St. Petersburg to Moscow - Train Journey Part I

I will never be able to capture the debacle that was our train journey from St. Petersburg to Moscow. It began with shots of cognac and ended in a plethora of noises, emotions, and ultimately Moscow's heat!

The duration of the overnight train journey was ten hours. At first, Monna, Sven and I anticipated taking a five hour "express" train early in the morning. As it turns out that train didn't exist so we had to leave the night before, much to Claudio's chagrin (He wasn't scheduled to fly out until the next morning). So we said goodbye to Claudio at the hostel and headed to the train station.

We left St. Petersburg as the thunder clapped, the rain poured and the lightening lit up the heavens. Typical.

We decided to celebrate our first Russian overnight train journey with nothing other than Finnish Lonkero.

It was a good decision given what was in store for us.

We boarded the train and settled into our separate cabins (Sven in one and Monna and I in the other). The other people in Sven's cabin (four per cabin) did not speak any English. Neither did the two Russians in our cabin. Sven was only able to communicate with his group through sign language. And the only sign language they understood was the sign for taking a shot. Four shots of cognac later, I happened to walk in to his cabin. Now I was forced to "engage" in the conversation with them!!!

Needless to say the party ended up in Monna and my cabin. Again typical. :) We hosted about half the train til around 2am.

By three, after Russian folk music and debauchery, we all called it quits.

6:00 AM: A.k.a. not time to get up. Suddenly I am wide awake. Not sure why, I turn over to get out of my bed. Wrong move. Two of the Russians from the evening had decided that they would enjoy fornicating in our cabin. Thus making the noises that inevitably woke me up. Awesome.

We arrived in Moscow with a hangover, not a whole lot of sleep, and 32 degrees Celsius. Ouch.

Now obviously this is only the outlined version. Like I said before , the full version can only be found inside the heads of Sven, Monna and myself. Which is probably a good thing! :)

"Venice of the North" - St. Petersburg

As was common for most of our trip, we were sent off by Finland and the island with a bout of rain!

Thankfully, Henrik was prepared and gave us all rain gear for the boat ride to shore!

We traveled St. Petersburg directly from Finland via train. Interestingly enough, we had no issues crossing the boarder into Russia. I was prepared though. I had my little piece of paper in hand that explained (in Russian!) my purpose in the country as well as the reason my invitation only list Moscow as the singular destination. Thank you Spoonde!

In the afternoon, we arrived at the train station to this....

Калінінградская вобласць з'яўляецца анклавам, і асноўная тэрыторыя Расіі пачынаецца ўсходней, пад 27°17’ у.д., на мяжы Расіі з Эстоніяй, на беразе ракі Педэдзе. Такім чынам, працягласць тэрыторыі Расіі з поўначы на поўдзень перавышае 4 тыс. км, з захаду на ўсход — набліжаецца да 10 тыс. км. Агульная працягласць межаў Расіі — 60 933 км

.....well not exactly but I think you all get the picture. (Yes, Claudio, I know you can decipher a bit of this and yes, it is the wikipedia entry for Russia in Russian. :) Thanks.)

Russian has a completely different alphabet structure. So all of those times in France and Spain when you can deduce the meaning of a word based on a Latin root become completely irrelevant.

Fortunately, Claudio picked up on the language pretty quickly. He was able to find cafes and read menus. Which in our group are two very important skills. Sven, with Claudio's help, was then able to navigate the subway, which enabled us to reach our hostel and ultimately travel around the city! :)

On our second day in St. Petersburg we had the best luck possible. This fabulous little website called Couchsurfing sent us a welcome gift in the form of Dasha Safronova. She is a native of St. Petersburg and speaks German and English sublimely. She gave us one of the best and most comprehensive tours of a city I have ever had. She told us that due to all the water ways in the city, St. Petersburg was known throughout Europe as the Venice of the North. Pretty cool, huh? We ate traditional Russian food and went with her to watch Zenit FC beat some random team from Moscow. She spent 10 hours with us, culminating in a Russian dance party at a local bar! Now that is a way to get to know a city!

