Category: Travel

Well that border crossing was everything we read it would be. Long, tedious, and at the lovely time of midnight. The mongolian side was fairly straightforward. An hour to check passports and search our cabins, and off we went to the Chinese side. In China though, there was the thorough passport check, cabin check, and then the joy of them changing the track gauges (from single in Russia/Mongolia to double track in China). This took hours. Our cabin attendant did inform us that as our passports were already checked, we could get off the train as the process would be ‘very boring’. So off we got, and wandering into the large station shop. This shop had absolutely everything from food to house hold detergents, fresh fruit and veggies, even bedding, linens and jade carved dragons. We took our time and made a few purchases. When we went out outside again we had the pleasure of finding the platform empty – no train. Us and about 20 or so other tourists looked a little baffled but as we all tried to keep our game face on no one looked too panicked. The fact is we were all probably doing the same thing, trying to look like unfazed seasoned travelers even though we had no clue where our train was our when it was coming back.

An hour or so later, we got hussled out of the station through the back door onto the main street. Now i was a bit worried. Jason’s Chinese came in handy with a few ‘Wei shema’s?’ (aka: why), we managed to figure out were were being moved to another building, the departures terminal. Over another hour later the train finally showed up and we were allowed back on. Dear Lonely Planet guide book. Could you not have mentioned this detail? If you get off the train at 10:30pm don’t expect to get back on until well after midnight.

Back on the train, in no time were asleep, wanted to rest up for our last day on the train.

This is what we awoke to:

Kind of to be expected I suppose. Is that smog, fog or the infamous spring sand storms? hard to tell.

For our day in China for some reason we were given meal tickets. This meant that the restaurant car was packed, but at least we got to see some more life on the train. At the border last night we’d clearly picked up a pile more passengers. The restaurant car itself was nice. Clean, efficient, kind of neuvo communist looking (unlike the old fashioned soviet looking Russian car). Breakfast was a quick efficient affair. Hard boiled egg, bread, and tea. Sit, eat, get out al in under 15 minutes.

So, what’s the view like in China? Well, you spend plenty of time in Inner Mongolia which looks sparse and desert like:

Then you pull up to a city of 3 million people you’ve never heard of to find mass industrialization:

At certain kilometer marks our guide book would tell us things like: the north side of the train will offer commanding views of the great wall.

Well, maybe on a less hazy day, this was our view:

Can you see it? barely?

Lunch was another set menu in the dining car, rice vegetables, meat ball things – pretty tasty actually. And the afternoon was spent looking at more scenery like this as we got closer to Beijing:

One very annoying thing is about 2 hours outside of Beijing the cabin attendants start to clean up. But not a little tidy up, like come in take all our sheets and bedding, the table cloth, our carpet, our window curtains…. they stripped our room bare. They also mopped all the floors even though us filthy travelers with dirty shoes are still walking around?! To me its as annoying as being told you can check out of a hotel at noon, but at 10:30 the cleaning staff will come in and start servicing the room around you. We’ve been on this train for 6 days, can you not wait another 2 hours? And seriously, you probably want to keep those cushion covers on the upholstery, remember we haven’t had a real shower in 6 days!

But, by the time we pulled into amazingly we were only about 9 minutes late. Fantastic punctuality.

So, 5 and a half days on a train – overall? We loved it. And actually found ourselves wishing we could stay on a bit longer. Favourite day? Mongolia. All around the most interesting scenery. Would we do it again? Probably not that same route, but another long distance train ride, for sure.

Mongolia! At last.

We awoke around 7am local time to arrive in the capital, Ulaan Baatar. Jason was ecstatic. He was one of the first off the train, in search of a money changer. The best he could do though was an ATM inside the station. Back on the station we picked up some more supplies (soup, bread, noodles, the usual). We only had about 30 minutes here, but we wandered the platform, snapped some photos and people watched. Mongolians generally seem happier than the Russians. We also noticed that last night a new restaurant car was inserted into our train.

