the toll booth for an hour because traffic was so backed up.

We decided to park on the island where it's safer and closer to where we were staying and took a water bus to our hotel. Claire had bought some study materials for the Italian language and she had been able to use it a lot (so many people don't speak English here). The hotel (recommended to us by Susan's former roomie, Christine) is nice and we were glad the staff speak English. We checked in and got our bearings and planned out our evening. We consulted Rick Steves and found an inexpensive pizzeria, which turned out to be excellent (thought the service was a bit slot).

We went to St. Mark's Square to find out where we would be going the next day to save time tomorrow. What a difference between night and day of the city. At 10pm, there were still crowds of people on the square, but during the day there are MOBS of people. Claire bought a great mask for her collection and we had a great evening walking around and listening to the live entertainment on the square (every restaurant seems to have a live quartet playing great music).

Labels: Austria, Europe 2008, Italy

Today we headed to Salzburg. We started out with a bit of a scare about the legality of driving in Austria without an international driver's license, so we were delayed while figuring it out. We finally learned that it was OK - the worst that would happen would be a fine, rather than spending the night in jail and getting the car impounded (our worst fears) so we bid farewell to our German relatives and drove to Salzburg. We relied on our GPS system, "Daniel" (named after the voice we prefer to use on the system) and we had an interesting ride. Daniel took us on crazy narrow roads that might have been for pedestrians only. We got a little concerned, so we called the hostel to make sure we were on the right road only to find tha they had given our beds away as a result of a misunderstanding.

By the time we learned that, it was already 2pm on a Saturday in Salzburg during the annual Mozart festival. We called the Tourist Information booth for suggestions on finding a different place to stay only to learn that the city was 99% booked. We called all of the hotels in our Rick Steves book with no luck. Then, we decided to ask Daniel for the hotels in the area and started calling them. We managed to find one that had two double rooms available and they said they would hold them for us for 30 minutes. Well, Daniel said we were only 3 miles away - the hotel was on the other side of the river, so 30 minutes seemed like plenty of time. Little did we know... The route planned out for us by Daniel took us on more crazy narrow roads through ruins and the fortress on top of the hill. There were pedestrians everywhere and not another car in sight. We finally got to the top of a hill that Daniel wanted us to drive down which was clearly not wide enough for our car, so we decided to follow common sense instead of Daniel. We ended up in Mozart Platz which was closed to vehicular traffic in honor of the Mozart Festival. by then, there were a few other cars behind us, so we pulled over, let them pass, and followed them through the crowds and back to normal roads. What an experience!

Eventually we found the hotel (barely within the promised 30 minutes) and checked in. The rooms were a great value - especially since they charged us for a triple room instead of two doubles. Also, it came with a great breakfast with terrific service. We were quite pleased at our change in plans since it was way better than the hostel we were going to stay at and wasn't that much more expensive.

The rest of the evening was spent seeing the city and the Mozart museum. We went to a spagghetti restaurant for dinner and the stumbled upon an outdoor airing of Don Giovanni. We watched it until we were too cold (and a bit put off by the questionable storyline) and then returned to the warmth of our hotel and retired for the evening.

Labels: Austria, Europe 2008

We got up early to set off for Bavarian Castle country. We had purchased our tickets in advance a few days ago and had our first visit around noon. We didn't leave ourself an extra cushion of time, so between rain and an unexpected road closure on our route, we ended up arriving too late. In addition, Susan had forgotten to bring the confirmation number along, so we were concerned that our advanced tickets would not be honored. Thankfully, they just rescheduled our visit for a few hours later and we were on our way without waiting in the long line for those who had not purchased tickets in advance.

It was raining all day and Susan hadn't realized that 3 weeks of walking in her old shoes had left large cracks in the soles - at least she didn't know about them until she stepped outside where her socks were instantly soaked through. It was cold, rainy, and foggy all day, which detracted considerably from the majestic views we were hoping to get of the outside of the castles - especially Neuschwannstein, which is the most famous of all Bavarian castles - the one that the Disney castle is modeled after. The first castle of the day, Hohenschwangau, turned out to be the most rewarding (although least well-known) because the interior was amazing and there was a lot of information provided through the audio tour. Neuschwannstein was quite disappointing - considering that they had 17 years to build it and they only managed to finish a dozen rooms or so. The view from Mary's Bridge is supposed to be amazing, but we just saw white nothingness from the fog.

The next stop on our Bavarian castle tour was Linderhoff. We were told that it was a copy of Versaille, so we were expecting something quite large. It may have been inspired by Versaille (Johan Ludwig was a great admirer or Louis XIV and Louis XV) but it's certainly not a copy. We had a nice tour but then were so tired of the cold and rain that we made a beeline back to our home base for the night where we got warmed up and dried and ate some yummy food.