Some pictures of the city, the people and the events that transpired:


** Monna and I in front of the Hermitage Museum


** Dasha and Sven at the bar where we watched the football game

* Monna and I on the dance floor in the bar that evening. Dark? I know. :)

"Ankka, ankka, ankka" - The Finnish Island

I am sitting in a hostel in Riga right now. It is called the Tiger hostel and compared to all the other hostels I have ever stayed in it is like a hotel. For one, it has Internet in every single dorm room. Meaning that, unlike Russia, I can update my blog. Unfortunately, I am very far behind. I have left Finland, traveled through Russia and now I am in Riga. So now I have the arduous task of recounting previous events.

First up, the Finnish island!

Located an hour and a half north of Kouvola, the island is truly isolated in the middle of a lake. Monna's sister, Sanna, was nice enough to take all four of us down to the lake. There we meet Johan, Monna's cousin, who swiftly put all our stuff in a little boat and drove us out to the island.


**View on the island from the beach

From the water, you can barely see the three cottages that belong to Monna's family. They are all somewhat hidden by the trees. Each has its own sauna and outdoor toilet.


**The sauna, also the sleeping quarters of Sven and Claudio

We stayed there for two nights and needless to say, on the first day, when the weather finally turned sunny, none of us were too keen on leaving for Russia.

Monna's relatives made sure we felt very welcome on their island. The evening we arrived Annika, Monna's Aunt, and her husband Henrik hosted a family dinner for us at their cottage. Johan grilled a delicious leg of something (I believe it was lamb) for us and Annika and Minna, Johan's partner, prepared salmon lox and herring with new potatoes. We were also joined at the table by Patrik, Monna's cousin, his son, Leon, as well as Johan and Minna's son Peik. It was truly a lovely meal!

The next day Henrik took us on a boat tour of the lake. It was massive. I enjoyed riding around in the boat and peering into the lives of the various Finnish households on the lake.

Every evening we went for a sauna. Girls and then boys (they have their saunas quite hot!). The deal was that after the sauna you had to run and jump straight into the lake. Well let me tell you, that lake is COLD! But after a sauna it feels oh so refreshing! Either way it was a great way to end the evenings!

Weirdly enough I have been traveling for awhile now and this was the first place that actually felt like a vacation and not just another backpacking trip. Which was good. It left our spirits high in anticipation for what was to come... Russia!

COMING TOMORROW..... Our trip through Russia!

P.S. "Anka" means duck in Finnish! Sorry for not including that the first time around! :)

In the middle of Finnish nowhere!!! :)

It has been a couple days since my last post. Let me assure you I am still alive and well, but I am simply out in the Finnish countryside enjoying my very limited access to the internet.

I am currently staying at Monna´s parent´s house in Ristiina.



You can see how remote their house is in the picture above. It is lovely. Quiet. Serene. We have been relaxing all week doing only the things we love. For example....


Fishing


Acrobatics


Sunbathing


Baking


And target practice!!!!





But most importantly, going to the sauna!!!!



Overall, it has been a very enjoyable couple of days!

Next plan on the agenda is to travel further into the countryside and visit the family island before we take a train to St. Petersburg! No more posts until Russia.

Happy Fourth of July... from Helsinki

I have the best friends on the face of the planet! Honestly. They put up with my rooing and laugh at me when I am silly. But the most amazing thing this trip is that they helped me throw the best Fourth of July party Finland has ever seen! Complete with that stupid cake. You know the one that has the berries and looks like an American flag!

More on that is a sec. First, I must give you a current status report:
Current counrty - Finland
Current residence - La casa de Jatta (Monna´s Aunt, whom I had the pleasure of staying with in Rome the last time I was out this way!!!)
Participants - Monna, Sven , myself and now, newly arrived, Claudio!

We have been in Helsinki for two days. Yesterday, we went on a sight-seeing tour that include the churchs, harbor....