Once we pulled out of the capital, we got a chance to see how big it actually was. This is no far flung nomadic outpost, but rather a large bustling industrial city. What caught our eye though is that even though there were plenty of modern buildings, the yurt tent was always present.

(suburbs of UlaanBaatar)

Today proved to be by far the most scenic day. We spent most of it glued to our windows (and wishing we’d brought squeegies to clean the dust off the outside windows). The towns were few and far between, and even when there were towns, they were sparse to say the least.

one of the bigger towns:

The actual stops that we made were interesting, but on a completely different level than in Russia. Gone are the ladies selling food, we were lucky for the odd card table set up with bottled water and juice. Also gone were in signs of other commuter traffic. It was clear that we were the only train this station had seen for hours. And since our train was so quiet, it just added to the barrenness of each stop.

By lunch time we decided to try out the mongolian restaurant car. Mongolia gets the reputation has worst food on the entire trip. Typical speciality is boiled mutton and rice. We did however find they had the prettiest restaurant car by far – full of wood carvings. And the food, it was actually pretty good. We get upsold on 2 set menus which I imagine were touristed up, but that boiled mutton wasn’t half bad!

Nice thing was they accepted a combination of our left over Mongolian currency and some Russian Roubles (at a ridiculous exchange rate, but well .. what can you do).

Back in our cabin the scenery kept us entertained all day. Livestock, small towns, emptiness… today was a photo happy day.

Jason picking up some water

typical view out our window

By sunset our train pulled close to the border town with China. We got this one final shot before starting the extremely lengthy process of crossing over to China.

Sometime overnight we officially crossed into Siberia. Scenery has changed. Yesterday was birch tree forests with small industrial towns. Today the trees are thinning out and there are much larger expanses of open untended grassy lands. Still lots of snow. We slept through the 8am (moscow time, +3 local time) stop at Ishim, so we’ll have to wait 3 and a half hours until Omsk to experiment with any more food tastings.

Lonely Planet tells me we’ve crossed into another time zone, we’re now at Moscow + 3 hours. Jason discovers that our shared ensuite shower doesn’t have enough pressure to wash his toes let alone any other body part so he resorts to filling up the sink for a splash shower of key parts.

In Omsk, we buy some bread and onion rings /crisps from a little kiosk on the platform. At this stop we’re more brave and venture off the platform to have a peek at the town. just a peak though.

Later in the day, we head back to the dining car for our main meal. My 3 hours of menu translation the day before proves useless as both dishes we requested were out of stock. Pierogies out of stock in Russia?! Criminal. Again we are the only ones in the dining car. The staff watch Braveheart dubbed over in Russian. My borsht is quite delicious.
At the next stop we pick up some bottled water. No snacks tempt as this time – i think we’ve filled our quota of salt for the day.

We spend the rest of the day reading, lounging and slowly being rocked by the train into various naps.

We make one more stop in the evening at Novosibirik, surprisingly a huge city. Interestingly enough, we had tried to come here last year for the solar eclipse in August but couldn’t get the planning to work. On the platform a few kiosks are open, we browse, but decide 300 roubles is too expensive for sausage.

The train leaves Moscow at 9:30pm. We’re so excited all day. We actually arrive at the station a solid 2 hours early. We wanted to allow plenty of time to understand the departures board, find the platform, find our train, stock up on supplies. 2 hours was about 1.5 hours too early. We quickly realise the platform number won’t be announced until about 30 minutes before. As for supplies, there are a series of little kiosks in and around the station, but they are tiny and seem to stock mostly junk food. We do manage to get two giant 5ltre jugs of water, some juice and snacks. The rest of the time is spent eyeing our stuff, our back pockets every suspicious looking person in the terminal (like everyone) and generally feeling unsafe. The place smells, people smell, and there are way too many people loitering around doing not much. We couldn’t be any happier to get onto that train into the safety of our compartment.

When we do get on, Jason is in pure gitty bliss. He spends the next few hours unpacking, checking out our compartment, his bunk, our shared sink/shower room, and just generally buzzing around.

