'RuFiEsLe', April 2015

The time has come to talk about one awesome journey.

After David and I were in Croatia and Dresden in 2014 we decided that we should go on at least one vacation together every year. So this year it was 'my turn' to chose the location and with Davids agreement I booked a round trip for the two of us:

Frankfurt, Germany to St. Petersburg, Russia by plane

St. Petersburg, Russia to Helsinki, Finland by Ferry

Helsinki, Finland to Tallinn, Estonia by Ferry

Tallinn, Estonia to Riga, Latvia by Bus

Riga, Latvia to Frankfurt, Germany by plane

Sounds awesome? It was.

'RuFiEsLe' stands for the four countries by the way, using the German words:

RU-ssland

FI-nnland

ES-tland

LE-ttland

..in the correct order.

Getting everything booked was easy and we even managed to get our visa for Russia (which is not as easy as for other countries, as you need proof of stay (hotel reservation), an invitation from your hotel, an extra travel insurance,...).

The trip started and we arrived in St. Petersburg, then took a taxi to reach our hotel. The lobby looked okay and the room was.. well.. about good enough. The heating was on full power and it was impossible for us to find out, how to turn it down, so we called for assistance. A lady came to our room and when we asked her how to control the temperature in the room as it was too hot.. she looked at us as if we were retarded and opened the window. Oh. Yeah. That's the best way to do it. Thanks.

So we spent the rest of the day exploring the area around our hotel - not much to see, but interesting impressions. In the evening we found a small local pub where we decided to have dinner and check out the local cuisine: Borscht. The taste was kinda as expected and we flushed it down with a few beers. After that it was time to get to bed.

As there was no breakfast included in our hotel we left our room in the morning and went out to a café to get our breakfast for the day. While eating we decided to go on a bus tour through the city - as it was pretty cold we didn't want to walk around all day. After breakfast we walked down to the bus station and managed to get a ticket for a sightseeing tour. Now this wasn't as we all know it from places such as Paris, Berlin or Edinburgh (like standard hop-on-hop-off tours).. this was a minivan and we were the only guests. Apart from us there was a driver who didn't speak a word and an elderly lady who acted as our tour guide. I can't remember how exactly she looked like but do remember her strong Russian accent. So we spent the next 2 hours driving around St. Petersburg, stopping occasionally to take some pictures and one final stop at a souvenir shop, where we got some hot drinks. The whole tour was nothing special but fine to get an overview of the city.

After this highly exciting tour we were in definite need of a nap. So we went back to the hotel and before falling asleep agreed on checking out a special bar we read about in our travel guides. Nap time.

In the afternoon we got up and went out for dinner in the 'Rock Pub', just around the corner. Can't quite remember how it looked from the inside but they had a statue of Freddie Mercury outside and some partially decent music inside. With our bellies filled we took the train (or bus?) to a place near that bar we wanted to check out. Well, we thought we were near that bar. We started looking and walked around the dark streets of St. Petersburg but couldn't find the bar, not even the street it was in. We started asking pedestrians where to find it, none of them were able to help us - in fact most of them didn't even speak english. Just one guy understood us and was able to tell us, that we were in the completely wrong area and he couldn't even tell us how to get to the place as it was that far away. Oooookay. Well. We simply got in a taxi and the driver took us to that said bar. And it really was quite far away.

So, now let me tell you why we wanted to visit this one bar.

I have no idea what it was called. But they were special, because every day at midnight they would celebrate new years eve - regardless of the date. Sounds awesome, right?!

Well we got into that bar and were greeted by the staff. A dude in a bunny rabbit costume. First impression apart from that weird guy: There are no friggin' other people in this bar?! It's deserted. The friendly staff-bunny took us to a table and we ordered two beers (it was such an effort to get here, now we've at least gotta have a beer or two, right?!). The next time he came to our table he didn't bring any beer. He brought two snowflake-shaped hats and told us that it was mandatory for us to wear them. Uhmmm. Okay? Well we did put them on. The next half hour was spent by chatting (to each other and to the friendly bunny), taking pictures with the snowflake hats and drinking beer (second round). Suddenly the door opened and a guy walked in. He was on his own and looked a little lost, sitting at a table near ours. After a while we invited him over, I can't remember his name - something Spanish - let's call him Pablo. He got a funny hat as well and we were chatting with him for a bit. It was about 11pm by now. Pablo turned out to be pretty weird (not in a good way). We had a few more beers and had the glorious idea to try every kind of vodka the menu offered.