***Sven in Senate Square

and it´s open air market. You can get some unusual things at this market including a necklace made out of reindeer antler. :)


***Me eating weird food from the market

Today, we went to the Suomenlinna fortress, a small island off the coast of Helsinki. We had lunch there and enjoyed watching the tourists mix with the locals (who visit the island often in the summer).


***Claudio and Monna on the boat to the island

Alright now back to my party. Since it was Fourth of July and actually I think the first time I have not been in the states for it, I decided that I was going to bring Fourth of July to Finland. My friends were up for the challange.

I put together the menu (and the grocery list) and then we all braved the grocery store to see what ingredients we could actually get in Finland. Before I walked into the store I was already worried about the ready-made box cake!

I put Sven in charge of the grilling. Claudio and Monna were in charge of the potato salad and the drinks. And I was incharge of the cole slaw and finally and most importantly, the flag cake!

It was brilliant. Sven cooked the meat to perfection and actually ended up helping me with the cole slaw (because I haven´t ever really made it myself!!)… okay, okay and also with the potato salad. But the cake was all me! And it was lovely!
We all gathered outside on Jatta´s terrace and were quite happy with the result. Jatta even provided Looney Toones napkins that were red, white and blue.

COMING SOON – The video of me singing the National Anthem as I brought the cake out to the table. There might have been a bit of Lonkero involved. ;)

Now with pictures!!!

Sven finally got a couple of the pictures off his camera and so I have uploaded them to my Hatfield post. Check them out!

The Tower of Fat Margaret - Tallinn

Travelling to Tallin by boat was a very interesting experience. I have been on a Cruise ship before but nothing like this. However, first, I must describe the events that lead up to us leaving Stockholm.

The cruise ship to Tallinn was to leave at six oclock on Tuesday evening. The morning was lovely. Monna and I went over to Skansen, the open-air museum in the center of Stockholm. We saw reindeer, elf and bears, oh my! Later, we went on a boat tour through one of the canals and then met up with Miki for our last coffee at the Museum of Modern Art.

Fortunately, while having coffee with Mikki, we realized that due to bus strikes it was going to be a bit challenging to get to the ferry terminal. Basically involving the metro but more terrifying navigating the streets to find the right dock. So we left Mikki with map in hand and returned to her apartment to pack the rest of our things.

As we turned the final corner before her apartment, the clouds broke and it began to rain. My only thought was "just a little, please, just a little!". Once up at Mikkis apartment it was clear that a little was not going to happen. Now it was dumping, and I mean hard! All of a sudden, I began to flash back to the little town in Morocco, where Cole and I had to run through the streets barefoot because we were literally up to our ankles in water! How was I going to manage that in Stockholm though? I have a fifteen pound backpack and about a 25 minute hike to the ferry terminal! Needless to say, Monna and I prepared the best we could. We put on our lightest clothing and headed out to face the rain.

Apparently, the travel gods like us a little because as we marched up the hill towards the closest metro station the rain began to stop! And we managed to make it all the way to the Tallinn ferry terminal without seeing another drop! Phew.

The Tallinn ferry was huge. 10 floors. And who knows how many feet long but a proper cruise ship. Monna and I had a little cabin to ourselves on the eighth deck. That evening we decided to participate in some of the cruises evening activities. Oh wait, no, I decided to participate. Long story short I ended up sing Madonnas "Material Girl" on stage to a crowd of clueless Estonians (and a couple Swedes) who had, apparently, NEVER heard this song before! What!?! Awesome.

With my new found embarrassment, I decided it could not get any worse so Monna and I went down to one of the "clubs" and danced the night away on a partially empty dance floor. The only other people around us where men who obviously had no interest in us ladies.

So now we are in Tallinn. With Sven. Staying in a pretty awesome hostel called Euphoria. The hostel is far enough from Old Town to be cheap but close enough to Old Town so that we can simply walk in. We will stay here for the night and then leave tomorrow afternoon sometime.


*** Food we ate at Old Hansen!!! Yummy!



*** Monna and I with our favorite accessories!!!!

More to come in a bit.... cheers! Miss you all!