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

We've spent time over the last few days trying to sort out our rental car situation as it pertains to visiting Italy. After much confusion and hearing different stories depending upon who we called, we decided that it was OK for us to drive to Italy. Consequently, Czech Republic is in the same category as Italy in our rental agreement, so we decided to make a quick trip to Czech today. One of the biggest reasons why rental car companies prefer that you not take their car to Italy and Eastern Europe is the large number of auto thefts in those countries. To diminish that threat, we decided to avoid the traditional tourist towns (namely, Prague) and instead decided to visit the region closer to Germany. It started with a drive through Plzen, a large, unknown town not too far from the German border. Then, after looking at a map we decided to visit a local castle, which turned out to just be a hunting lodge and was more of a large house than what you would normally associate with the word "castle" or "kozel." To get there, we drove on many small, winding roads in the back country of Czech and it was delightful. The scenery was pretty (although not as green as Germany) and the villages were quaint. After parking near the Kozel, we walked up a path to get to our destination and on our way saw a nice lake. We stopped to take photos of the surrounding fauna and were astonished to find Jaws' little brother right there in the lake. In fact, dozens of his little brothers. Dorsal fin and all, cutting through the surface of the water in search of food, and the little buggers couldn't have been more than 6 inches long. It was quite a fascinating sight and we stopped to try to capture it on film. The pictures truly don't reflect the experience of seeing these fish, but we did our best.

We had a tour of the Kozel and it was cozy - some rooms more elaborately decorated than others - and then we got back in the car (which, thankfully, hadn't been stolen) and returned to the safety of Germany. We stopped in Regensburg again with every intention of getting a bite to eat at the ancient bratwurst stand, but due to an embarrassing misunderstanding with the waiter we left without filling our tummies. Which was a good thing, because a wonderful, traditional dinner was waiting for us back at "home" - ham hock and sauerkraut.

Labels: Czech, Europe 2008, Germany

Another day to sleep in followed by a late breakfast with the family. However, today we decided to spend the afternoon in Nurnberg. Of course, we know of Nurnberg from the War Trials after World War II, but we were surprised to learn what a hotbed it was for pro-Nazi activities. We learned all about it at the Nazi Documentation Center (another interesting place that we found courtesy of Rick Steves). We found it to present a lot of information in what seemed to be a very objective, non-biased way - the good, the bad, and the ugly of Nazism, it's birth and death (or at least downfall). It was very interesting to learn what political and social changes were happening to Germany to make it's citizens receptive to the Nazi agenda and to watch interviews of people from all sides of the political spectrum who lived through those times. We stayed until closing time and then, of course, paid a visit to the famous court house. It's still in use and is closed to the public, so we only saw the outside. Finally, we returned "home" for another delicious dinner with the family. Unfortunately, the dinner table became somewhat hostile as a political debate developped (we do not have the same political perspective as our German relatives) and things rapidly developped into a loud disagreement. Eventually, things calmed down and we were able to go to sleep with no hard feelings (I hope).

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

We slept in and had a traditional continental breakfast with the family. We finally realized how the term "Continental" breakfast came into being - it's basically a buffet of bread, meat, cheese, and fruit - and is so named because that's what people in continental Europe eat, as opposed to the heartier hot breakfasts eaten in England. Who knew?

We went to Regensburg to see the town (lots of churches, a river, and a 1700 year old bratwurst stand). We got some great Italian sorbet and then returned "home" for another relaxing evening.

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

We all slept in, had a late breakfast, and then bid adieu. We went back to Heidelberg to see the castle and stop in a few souvineer shops we had seen along the way. Afterwards, we departed for our relative's house in Bavaria. ALong the way, we stopped for a snack at a bakery in a very small town off the highway. We had fun trying to communicate with the owner, who didn't speak any English. In the end, we all got tasty food and had a good laugh!

We arrived at our relative's house in the evening and had a delightful time. The family consists of Grandpa, parents, and two children (an 18 year old son and 9 year old daughter). We only saw the son once during our visit, but the rest of the family was around most of the time and we really enjoyed spending time with them.

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

We got up relatively early again (7am), ate breakfast, packed up, and set off for Heidelberg, where we met up with Ivan's schoolmates. The drive was beautiful and it was exhilerating to travel on the autobahn, though we certainly weren't the fastest ones on the road. We saw numerous signs for turnoffs to historic places on the way, but wanted to spend as much time as possible with Ivan's friends, so we decided not to stop. We arrived at Johann and Julia's house for lunch and then were joined by another classmate, Vitaliy, who drove down from Frankfurt. Together we went to Heidelberg where we waleked through old town (the largest pedestrian walk in Europe, or so we were told) and went for a boat ride on the Rhine. We had dinner in a delightful restaurant and returned to Johann and Julia's where we spent the night. Us ladies retired around midnight while the guys stayed up until 3am!