Me? I’m tired from spending the last 2 hours on high alert for thievery. I got straight to sleep, happy that we made it and its starting.

I suppose its the architecture that is the most reminiscent of Poland from the 80’s. Grey, soviet buildings, that were quickly built post war. But where as Warsaw has recently renovated and painted many of these buildings, the ones in Moscow I saw where still in their shabby grey state. There is also just a general feel that Moscow is about 10 years or so behind places like Warsaw (which tells you how far behind it is of other cities).

Its true what they say about Moscow, it is a city of two distinct classes. The new rich Moscow with its glitzy posh restaurants and cafes patroned by a crowd ostentatiously dripping in designer wear. And the old Moscow, the poorer Moscow, with the old babushkas waddling down the street in giant fur hats.

I will say, generally speaking, the stereotype that Russian women are beautiful seems to be true. Its hard to say if it’s because they are exceptionally well put together, or if its a natural beauty. But there are an exceptionally large amount of thin young women, strutting down the street on a lazy sunday afternoon dressed for the fashion shoot in giant stilettos with a face full of dark eye makeup. Their handbags ooze expensive showiness, but are carelessly slung on their arm (which to Jason and I is a notable relief as bag snatching must be pretty damn low to be that casual).

Intermixed between the drab soviet architecture are the impressive historical buildings. The Kremlin was as impressive as I had expected. Although, the red square was smaller than i thought it would be, and believe it or not, a much more distinct rectangle. The churches really are a work of art, and deserving of every bit of photography they get. The onion topped domes are really pretty, and in many cases the church is an absolute spectacle in excessive colouring. Maybe they used all the paint on the churches leaving nothing for the grey apartment blocks?

For food, we tried to stick to Russain food, or at least food of the (former) Russian empire. Most impressive was the Georgian restaurant we went to – absolutely exquisite. Uzbekistani, interesting but not as good. The Moscow obsessive love for Sushi is a bit shocking, literally every restaurant or cafe will serve it. The pierogie were excellent, as was the borscht – to be expected. Sunday brunch buffet at the Park Hyatt was interesting. Seems normal to bring your pet dog, chow down on sushi, but not be served eggs.

Riding the metro was a highlight. First for the massive brain exercise of figuring out the map whilst testing my Cyrillic reading skills. But second for the visual display of the metro stations. We’d read that they were built to be a celebration for the worker. Marble walls, chandeliers, some of these stations were quite done up.

The one thing we didn’t do was go to the ballet or symphony. But that wasn’t due to lack of trying. Tickets on the internet were going for around 200 USD per person – a bit excessive if you ask me. We tried our luck at the theatre box office, but found giant queues of people (blobs like at the airport) and everything in Russian. In the end we couldn’t stomach the patience we’d need to get to the front of the blob to find out that tickets were likely that same 200USD price seen online. Its hard to tell if the theatre buildings were architecturally nice or not, they were all covered in scaffolding.

Overall, a good couple days in Moscow. Not my favourite city in the world, but fascinating to see, especially from a historical perspective. I wouldn’t want to spend more than 3 days though as you do run out of historical sites to tick off that list, and really you’ll break the bank if you stay much longer. And tonight, the trans mongolian express.

So day 3 in Moscow comes to an end. And in a few hours we’ll be heading to the train station to pick up the Siberian express.

Moscow. First impressions? The Warsaw I remember from the 80’s. The airport was sufficiently soviet looking, grey drab but clean. Customs line? Can’t really call it a line. More like one giant blob of pushy impatient people. This I was actually expecting. Soviet and ex soviet countries have zero respect for an orderly queue. These people in their lifetime remember waiting in line for bread – so can i really blame their ‘ no body helps me but me’ attitude? Surprisingly though, this is the non-Russian/Belarus passport check.

