Tomorrow we cross into Russia to St Petersburg.
Personally, this is one of the two most important bits of the trip for me.
I've been struggling to get a fast enough WiFi upload speed to update this report.
We are now in Latvia, having come from Finland via Russia (St Petersburg - an awesome city), and Estonia. More to come later.
One picture as a teaser...
This is the building I had most wanted to come and see having seen pictures of it when I was a small child. It is the Church of the Spilt Blood. The Cathedral.
Russia.
I'd like to spend a little bit of time on this. For me I have had a very long desire to travel to Russia. It is a country of mystery and intrigue for me. Growing up I was taught Russia and communism was bad, therefore Russia was not a country I should aspire to travel to. Yet I read books and saw pictures of amazing places and intriguing people. I determined from a very young age that despite all of the persuasion from parents, friends and family not to travel to Russia that I would indeed do that.
Well some 30 years later I's finally on the doorstep of the great big country. Much has changed since I was a young adult.
We left Kotka early and made the Finland side of the border just before 9:00am. Ten minutes later we lined up at the Russian border. It took about an hour to get through. The border officials were helpful.
We then decided to take the shortest and quickest route into St Petersburg, including the new toll roads. I found the toll roads very nice.
Russian drivers on the other hand were not. Coming from Finland where almost every single driver was polite and considerate the Russian roads were a big contrast. It was almost survival of the fittest! Definitely needed to use mirrors on both sides of the bike.
We made it into the city and found our accommodation without trouble. Well a couple of false turns but not bad. We settled in and then walked into the city. The accommodation was very nice.
The walk into the city center took a little while, but the day was warm and the weather kind. The visual explosion of buildings and architecture was mind blowing. The two must see buildings for us were the museum, the Hermitage, and the Cathedral - the church of the split blood.
Lidy and Bernard went inside the museum while Mense, Kitty and walked walked around the center and surrounding buildings. I was stunned at the beauty of it all. I had waited so long to come here, and the city was exceeding my expectations. It was awesome.
Some pics
Russian Museum (not the Hermitage)
The Church of the Split Blood
Inside this church the art was spectacular. Each picture is not a painting, but a mosaic. Look at the picture closely and you will the individual tiles
My videoing is pretty poor, I am a new user of the GoPro. Anyhow, look at this short clip of the inside of the church and my reaction to it on walking in.
https://mrkiwi.smugmug.com/DWC/Europe-2017/Videos/n-wGC5V6/i-GkQbG5T/A
The next day, Monday 12 June, I unfortunately slipped getting out of the shower and strained my back. I had an enforced rest day and caught the team up for dinner.
It was Russia Day and I had planned to go into the city center to see the celebrations. We caught some of the band's practice yesterday. However, I decided that I would not. In any event, it was just as well, as there were protests nearby the celebrations and avoiding the hot spots turned out to be a good strategy.
We instead had dinner at an Irish pub in St Petersburg. One of the waitresses was intrigued that I came all the way from New Zealand. But she got New Zealand a little confused with those pesky Australians
.
The next day we packed up early and left for Estonia.
While I liked St Petersburg I could not quite relax when roaming the streets. It was an interesting city, well worth the visit. I'm very glad to have finally made the trip to St Petersburg.
Some more pics
I couldn't quite bring myself to order this
Secure bike storage
Another interesting church
More buildings of interest (to me
)
Fish and chips
Tuesday 13 - St Petersburg to Mustvee Estonia.
Unlike the countries I had visited up to this point, where I knew a little about them even though I had not been to them before (apart from the Netherlands and Germany), the next four countries I knew almost nothing about other than were they were on a map. I was looking forward to learning a little about Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.
The Russian border crossing was more or less straight forward. The border officials were helpful, but they took some time to assess my first aid kit. I have a strong allergic reaction to bee stings so I carry an EPI pen in in my first kit. This pen is used to administer adrenalin should I need it. The border officials didn't know what to make of the EPI Pen but in the end they got out a magnifying glass the read the small print on it and they let it through.
The Estonian border reception was warm and welcoming.
We then took the road to Mustvee on the side of Lake Peipsi. The accommodation we had booked was over-subscribed but they put us in another building with better off road parking for the bikes and in a quieter location, but no WiFi. Mustvee is a small village that is essentially a summer holiday location. The lake is huge.
Some pictures
Thunder storms rolling around us as a welcome
The lakeside marina is small but very picturesque.
Wednesday 14 June - Mustvee to Riga.
This was a solid day's ride through some scenic country side and small towns finished off with a blast down the motorway into Riga.
Here we met up with Klavs Grass.
He looked after us very well while in Riga. The first night of arrival he picked us up in a van and drove us around the city to see the sites.
The following day we walked around the old part of the town, it was a beautiful warm fine day and we had a lot of fun. A lot of walking too. Then in the evening Klavs picked us up and took us to Jurmala, a lovely beach resort area just outside Riga. The restaurant was fabulous and we were treated to a lovely sunset.
Some pics of Riga and the beach
I will finish this thread when I return to NZ.