At about ten minutes to midnight the bar suddenly was stormed by people. We were pretty pissed by now (excuse my language..) and all of a sudden the place was on fire (metaphorically). All of a sudden there was a DJ playing music, people were dancing and singing and drinking. We were too. About half way through our vodka-tasting the countdown started - almost midnight! Everyone started counting down, people lit sparklers and poured champagne. .....5 - 4 - 3 - 2 - 1 - Whoooooooooohooooo. Everone started hugging and then started line dancing. Myself right in the middle. No idea what David did - the whole evening is a big blur in my memory from this point. It's a mix of colors, dancing, vodka and more blur. At some point we left (no idea whether we had enough or if we were kicked out or even what time it was..) and decided we knew where we are and can walk back to the hotel. As Trump would say: wrong. But we had a great time walking through the night, down some random streets of St. Petersburg, singing, not being able to walk in a straight line. At some point we figured that none of our surrounding looked familiar and that we should maybe get in a cab. Said and done. The drive took us about 5 minutes - into the opposite direction that we were walking in. We got out of the taxi (I'm pretty sure the driver robbed us as I kinda remember that we paid faaaar to much for these few minutes) and back to the hotel. Time to get to bed.

The next morning i felt great - for unknown reasons. I woke up early and decided to wake up David in the nicest possible way: By offering him a shot of peppermint liquor. He did wake up. He did take the shot. And he did fall asleep again afterwards.

So we finally got up and had breakfast. We then used the famous St. Petersburg metro (well, famous because they have the worlds deepest metro as fas as I know.. and some pretty long escalators) to get to an Island in the Neva river, where we found a tank museum and some other cool stuff. The one thing I do remember clearly is how numbingly cold it was. I was wrapped up in lots of clothes, hat, scarf and gloves.. and was freezing. At some point we had to enter a restaurant to warm up with a nice cup 'o tea. The river war partially frozen and big chunks of ice were floating around. The strong wind made it even more unbearable.

On the way back from the island (which we did by foot) we stopped at the State Hermitage Museum - but again, didn't bother going inside. I've heard that you could spend days and weeks and months in that museum without seeing everything. As we had been walking for quite a while this sounded pretty discouraging. So we just had a look from the outside and then walked back to the hotel. We decided to have a short rest (which ended up in a little nap!) and then went back to the 'Rock Pub', as the food was decent and the music okay-ish. While sitting there we thought about the rest of the evening and agreed: It was time for 29-year-old me to see a strip club from the inside for the first time. So we walked out of the restaurant and a bit down the street, where we found several clubs. After negotiating with the bouncer at one of the clubs we entered and got a beer and a vodka. Once again we were the only people there except for two dancers. Private show, woohoo - weird. Well there's one thing I do remember apart from the two girls taking turns in dancing and looking pretty decent. And that thing is the vodka. This was the best vodka I had ever drunk - by far. Perfect temperature, smooth as silk and simply delicious. Unfortunately I missed asking the bartender for the brand. At some point David told me it was time to go, as it would get very expensive otherwise (the girls started insisting on us buying drinks for them). Okay, anyway - we were tired and had to get up early the next day. Back to the hotel!

The next morning started early, we packed our stuff and checked out - then stopped at a supermarket for some basic supplies (biscuits, chips, vodka). From there we took a cab which brought os to the harbor. We entered 'Princess Anastasia', an enormous ship. We found our cabin and had a rest before the ship departed. On departure we stood outside and watched the harbor of St. Petersburg disappear, then went for a walk to explore the ship: Nothing special. A few restaurants, games rooms, duty free shopping.

As David didn't feel to well (sea sickness) we went back to our cabin and he slept while I spent my time doing random stuff to pass time. In the evening we went to one of the restaurants on board and had some overpriced Italian food while listening to live music.

That was it, time for bed.

