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Published: August 19th 2009
Well, I am now in Bangkok! The first leg of my trip is over, so I thought it was about time I updated this blog....and I think it might be a long one cos we did a lot of stuff on our Northern Adventure (as Chris called it)!!!
So, I'd better start form the beginning. Helsinki was lovely and our hotel was very nice (a converted prison!). We visited Suomenlinna Islands, which is a fortress and world heritage site and Chris had a reindeer sandwich (while I sang Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer at him to try to put him off it....which didn't work). We went to a couple of museums and churches and had a walk by the harbour. It was quite a nice city with some pretty buildings.
We got the hydrofoil to Tallinn in Estonia and I really enjoyed Tallinn, my favorite place so far I think. The old town was so pretty, lots of cobbled streets and old buildings and little alleyways! It was much cheaper than Helsinki too!! We went to the Design Museum on our first day and that was really good - lots of Estonian jewellery, which was nice! We did the free walking tour, which was good cos she told us lots of interesting stories about about the buildings and churches (there are a lot for such a small town and all completely different!) and took us to all of the interesting sites and view points.
From Tallinn, we hired a car and drove to Lahemaa National Park, about an hour and a half away. It was a bit weird at first, driving on the wrong side of the car on the wrong side of the road, but I got used to it! The place we stayed was really cool too - it was a log cabin in the national park right by the beach!!! It was nice to have a bit of a relax while we were here, despite being attacked by mosquitoes every night! We went to the beach and saw lots of eratic boulders and some lighthouses, visited some manor houses, had a walk in the forest and saw little frogs and lizards and we heard a woodpecker and felt it on the tree, but unfortunately we couldn't see it. We also walked the beaver trail and saw a few beaver dams!
We got an overnight bus from Tallinn to St. Petersburg, which, looking back, may have not been the best idea. It left at 11pm and we had about 2 and a half hours of driving to the Russian border. It then took another 2 and a half hours to get to the other side! We had to have our passports checked against Interpol on the Estonian side first, after waiting ages for the coach in front to be done, then we had to get off the coach, collect our luggage and walk across the border with it. At the Russian side we spent ages waiting for us each to be let though and the guard spent a LONG time looking at my passport photo (I guess I must look quite different with unstraightened hair!!!). The journey to St. Petersburg from there wasn't very nice either, the roads were really bad, so it was really bumpy and we hardly slept at all. It was quite daunting when we arrived too, partly because it was 6.30am and we had had very little sleep, but all the signs were in Russian and nobody spoke any English. Somehow we managed to get the Metro (which is very posh, lots of marble pillars and wooden escalators and old-style lamps!) and found our hostel (we've downgraded a bit since Helsinki!!). It's got a bit less daunting since then though. The more 'touristy' areas have some English signs and menus and they speak some English too. We've managed to see quite a lot too - Peter and Paul Fortress with the cannon firing ceremony, we've walked across the bridge and saw the St. Petersburg skyline, we went to the Russian Museum and the Church of our Saviour on Spilled Blood (which was incredible on the outside and inside - 7000sqm of mosaics!!) and even the Erotica Museum, which was inside an STI clinic, cos Chris wanted to see Rasputins penis (seriously, I'm not joking!!). It all took its toll though and between the heat (it was very hot!), all the walking and falling down the stairs in one of the museums (they made us wear shoe covers and the stairs were marble, so it was very slippy!) my foot swelled up like a balloon and I couldn't walk :-( It meant that I had to stay at the hostel on our last day and miss the Hermitage!!! Chris had to queue 3hrs for it though, so it's probably a good idea I didn't go! He took lots of photos for me though, so I kind of got to see it!
That night we got an overnight sleeper train to Moscow and that was much better than a bus!!! I had a proper bed and it looked all posh inside - it was very exciting and I got some sleep, so that was good too! Our hostel in Moscow was nicer than the St. Petersburg one too - it was called Godzillas! Moscow seemed more cosmopolitan than St. Petersburg, somehow, but generally the people weren't very friendly and some of them were a bit rude at times. The city itself was quite interesting though - we went to the Gulag museum, which, despite the lack of English, was very sad, we went to an ice sculpture museum and that was really cool (no pun intended!) and we went to see Swan Lake by the Russian National Ballet, which I loved and I think Chris kind of liked! The Kremlin was actually a bit of a disappointment - there were a lot of churches, but they weren't as impressive as others we'd seen, although I did quite like the Armoury (although Chris said he'd seem better stuff in London). Red Square I did like - St. Basils was incredible, as was GUM the shopping centre, and Lenins tomb, which was a bit weird and looked like they'd got him from Madam Tousauds!!
It was very sad saying goodbye to Chris at the airport :-( Scary too, heading out on my own! But I've made it to Bangkok and it's all going well so far....but I'll tell you about that in my next post!
Sarah xxx
P.S. I'll post some pictures on here just as soon as I figure out how!!!
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Jenny
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OMG
He had a reindeer sandwich...like for real?! :( When i see him i will shout!! Glad your having fun...might look at coming to hawaii hehe. Speak to u soon xxxxxx