45 min later the blob squeezes through customs, our visas seem in order and we’re fetching luggage. Coming out to the arrivals area we pass giant warning signs in broken english about illegitimate taxi drivers, with very harsh warnings of: safety not guaranteed. noted. its a mob of family members and taxi drivers (most non legit). Although family members do come to greet people at airports in Western countries, the Eastern European countries just take it to another scale. I’ve seen it first hand in Poland were everyone of my 25+ family will make the trip to come see me at the airport, kiss hello for 5 seconds before we pile into various cars where i won’t see 20 of them, and only speak to the 4 or so in my car for the 45 min journey back into town. Its always been weird to me, but its a sweet gesture.

In Moscow we breeze past the throngs of Russian relatives and make a bee line with Jason for the nearest cash point. we’d changed some euros into Roubles back at Heathrow but knowing how expensive Moscow is reported to be, good to stock up on some more while we have the chance. Immediately we get approached by a man in surprisingly decent english offering his taxi services. We smile say no, and turn away. A police officer has already closed in on his position and given him a stern warning in Russian. Cash in hand we find the official taxi desk and ask the women for a taxi to our hotel. Immediately a man approaches us from behind and shows us some sort of seemingly legit looking certificate (a license perhaps?) and confirms the price in english. As the women behind the desk shows no adverse reaction we assume that this is our driver and start to make arrangements. Within 30 seconds though the police officer is on him, scolds him like a child and chases him away. Confused we turn back to the women behind the desk who has shown no reaction to the exchange, and instead simply points to a pricing list. We make arrangements, pay and are told in very broken english to wait 5 min for our driver. This gives us time to watch the half dozen illegitimate driver try to snag a fare. 3 seem hard pressed on snatching the customer as they approach the legitimate taxi desk, but with every attempt, they are chased away by the Police. This cat and mouse game goes on the entire 10 min we wait. Why they’re even allowed to loiter and solicit for fares I don’t know, it seems the Police never let them close a sale.

Our driver finally shows up and grabs our luggage. For a 60+ year old man he moves surprisingly quickly, as i have a very hard time keeping up. Jason gives me an expression of indecision. Leave his pregnant wife trailing behind? or stay with our luggage that is quickly getting out of sight.

It may be a legitimate taxi, but the car turned out to be a 15 year old Renault in rough shape. The driver spoke no English (seems that’s a skill only illegitimate drivers have), but was satisfied with the hotel address we showed him. We settled in the back and peered out the dirty windows as the Russian outskirts, and Moscow suburbs whizzed by. It was an hour and 20 min ride into town. The fuel light blinked the entire trip.

After a solid day off with Lindsay last week, exploring the girlier bits of London (and trying to not let the crap weather get us down) Saturday rolled around and we were off to Reims, France.  2 hour on the Eurostar, a quick change of stations in Paris, a 45 minute express TGV train later we’re in Reims, the capital of the champagne district.

It’s a typical cute french town, cobble stone streets, obligatory cathedral (check, check), but due to the mass tourism of the champagne houses the town is over stocked with cafes and restaurants happy to let you indulge in art of french leisurely relaxation.  We spent over an hour on a cafe patio munching on leafy salads and sipping a champagne cocktail, followed by a few hours in another cafe in the sun sipping cafe cremes chatting, reading the paper (napping if you’re jet lagged!) and people watching.  The best thing the french do is let you sit with your one drink for hours, without trying to get you to buy anything more.  Some people might call this bad service, i call it decadent.

Eventually we peeled ourselves off the patio chairs and wandered the town stopping to window shop and scouting the champagne houses for one to visit the following day.  Time for a cafe break, we are in France after all.

For dinner we went to a local bistro recommended by a coworker that was truly excellent.  Two big things for me, 1: I got to try escargot for the first time and 2: I learned what Magnum means in the context of ordering a bottle of champagne.  To be fair, this was new to Lindsay too.  No it doesn’t mean premium, and no it’s not a brand of champagne.  In fact it’s a size.  2 bottles worth, 1500 litres worth to be exact.  It’s like the french word for “mega”.  We got quite the look from the waiter (and let’s be honest almost every patron in the restaurant).  I guess they don’t encounter 2 champagne rookies like us everyday!