The alarm rang early the next morning as the ship reached Helsinki at 7am. We had a shower, packed our stuff and 'enjoyed' the breakfast in the canteen (hardly edible), then it was time to say goodbye to 'Princess Anastasia' and disembark the vessel. We took the tram from the harbor to our hotel (public transport is pretty cool in Helsinki!) and checked in. The Radisson Blu we stayed in was located in the center and pretty cool. As David still didn't feel well he had a nap and I tried watching a movie on pay-TV (no, I'm not talking about adult films.. but you had to pay if you wanted to watch some more recent movies). As it didn't work I called for help and a nice lady appeared few minutes later. She tried as well, but was just as successful as I was. So she just unblocked all movies for us and told us we could watch anything and not pay. Coolio! So I watched some random movies while David was sleeping - at some point I woke him up as I got bored. We got out of the hotel and started exploring the area. We didn't find anything too decent though.. The famous market hall was closed (easter!), so we looked at a few churches and then found a restaurant where we decided to have a late lunch. The prices were pretty steep but not as high as expected, so we even were able to enjoy eating. After that we headed back to our hotel to rest (again...). In the evening we headed back out to meet Kris. Kris was a local guy, whose contact I got from Nico as he knew him from his time in England. Kris took us on a tour through some bars and we had a beer or two in each. Pretty cool guy - and always nice to meet some locals!

After that we got back to our hotel - time to sleep.

The next morning started with a pretty decent breakfast at our hotel - exactly what we needed! After that we headed to Helsinki harbor to catch a ferry which would take us to Suomenlinna, an island just off the coast of Finland, which is part of UNESCOs World Heritage. The ride took us about half an hour, then we reached the island and started exploring. We walked and walked, enjoying what we saw: rough coast and a huge abandoned fortress. Enormous rusty canons at many places and dark catacombs - pretty cool! Whenever you're in Helsinki this is a must-do.

After many hours of exploring we headed back to the ferry and got to the main land, where we decided to walk back to the hotel. David - once again - needed a nap, still not feeling too well. And I wasn't too sad about resting for a bit myself.

While the old dude was sleeping I checked out what our options were for the evening and found a pretty cool one: A german band called 'Eisbrecher' were having a concert about 2 minutes by foot from our hotel. As we both enjoy their music on occasion we decided to join the concert, thinking we'd be the only germans around. Hah. Far off. The whole club was full of germans, whenever walking past a chatting group we'd understand every word. I believe there were hardly and Finnish folks around - but why?

Anyhow, we enjoyed the concert and then headed back to the hotel to get some sleep - preparing to leave Finland the next morning.

So we got up and had breakfast again, then packed our belongings and took the tram to the harbor, where we got on our ship. This time we did not have a cabin as the ride would only take us about 3 hours.

We spent the time loitering and looking out of the window - and arrived in Tallinn, Estonia.

We decided to walk to the hotel as it wasn't supposed to be far away. Unfortunately it starting to rain a bit, which made the walk quite uncomfortable. Anyhow, we did manage to reach the hotel we were booked for and checked in. Well.. we tried. Unfortunately they had made a mistake and did not have a room for us. So they booked another hotel for us and sent us away. How kind!

The other hotel was located in a nice area but the rooms were tiny and the walls so thin that we could hear every cough in the surrounding rooms. Not a very good start. I wanted to get out, but David felt terrible after being on a ship again. So he was in definite need of a nap. I decided to not waste time and started walking.. exploring the old town of Tallinn. I checked out a few churches and enjoyed the beauty of the place: Cobbled roads, old buildings and huge churches. Neat!

I bought a few snacks on the way and walked all around the place. Before returning to the hotel I sat down in a café, a blanket on my knees and a hot cup of tea in my hand. Perfect!

After that I got back to look after grampa.. who was still sleeping. Oh dear. But good for me: While he was sleeping I hid a bunch of chocolate easter eggs in the room and then woke him up, so he could look for them - pretty fun to watch, as he was barely awake.

After freshening up a little we got back out and found a restaurant that looked pretty cool. The service was terrible but the food was pretty decent: First time for me eating moose. Yummy! After that we started walking back to the center of the old town, where we found a bar/club. The signs on the door were all written in Estonian, so we just entered. We had a few beers and enjoyed our time, when suddenly everyone started dancing. One guy on a small stage danced and everyone in the audience copied him. Wow.. confusing?! Anyhow, we enjoyed the show and just left at some point. By now there was a second sign on the door, written in english: 'PRIVATE PARTY'. Oops.. oh well, that explained the looks we got, when people noticed we were speaking in a foreign language.