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

We decided to get up early to try to get tickets to see the Historic Green Vault (they only give out 200 tickets each day). To get there fast, we borrowed bikes again and rode into town. We only had to wait in line for 45 minutes and we were still among the first 50 in the door - not at all as crowded as we expected, though perhaps the rain had something to do with that.

The treasures in the vault were incredible and we are all very glad we were able to go (it was Claire's suggestion - Ivan and Susan were hoping to take a train to Prague, but the visit to the Vault was amazing). You aren't allowed to take any pictures inside, so the best we have is one postcard we bought of the emerald collection (our birthstone - yes, all 3 of us were born in May!!). We also got a day pass for the rest of the museums and palaces, so we spent most of the day in the old town.

We took a break for lunch of bratwurst at a street stand and in the evening returned to the hostel for a tasty dinner of ravioli, grilled cheese, and (for Ivan) tuna. We spent some time on the computer (downloading Claire's photos and recording some expenses) and went to bed at 10pm. Susan was moved from the co-ed room she had last night into the girls only room with Claire and it was considerably quiter (probably because the windows were mostly closed) so at least the girls got a better night's sleep.

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

Mental Note: Stick to rental car companies in the center of the city. Yeah. They don't all speak English in the suburbs.

Ivan and Susan woke up early to go to the EuropCar office to pick up our car. Our first problem was that the guy helping us didn't speak English. Eventually, a woman who spoke English helped us and we learned our second problem was that the car they had for us couldn't be driven to Zurich (it was too many kilometers to put on the car) even though our reservation clearly said we would be dropping it off in Zurich. So, they had to have a car driven to us from another location, which delayed us by over an hour. When the car finally came, it seemed to be an upgraded version and they told us we couldn't take it to Italy, although our reservation specifically said we could go to Italy. We still need to get that sorted out, but we were just too glad to get the car and be on our way that we didn't want to bring it up at the time.

We drove back to the hotel to collect our belongings and Claire, got lunch at the Kebap stand, and drove to Dresden. In Dresden, we stayed at a great hostel. We were able to borrow bikes for free and spent the evening on a bike tour of the city (guided by Rick Steves). We had dinner at a soup restaurant and returned to the hostel for a decent bed time. Unfortunately, although there are many nice things about the hostel, quietness at night is NOT one of them. The hostel backs up to a few bars and the noise throughout the night made for difficult sleeping.

Labels: Europe 2008, Germany

Today we slept in (Hurrah!). We had planned to see the DDR museum in the early afternoon and the German History Museum in the evening - the tour guide yesterday said that it and all other state museums were free on Thursday from 6-10pm. We arrived at the DDR museum with a large crowd of others, so we decided to get ice cream instead because the museum was really crowded. After we finished our ice cream, we took a bus around the city with the intention of taking the self-guide Rick Steves bus tour. However, when the bus got to the Reichstag we saw that the line wasn't very long (probably because it was SO hot today) so at the last minute we jumped off the bus to visit the Reichstag. It was very hot, but we only had to wait 30 minutes (usually the wait is 1+hrs). We got a great view of the city and learned some more history.

Afterwards, we had some time to kill before the museums were open for free, so we went to another local restaurant (recommended by Rick Steves) which was pretty good (but also more expensive). Ivan ordered the schnitzel; Susan tried the jager sausage (with spagghetti); and Claire had another type of sausage. All of the food was very tasty and very German.

At 6pm, we went to the German History Museum only to find - to our dismay - that it closed at 6pm and wasn't participating in the free museum activities. We had all been looking forward to that museum the most and were disappointed that we missed out in our attempt to save a few Euros. Instead, we went to the new museum where the Egyptian display is and saw Nephratitit's head (among other things). We stopped at a coffee shop on our way home (and a Birkenstock store - though we didn't find anything we liked) and then went back to the hotel to pack most of our stuff and prepare for the next leg of our journey which begins tomorrow.

Labels: Berlin, Europe 2008, Germany

We awoke in time for the 10am walking tour with the "Original Berlin Walk" (recommended by Rick Steves). It was fantastic, but we got so much more out of it having done the Rick Steves self-guided tour first. Probably 1/2 of the tour were places we had seen yesterday, but we learned so much more history from our guide today. However, after 3 1/2 hours of walking, we were all pretty tired by the end. We went to the kebap stand by our hotel for a fabulous lunch of Donner Normal sandwiches (a cheap and tasty middle eastern / Mediterranean food) and returned to the hotel for rest and internet use.