3 hours later, the bottle empty, we showed them!

Sunday.  Surprisingly no hangover!  I think I have a new love for champagne.  breakfast on the cafe we note that the main strip is quite sleepy.

Oh ya, France.  France loves to close stuff on Sundays.  Thankfully they keep the champagne houses open, so it was off to the Mumm house.

The tour was an hour, quite detailed and very educational.  And yes, within the first 5 minutes of the tour the sizes of the bottles are taught.  Lindsay and I exchange a glance and a quiet giggle as we see the magnum bottle in a line up vs. the other bottles.

Later that evening it’s the TGV express back to Paris and the Eurostar back to London.  And as we pulled into London, its one of those rare moments that i get to truly appreciate living in Kings Cross.  10 minutes later, we’re home.

I’ve realized that I have a bad habit of coming back from holiday with the best of intentions to write up the trip, only to get busy and weeks later realise that not only is that holiday so last week, I couldn’t be arsed to do a write up. So this time, I seized the free wifi and drafted this up while still there.

And even with that, here I am, a week back for the trip and I’ve slipped. Oops! just the same, here it is:

Santorini.

After an overnight flight from Heathrow through Athens we arrived to cold foggy 7am Santorini. The manager of the Mill Houses was extremely accommodating for our early arrival. He made us a fresh pot of tea and brought us a few slices of citrus birthday cake, while he hurried around to see if our room could be readied. We sat on the terrace munching on cake bundled up in a multitude of layers. The view was non existent through the fog. The fog did help make everything horribly damp though, and I wasn’t feeling too good about this latest bank holiday choice. It is the low season still. A flash back of last years late May bank holiday comes to mind when we went hiking in the off season of Switzerland and hit a snow storm. The things I make us endure for off season prices!

After only half an hour the manager came by and informed us that our room was ready. 7:30 am and our room is ready? Unbelievable. less then 10 minutes later we were sound asleep.

5 hours later we awoke to what seriously was a new day. The fog had burned off, the sky was brilliant blue and the view was every bit the brochure promised. Firastefani made for the perfect first day overnight recovery spot. It’s picturesque and quiet. Something you really appreciate when you walk the mere 15 minutes to the capital Fira to find 2 cruise ships of tourists swarming about the narrow streets asking joyous things like: ‘Do you take american dollars?’ Loved the response by the way: ‘no! euro only.’ My thoughts: listen lady, this isn’t 1997, leave your American peso on the cruise ship. You’re in the EU now. It’s called a bank machine, use it.

By day 2 we switched hotels to one in Thira thinking we’d be closer to the action. Action, not really, but we were definitely closer to the tourist hive. So we rented a Smart car and explored the island. The part of Santorini that’s not postcarded to death includes flatter ground, sea level accommodation and lots of black sand beaches. If you care to mimic being a sausage on a teflon pan, this is the place for you. The average age of the tourist drops by about 25 years too. the old folks don’t make it this far from the cruise ship, the stick to the well beaten tourist circuit, and the high concentration of jewellery stores. And the ones that do make it to this side, are very laid back people who ditch the tick list of sites to see, and instead grab a nice cocktail in the very comfy beach bars.

Day 3: Oia. (pronounced EE-a!)

Truly amateur photographer’s paradise. Any snap happy monkey puppet named Bobo could take a decent picture in this town. Point, click and it’s photo after photo of postcard perfect shots. With my snap happy Bobo in tow, we wandered the town. As much as I thought the houses were perched on cliffs in Fira, Oia takes the dare just that extra step further.

The town is essentially one long pedestrianized street that hugs the edge of the cliff.

Everything was just that much more picturesque in Oia. the hotels, restaurants, shops even the walk ways. We got lucky with our hotel choice (booked online less than 24 hours before departure). Armeni Village is perched on a cliff like the others, but it’s on prime real estate jutting out away from the others.

