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Published: November 26th 2012
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Mir Castle
On the first of our day trips we went to Mir to see the Mir Castle. Mir Castle sits next to a small lake The day trips out of Minsk
While Juha and I were in Belarus we also made a few day trips out of Minsk. For reasons I explained in
the previous blog entry from Belarus the visa regulations made it too difficult to stay over night outside Minsk so day trips was all we could do.
This blog entry will be about these day trips. But before that I'd like to talk a little about the Belarusians.
In Belarus people are not used to meet tourists simply because there are not very many tourists around. When we were in Minsk we barely saw any tourists at all. In typical tourist attractions, such as Mir Castle and Nezvizh Castle both of which I will write about later on, we saw some tourists but not hoards like in other countries. So in most places people we met had very little previous experience from meeting tourists. I think that is one of the reasons why some people we met acted a bit strange when we showed up. The best way I can describe their way of behaving is that they seemed very very bored. They seemed to be thinking "I sit here and feel miserable and
Mir Castle
Mir Castle is one of the four current world heritage sites in Belarus now my worst fears have come true. Two bloody foreigners have showed up. Two foreigners who have the nerve to ask me for a bus ticket, and they are actually polite enough to use a few Russian words, and the bloody foreigners even have smiles on their faces like this is a good day or something. What have I done to deserve this torture? I just want to sit here all alone and feel miserable for the rest of the day. I don't want anyone to come here who isn't at least as miserable as I am."
To be fair towards the Belarusians I have to add that these people were a minority. Most people we met were nice and good people. Most of them speak no or very little English so we could not really talk to them. But I don't mind if people can't speak a language I understand as long as they put on a smile when they see me instead of a face that says "Please go away".
We also had the privilege to get to know one Belarusian, Kasia, a bit better than we usually get to know locals. Kasia gave us a
Mir Castle on a banknote
Mir Castle is featured on 50,000 Rubel banknotes walking tour of parts of Minsk where we would never have gone had it not been for her. It was really good fun to "tour" (i.e. walking around randomly) the lesser travelled parts of Minsk with a local "guide" (i.e. someone who lives there and talks about friends and relatives and things she does in her every day life).
Now I am going to get down to write about the places we visited on our day trips.
On the first of our day trips we went to Mir to see the Mir Castle. Mir Castle sits next to a small lake. When we walked around the lake we were able to take some great photos of it with the blue heaven behind it and the reflection of the castle in the lake.
Inside the castle we noticed that it has been restored in such a way that it in some places looked like it had been built only recently. It was still nice but the magic feeling I sometimes get in old palaces didn't arrive during the visit in Mir. It is still definitely worth visiting.
Mir Castle is one of the four current world heritage
Mir Castle chapel
Mir Castle has a small chapel sites in Belarus. One of the other three is Nesvizh Castle. I went there on my own because Juha had some other plans and he also wasn't very interested in going there.
Nesvizh Castle also felt like it had been restored lately but is nevertheless worth a visit.
The third daytrip went to a small village called Zaslavl and a sight called Stalin Line. Stalin Line was a
series of defence bunkers and fortifications protecting Soviet Union from an invasion from the West. In Zaslavl they ("they" in this case probably means the Belarusian army) have created an open air museum to give people an idea of what Stalin Line once looked like. When we were there the army put on a show where the first part was a display of various close combat techniques. In the second part of the show they staged an enemy attack on the museum and the army soldiers fought them off.
In the Stalin Line museum they also had some weapon systems on display. They had tanks, fighter planes and a genuine
R-12 medium range ballistic missile. If there is someone out there who doesn't get the "Say 'Hello' to my little friend"-reference
try this link and pick one of
Mir Castle courtyard
A well in the courtyard the search results that seem to be from the movie Scarface.
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