In the afternoon, we went back out on the town to take in more sights. We were pretty interested in the Check Point Charlie museum, but we decided to divide and conquer: Claire went to the museum while Ivan and Susan took a look at Ku'Damm and Potsdammer Platz (the "Times Square" of Berlin). After Claire was done with the museum she told us many of the amazing stories she learned of how creatively people attempted to escape from the East. The successful stories were very exciting and the unsuccessful stories were heartbreaking. We enjoyed some refreshing ice cream on the street and then returned to our hotel where we retired relatively early.

Labels: Berlin, Europe 2008, Germany

Off for Berlin... But first, sometime between 1am and 4am, the storm knocked out the electricity to our cottage (yes, even though there's no running water, there is... correction, was... electricity). It made things much more difficult to get ready for the day and especially to clean up after ourselves, but we did our best to leave the cottage as clean as possible.

We first drove to the port where Ivan's parents will be leaving in the evening and then returned the rental car. During our flight to Berlin, a problem was discovered in-flight, which required us to turn back for Helsinki after about 30 minutes in the air. However, about 20 minutes later, the problem was resolved and we were able to turn back around. The pilots made up most of the lost time and we managed to arrive in Berlin only 15 minutes late. The landing was a bit of a hair raiser as the plane kept rocking back and forth and the land was approaching awfully fast. Still, the pilots managed to pull off a safe landing and everyone lived happily ever after.

In the airport, we collected our luggage, bought a map, and found public transportation to the hotel (later we learned about a group day pass, but not before we spend 6.30 Euros getting to the hotel). We disembarked the tram at the specified stop, but there were unable to find the hotel from the directions given. Thankfully, with the help of two very nice German ladies (who didn't seem to speak any English), we were pointed in the right direction and were happy to finally arrive. The staff of the hotel was very friendly, helpful, and spoke excellent English.

We napped and found a fantastic restaurant (reccommended by Rick Steves) for a traditional German dinner (schnitzel, meatballs, etc) and then took a walking tour of the city (again, with the help of Rick Steves). We were able to get familiar with the lay of the land and the public transportation system and decided to take a guided tour tomorrow morning.

We returned to our hotel (which was quite nice, although the room was very small for three people) and got a good night's sleep.

Labels: Berlin, Europe 2008, Germany

Today Claire and Susan are leaving again, but this time to visit some long-time friends who are missionaries in Tampere. We awoke early and made the drive in fairly good time (about 3 hours). We left early enough to avoid rush hour in Helsinki and were in Tampere in time for lunch. We have known the couple that we visited, Tom and Linda, since 1994, when they were on forlough in the Sacramento area and their youngest daughter, Liisa, was in Susan's class at Victory Christian High School.

We spent several hours catching up with them and looking at family photos (particularly those of their two daughters' weddings) before starting a load of laundry (oh, what a joy that was!!) and hitting the town. We went out for lunch where Claire and Susan ordered some traditional Finnish food which we shared (reindeer stew and meatballs). Then we saw the city (and had some great donuts) before returning to their house to hang out some more. We asked Linda for recipes for some of the great dishes we've had, including Russian Bliniy and Finnish Rice Pies (with egg butter). We had a great dinner followed by tea and sweets (and yodeling... the "Zillertaler Schurzenjager" - Tom's favorite group!). We left in the evening and, after our long drive, made it back to the cottage around midnight.

We sorted our belongings and packed as much as we could in anticipation of an early departure tomorrow.

Labels: Europe 2008, Finland

Tallinn has truly been a delightful city with so much history to learn. Both the Tallinn History Museum and the Estonian History Museum, which we visited yesterday helped us understand the perspective of the Estonian people, who are actually some of the most forward-thinking of Eastern Europe (in our opinion, at least).

Today, we slept in again, had a casual breakfast, and then Risto took us back to the port where we caught our ferry back to Helsinki. After last night's rain, the water in the Gulf of Finland was much choppier on this crossing than last, and the crew kept circling the cabin, distributing bags for those who looked close to losing their lunch. Susan started feeling a bit queasy, so she had to lay down for awhile and eventually felt much better.

Ivan and his parents met us at the port in Helsinki and drove us back to the cottage where we caught up and relaxed at home.