On Day 4 we took the classic volcano tour. Since the island is the site of the biggest volcanic eruption the planet has ever seen we thought we should get up close with the crater. Basically 3600 years ago the volcano erupted and blew the island into chunks, and now what’s left is a well manufactured tour that is incredibly efficient at draining your tourist euro. It was Memorial Day weekend in the States, which resulted in an abnormally disproportionate amount of Americans.

That aside, and the fact that I felt like an ant marching two by two, the tour was interesting. As far as volcanoes go, I’ve seen better. But getting out to the actual volcano really gave you perspective as to how far away the main island is, and that pre-explosion it was all connected.

Back in Oia the tour boat dropped us off at the peer and rather than fight the tourists for the limited number of shuttle vans, we scrambled up the cliff to the town high above. As the donkeys breezes past you, it’s a humbling experience. They are in wicked shape.

Our long weekend ended the same way every night in Santorini ends. Yet another sunset to admire as you fade into relaxation.

Trip 11 out of my little book.

Going to Windsor was trivialy easy. Train from Paddington, change at Slough, and a 6 minute train ride to Windsor. Easy. but wait .. SLOUGH! I’ll get to the castle in a minute.

As a fan of the UK version of The Office, a stop in Slough is exciting. It’s like being on the set, my eyes peeled for Wernham-Hogg Paper Company. To anyone else, it’s a place to go to work in one of the many business parks or it’s a place to change trains as you make your way to somewhere better

.

Anyway, fun for me, but off to Windsor Castle. I can see how in the peak summer season you’d need a full day. Here we are in the absolute low season, cold dreary day in February and there’s still a substantial queue to get tickets, queue to go to the doll house, queue to the states rooms, queue to the loo … God the British just love to make you queue!

As for the Castle, well, it’s just a castle:

Well, a really old castle. Going on 900 years actually. And the Queen does live here (one look at the flag and we noted she was indeed in today). The Doll House was completely ridiculous. Built in the 1920’s it’s the size of our old Smart Car, and includes such ridiculous things like running water. Inside the castle proper, an extremely long audio tour takes you through the States Rooms which is a series of drawing, sitting, dining, dressing, and sleeping rooms. The art collection is impressive, the royals seem to have a fondness for Rembrandt. As do they have a fondness for self portraits. But I guess, back in the day, an oil painting was their version of a family photo album.
The most impressive room inside hands down goes to the one with all the weapons. This houses a massive collection of swords, riffles and daggers. Many of them are excessively decorated, and many are the spoils of the empire’s conquests.

In all, it takes a few hours to get through the castle and finally to the chapel. I found this picture on wikipedia:

From the air, you can really see how massive this place is!

Outside the castle, a kitchy town thrives on the hoards of tourists. We stopped for tea and noted that aside from the staff we were the only ones speaking English.

Across the river we popped into the town of Eton to have a look. It’s a famous private school (oddly called public by the brits. At &;pound24,000 a year tution, tell me HOW is that public!) . Through out most of the year the campus is open to visitors, but during the winter months it’s closed. Probably something about needing to study ..

That’s ok. Judging by the college chapel I’m not too sad:

I’m beginning to see a theme in the architecture of these buildings …

… a bit late, we were in Canterbury last week. But it’s been a busy week, and I’ve procrastinated…

Canterbury.
Our 10th of trip from Frommer’s: Best Day Trips from London book, 25 trips in all. I’ll be honest, I can see why this is pushed as a day trip. Although very pretty, the town is limited on things to do. There’s the Cathedral of course:

which is absolutely stunning, and there are Roman walls and other such historic fragments of buildings:

… after that there is some hype on those Canterbury Tales displayed in a very forced looking ‘museum’.  Oh there’s a large student population too.  That’s about it.  Did I mention the cathedral?

But I’m being too harsh. In Canterbury we had some excellent meals, enjoyed cream tea (tea, scones jam etc) at at least half the price of doing it in London, and we just plain relaxed.

