Cruising is so much more enjoyable when shared with family or friends. This time we cruised the Baltic Sea with 4 of our American friends - 2 couples. I used to work with 3 of these friends during my 2 year US military posting in 2002-2003. The 6 of us did a Caribbean cruise together 4 years ago, and at that time, we planned this cruise! We just needed the 4 years to save up our dollars!
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| At Kim's welcome |
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| Kim with her chicks waiting for the bus! |
Jenny and Peter flew with us to Copenhagen where we were met by my daughter Kim, accompanied by stunning weather. How wonderful to see a familiar face so far from home. A few hours later our American friends Jan, Dick, Rainie and Tom joined us at Kim's home for welcome drinks and nibbles. Thanks Kim. After our welcome refreshments, we were shepherded to the bus like chicks by Mother hen (Kim) to have dinner at the fabulous Torvehallerne Markets - a tempting array of food and drinks to suit all palates.
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| Jen, Peter, Jan, Murray, Kim, me Dick (Rainie and Tom MIA) |
No rest for the wicked, the next morning Kim showed us around her city - we visited The Little Mermaid, saw the changing of the guard at 'our' Princess Mary's Amalienborg Castle, and had a very Danish lunch in picturesque Nyhavn. See photo at right. From there we had a gentle stroll through the city, dropped in to check out a few stores including the amazing Lego store, then finally arrived at Tivoli - the second oldest amusement park in the world. Our Danish friends Sine, Adam and Sarah (they had Christmas with us in Australia) met us for dinner at a swish restaurant in the park, and then several of the group tried out some of the rides. As dusk set in, the lights came on around the park and it was so pretty.
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| Murray, Trish, Jan and Dick in front of our Royal Caribbean ship 'Serenade of the Seas' |
The next day Kim had arranged a very Danish buffet brunch at a restaurant not far from where we were due to board our cruise ship and before we knew it, we said our goodbyes to Jenny and Peter (who flew home to Australia 2 days later) and we were off on our 7 day cruise. Our cabins were on the 8th deck, and each had a balcony. Our bed and shower on the ship were among the best we had experienced during our 5 weeks of travel around Europe. There was a bit of a mix-up with our dinner table, and fortuitously, we ended up sharing with two delightful gals from Georgia - Susan and Gayle, and a husband, wife and her sister (Bob, Karen and Jan) from Texas. Susan has since sent me her favourite chicken enchilada recipe, and so I am keen to try it out when I get home.
Our first port of call was Stockholm - a very pretty city and home to the Vasa Museum - we called in there to see the preserved 64-gun warship from the 17th Century that had sunk on its maiden voyage in 1628 and remained underwater for 300 years. It has been painstakingly restored and the museum was built around it.
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| Replica model of the Vasa |
The next stop was Tallinn, Estonia. We decided to do our own thing and caught the red hop-on, hop-off bus, and ended up in the 'old town' - a quaint, medieval village where we wandered for hours amongst cobblestoned lanes and marvelled at the orthodox churches. We came around a corner and found ourselves in the old market square where I was immediately tempted by the array of colourful scarves - I just had to buy one to take home as a souvenir. The weather was beautiful, which made my photos more picturesque!
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| Sweet Estonian lady selling me the scarf |
St Petersburg was never on my radar as a city to visit, but the 6 of us did an 8 hour tour there, and it was very memorable. The Hermitage Museum was mind boggling, but there is no way you could visit that museum without using a guide - you would walk straight past Leonardo Da Vinci's first painting - painted when he was 13 years old - Madonna and Child. Also Rueben's first painting Union of Earth and Water. We had 1.5 hours in there, but to do it justice, you probably need several visits - after all, it is one of the oldest and largest museums in the world. It was founded by Catharine the Great in 1764 - and holds over 3 million items. The chandeliers alone were stunning…
Russian couples come to St Petersburg to marry - 3,000 weddings are held EVERY day of the week during summer. Most of the churches we saw from the outside, but we did go inside the Cathedral of our Lady of Kazan, built in 1811 - my photos just could not do it justice - the mosaics inside were amazing. We heard the story of how Alexander the Great was slain by his son in 1881, who then had a church built in 1883 on the site where his father was slain - and named Church of Saviour on Spilled Blood. The colourful tiles on the domes at the top were very eye-catching.
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| Church of Saviour on Spilled Blood - St Petersburg - site where Alexander the Great was slain by his own son |
Our last port of call was Helsinki, Finland. Once again, we did our own thing, and caught a shuttle into town with Jan and Dick. We set off at a cracking pace to visit the Temppeliaukio or Rock Church - build into solid rock but bathed in natural light due to a skylight - my directions were a bit off skew and we found we were heading in the wrong direction. We righted our compasses, ably assisted by Dick, and eventually found our way inside, and consequently added several thousand steps to our daily step tally.
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| Inside Rock Church - you may have to click on this panorama- hard to capture the view |
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| Lutheran Cathedral Helsinki |
The cruise was a lovely opportunity for us 3 girls to catch up - we had several games of rummicub together, so that I could keep up my skills for when I return to Ballina and play the weekly game with my aunt Dympna, friend Mary and not forgetting our church Deacon Vitalis!
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| Jan, Trish and Rainie |
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| Rummicubbing! |
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| Group at final cruise dinner. |
Before we knew it, the cruise was over, and we found ourselves at the Copenhagen airport. To soften the blow, Kim came in to spend a few hours with us at the airport as we waited for our flight to London. We had fun taking silly pictures with a new app she had on her iPhone. I'll sign off with them…
Cruising is so much more enjoyable when shared with family or friends. This time we cruised the Baltic Sea with 4 of our American friends - 2 couples. I used to work with 3 of these friends during my 2 year US military posting in 2002-2003. The 6 of us did a Caribbean cruise together 4 years ago, and at that time, we planned this cruise! We just needed the 4 years to save up our dollars!
Our first port of call was Stockholm - a very pretty city and home to the Vasa Museum - we called in there to see the preserved 64-gun warship from the 17th Century that had sunk on its maiden voyage in 1628 and remained underwater for 300 years. It has been painstakingly restored and the museum was built around it.
The next stop was Tallinn, Estonia. We decided to do our own thing and caught the red hop-on, hop-off bus, and ended up in the 'old town' - a quaint, medieval village where we wandered for hours amongst cobblestoned lanes and marvelled at the orthodox churches. We came around a corner and found ourselves in the old market square where I was immediately tempted by the array of colourful scarves - I just had to buy one to take home as a souvenir. The weather was beautiful, which made my photos more picturesque! 
St Petersburg was never on my radar as a city to visit, but the 6 of us did an 8 hour tour there, and it was very memorable. The Hermitage Museum was mind boggling, but there is no way you could visit that museum without using a guide - you would walk straight past Leonardo Da Vinci's first painting - painted when he was 13 years old - Madonna and Child. Also Rueben's first painting Union of Earth and Water. We had 1.5 hours in there, but to do it justice, you probably need several visits - after all, it is one of the oldest and largest museums in the world. It was founded by Catharine the Great in 1764 - and holds over 3 million items. The chandeliers alone were stunning…
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