Labels: Estonia, Europe 2008

We slept in and had a wonderful breakfast and then Risto and his family took us into Tallinn for more sightseeing. We went to Kadriorg, where there are several beautiful buildings (palaces) built by Peter the Great. Then we went to the Tallinn Song Festival Grounds, where we learned all about the Singing Revolution, which is credited with how Estonia was able to gain it's independence while avoiding much bloodshed. Then Risto and his family went to a birthday party while we spent more time in old town, visiting more museums, a Dominican Monastery (where we now have free admission for life), the Town Hall Square, and the Holy Ghost Church. In the evening, we returned to Risto's house, where we had another relaxing evening.

Labels: Estonia, Europe 2008

Kristen flies home today and then Claire and Susan go to Estonia by ferry. Kristen's flight leaves at 8am, so we had to wake up at 4:15am and leave the cottage at 4:45am. Ivan drove and we made great time to the airport. We gassed up the car and then Ivan dropped us off at the boat terminal (after dropping off Kristen). We arrived early and waited outside until they opened the terminal at 7am. We checked in and then went across the street to a market to buy some food to eat (we were already hungry since we had eaten "breakfast" almost 3 hours ago). We each got a pastry plus a rice pie for a snack later.

We returned to the terminal to wait for our boarding time. The tickets we had purchased were "super economy" which we weren't sure how they were different from economy (except for being much cheaper). Susan thought it meant that we wouldn't have seats, but when we got in we sat in some seats and no one said anything or checked our tickets. As a result, it was a very comfortable ride.

We hadn't done any research about Estonia or Tallinn, so when we arrived we were absolutely clueless about what to see and where to go. We also had no idea that Estonia, while in the EU, uses Kroons instead of Euros as the official currency. We weren't sure how easy it would be to find a money exchange booth in the city, so we went ahead and changed $40 in the boat terminal. What a rip off! But at least we had some Kroons, so we set off to continue our journey. The terminal had large lockers where we stowed our bags and many promotional maps about the city. None of them were ideal tourist maps (they were either listing all restaurants or stores or only a subset of the sights) but, by consulting all of them, we were able to get a pretty clear picture of the city (or at least old town and downtown).

We set off towards the highest spire that we could see from the water (which turned out to be St. Olaf's Church - I think) and in the process we walked past "Fat Margaret," a few old towers, part of the old wall, and the two main streets in town (translated, their names mean "Wide" and "Long"). What a great way to start our sightseeing in Tallin! We were able to climb to the top of the tower at St. Olaf's (we heard someone say that it was over 700 steps to the top - and I believe it!) and from there we got some magnificent views of the city. It helped us orient ourselves with the maps we had and plan the next leg of our journey.j

By thte end of the day, we had walked the length and breadth of the old town twice and felt quite comfortable navigating on our own. We visited sights such as the Nevskiy Cathedral, Kiek in de Kok, Herman Tower, Toompea Castle, and several museums.

One minor hicup in our plans was that Susan's cell phone wouldn't work in Estonia, so we had to buy a phone card to use the public phones to contact the family that we would be staying with. Eventually, everything worked out and we arragned the time and place to meet Risto, Ivan's former classmate with whom we were staying.

One highlight of our day was a great find - we stumbled upon a small cafe in search of a Water Closet. We went down into an underground street crossing and found a hole-in-the-wall place selling inexpensive food. We decided to "play it safe" and ordered a hamburger and were pleasantly suprised: it was huge, delicious, and very unlike any American hamburger we had ever eaten before. Instead of lettuce, it had cabbage; instead of pickles, it had cucumbers; instead of mayo/ketchup, it had a sauce similar to 1000 Island dressing; and instead of a beef patty, it had a breaded patty made out of white meat. Although it may seem anti-climactic to order a hamburger in Estonia, it was really a delightful cultural experience!

In the evening, we met up with Risto and he drove us to his home, tucked away in the countryside, not far from the village of Koogi (I think?) - the oldest village in Estonia. It was so peacheful and beautiful at Risto and Angela's house, which is situated on a nice plot of land overlooking the Gulf of Finland. They have their own dock and a small boat that can be used to go out into the water. The water in the gulf stays quite shallow for many meters, so they take the boat out to swim and fish, rather than wading out to a suitable depth.

Their house is large, beautiful, and modern (it was built last year) with an abundance of Siberian Larch wood. We foudn their home to be a restful and pleasant change from the last few days spent "roughing it" in the cottage near Porvoo. We had "family dinner" with Risto, ANgela, and Risto's family (sister, parents, grandmother) who live next door, and afterwards Tristan (Risto's son) helped his "Mama" (grandmother) pick berries for us. All-in-all, we agree that this has been one of the most enjoyable days of our trip so far. The only thing that could have made it better would have been for Ivan to be there with us (he is in Finland with his parents).

Labels: Europe 2008, Finland