Surprisingly there were no protesters to be seen in front of the Cathedral. I thought given all the flack the archbishop has been getting about his opinions there would at least be one angry Brit. Sadly no.

But there was our tea, and the excellent weather, and another ‘to-see’ crossed off our list.

I think it was sometime in October when I was trolling through Ryanair’s site seeing where they fly and noticed that the only stop they make in Finland is to some town called Tampere. Thinking back to our May Bank holiday last year in Spain and the good luck we had with their flight to the lesser known town of Almeria I took the idea of Tampere and ran with it. A quick search noted that the 3rd largest town in Finland was nestled on 2 lakes and home to over 90km of cross country ski trails within it’s city limits. It sounded like a solid winter weekend idea. I suppose picking up the magical unicorn of flight booking – the 2 pence round trip flight might have swayed things a bit too. Although, it’s funny how 2 pence each can suddenly turn into 96 pounds after all that tax, airport check in fee, baggage fees abd the because-we-can-and-you’ll-still-book-our-flights fees that they are so good at nickelling and diming you for.

In my research I’d read somewhere that people often compare Tampere to Liverpool in terms that both are cities living in the shadow of their country’s capitals but on the verge of a cultural rebirth. That all sound nice, but having never been to Liverpool this didn’t really help me.

We arrived late Friday evening and checked into our hotel. It was a converted industrial building which made our rooms look like lofts, but our neighbouring buildings looked all industrial too. Not a promising sight to a pair of empty stomachs (no need to purchase the food on Ryan Air, they have enough of my money thank you very much). Thankfully after a quick lap around the block we noticed that many of the buildings had been converted into shops and restaurants as well and we quickly popped into a Spanish Tapas bar for some light snacks. Why Spanish? Because it was there, I guess.

Another vacation and another reminder that I spend far too much time on details of hotels and airport transfers and not enough time on such simple things as learning “hello” and “thank you” in the local language. Luckily those childhood road trip pit stops at Taco Bell have equipped me with enough Spanish to recognise key things like ‘pollo’ and ‘queso’. Looking at the menu and choosing a tapas plate to share I’m grateful it was Spanish we happened upon and not say, Hungarian. I’m even more grateful when we order from our waitress since she gives us a look of absolute fear when she realised we speak no Finnish. Mental note, must learn more of the local language lest I am mistaken for an American.

Saturday the rental company drops off our skis at our hotel and drives us to the Kauppi Park. The Finnish fella tells us that due to warm weather and lack of snow we are his first customers of the season. They must have much higher standards than us because we think there is more than plenty:

I think my memory of cross country skiing on the Lake Placid Olympic tracks back in the 1990s are a bit hazy because I remember cross country skiing being much easier:

Day 1 is a painful experience.

Day 2, we’re sore, but we’re convinced that we might have learned something.
Back at Kauppi park we realise that it won’t be a quiet day of solitude in the forest. Instead a local race is on and there are loads of Finnish children geared up in race gear and pinnies. We watched for a bit.
This was one of those lovely travel moments when you accidentally become witness to some truly authentic local culture.

Back on the tracks we spend a few hours exploring the forest and are pleased to note that we did in fact learn something the day before. Today we fall much less.
This also gives us time to enjoy some of the views:

That evening we purposefully choose our restaurant, and we choose a Finnish tourist trap called Viking. At least the menu came in English because there is no way I would know the words for reindeer or wild pheasant (both delicious by the way). We also stopped into a very bizarre Spy Museum and wandered the town a bit. But the cold wind in the evening keeps us mostly indoors and in the cozy cafes scattered around the town centre.

By midnight the “On Time Airline” lands in Stansted over 30 minutes late. Our muscles are sore and our cheeks still have the rosy remains of a weekend outdoors.   About that cultural rebirth?  Well there were museums, converted industrial buildings, theatre and giving the other guests in our hotel clearly a ballroom dance competition on. Yet I’m sceptical to think that this could at all be similar to a weekend in Liverpool.
But on the train ride back from the airport I can’t help but be at least a bit curious.