Back to the hotel, back to bed.

Rise and shine, time to explore! Or sleep. David decided to get back to bed after breakfast, so I let him sleep for a few more hours. The rest of the day we spent walking around the city - can't remember what exactly we did. The next thing I do remember is going to a medieval restaurant in the town center. Everything was lit by candles only and it was completely packed. We enjoyed some moose jerky (like beef jerky.. but moose) as a starter and had a few flavored beers. As a main dish I enjoyed a mix of sausages: Boar, Moose and Bear. The latter was really horrible but the rest was really tasty. After dinner we headed back to bed, our last night in Tallinn.

In the morning we checked out after breakfast and somehow got to the bus station (probably by taxi?), where we bought some tickets for the bus to Riga, Latvia. We were offered 'VIP-tickets' and as they were just 4 or 5 euros more expensive we agreed - great decision as we were to find out later. The bus was late so we sat in the sun for a bit and enjoyed the odd sip of peppermint liquor.

Once the bus arrived we got in and found our seats in the very last row - being glad to have spend the few extra euros. The VIP seats were enormous leather seats that could almost fully recline, had an entertainment system included and were simply comfortable. You can take a guess what David did as soon as we departed. Nap time! I spent the ride watching a few movies and nibbling on some biscuits.

Arrival in Riga, the fourth and last country on our journey!

As usual we went to our hotel first thing after arriving and checked in. Luckily the hotel was not to far from the bus station, so a 20 minute walk covered the distance. We unloaded our luggage and David decided to have a nap (surprise!), so I let him sleep for a bit while playing some games on my mobile while waiting. After his nap we played some card games and then went outside to find a place to have dinner. We found a canteen-like restaurant which was cheap.. but also not very good. So after that we headed back to the hotel. Nighty night.

Our second day in Riga was spent by a mix of sleeping (...) and exploring the town. To be honest I'm not a big fan of Riga, especially after seeing Tallinn, which was much more beautiful. Yet we walked around for quite a bit and found a few nice places.

In the evening we found a medieval restaurant again, far down in a cellar, all natural stone walls, beautiful! We started with ordering drinks and here's the approximate conversation:

Me: "I'd like to have a coke please."

Waiter: "We don't have coke."

Me: "Well then a sprite or seven-up."

Waiter: "We don't have that either."

Me: "How come you don't have any soft drinks?!"

Waiter: "Soft drinks didn't exist in the middle ages." ... uhmmm.. okay. So I ordered some water (seems like they had sparkling water in the 6th century!) and soup, as well as a main dish. The soup was absolutely delicious and presented in a beautiful way. While waiting for the main dish (which ended up to be okay.. but nothing too special) I observed the waiter playing Angry Birds on his mobile. Seems like smartphones were pretty common in the middle ages too! Haha. Anyhow, the soup made my evening and the place was pretty cool. At some point a group of people appeared, playing ancient instruments and dancing to their own music.. coolio. After dinner we went straight back to the hotel.

Third and last full day in Riga! As we felt like we've seen everything interesting in the area we decided to take the bus and head to the Baltic Sea. It was a long walk from the bus station to the sea and once we reached it we continued walking along the coast until we saw a light house which was far out in the sea - reachable by a concrete path which was flooded by waves occasionally. Although it was freezing we decided to take the risk and walked all the way to the light house. Stiff from the cold wind we had a short break to have some peppermint liquor and a few gummy bears, then headed all the way back.

We reached the bus station and luckily didn't have to wait too long for the bus to arrive. Of course David fell asleep during the ride and as soon as we reached the hotel he went back to bed. Amazing. I spent the time doing random stuff and when he finally woke up we had a few games of Chinese poker.

When it was time for dinner we headed out to catch a bite somewhere and then went straight back to the hotel.

We slept a little longer on our last day (seems like David was in definite need of rest!) and then got our breakfast. After that it was just some packing, checking out of the hotel and taking a cab to the airport.

This was an awesome journey and a great memory that I probably won't ever forget. Being on vacation with this senior is always fun (at least when he's awake). As our next journey together is commencing in two weeks I'm really looking forward to that! :)

#Russia #Finland #Estonia #Latvia #RUFIESLE #Roadtrip