To set the record straight, no we don’t have a thing for rain.

Several of my friends who lived here last year told me about this heat wave in London last year in August and about the general lack of air condition in the city that makes things miserable. When I started working and commented on our freezing cold a/c (in April!) coworkers told me I would be happy come August, when it’s HOT. So, with that in mind, I figured we’d be eager to escape the heat and want to head north into Scandinavia. So several months ago I booked us tickets to Bergen, a city that averages over 260 days of rain per year! 3 days in the crisp Norwegian Fjords, oh how clever I thought I was.

But then we get the 2007 floods and the worst summer on record (since the 1700’s apparently) and I feel a bit silly flying north for the last bank holiday of the year.

But with e-tickets burning a hole in our inbox, it’s off to the fjords for us.

As the plane makes it’s pass over Bergen, first impressions are excellent: dark green landscape of small islands dotted with brightly coloured houses. After a slight delay with EuropeCar, we loaded into our green Ford and headed North.

Driving in western Norway is probably as close to driving in a car commercial as you can get. Tight narrow roads wind through the forested hills meanwhile breathtaking scenery drops down into the valleys below you. Once you get about 2 hours outside of Bergen the traffic dies down nicely giving you that “closed course” feel (Except when you round those blind corners and find yourself head on with a tour bus).

To get through the impossible landscape, the Norwegians have cut hundreds of tunnels into the fjords, some as long as 24km, many of which cut directly through the fjord. But with the landscaped so geographically shredded the infrastructure is further supplemented with high class car ferries.

We made our home base for the weekend in Mundal, a tiny village in the Sognefjord, Europes largest Fjord.

This village may only have 2 hotels and 1 cafe, but it still manages to have 14 bookshops and the self declared title: Norway’s Book Town.

I’ll be honest, those who know me well, know that the idea of paper books sitting out in the damp outdoors does not sit well with me. But that’s another story.

***

Sunday brings us across another car ferry to Ornes to check out the Norway’s oldest stave church:

.. and later that day to Jostedalen Glacier, the largest glacier in continental Europe. Both stops involved a bit of a hike, clearly the glacier more so:

The fjords are a place where photos just can’t do it justice. The scenery is truly magnificent.
After several weeks in Iceland in 2003, we are no stranger to glaciers. But with this one we managed to get a more dramatic view of the glaciers edge. In Iceland, the end of the glacier more subtly melted into the rock, where as here it appeared to be cleanly sliced revealing the layers of blue and white on the interior.

That evening we drove back to Mundal snacking on Wasa rye crispbreads topped with local Yarlsberg cheese and thin slices of dried salted lamb. Norwegian food is in fact quite delicious. The meatballs with cloudberry sauce we had for dinner the night before were excellent as was our lunch of Smorbord, open faced sandwiches common to Scandinavia that we first sampled in Copenhagen in 2005. And as we learned earlier that day, local raspberries taste uncannily like gummy Swedish Berries. Thankfully unlike Iceland, Norway is not a culinary dead spot.

***

Monday we decide to take a long scenic route back to Bergen starting with an hour and a half long car ferry across the fjord to the small port village of Vangsnes. Cruising the fjords gives you perspective as to just how massive the surrounding hills are. Ribbons of glacier waterfalls trickle down the slopes of the hills; it’s a peaceful way to travel.

As we make our way back to Bergen, our little green Ford makes the shockingly steep climb out of the Sognefjord away from Vangsnes and remarkably over into the next fjord just south of us.
It’s at the top though that we experience the most memorable scenery of the trip.

At the top of the fjord, the trees disappear and the landscape turns to rugged moss and rocks. The temperature drops to about 6C and for a while it’s only us and the frisky sheep. We stop and take time to breathe in the air.

I look around and note a scattering of small bright red coloured farm houses and quietly hope that we can find a guest house for next time.

Oh, to spend a weekend on top of a fjord in almost solitude rambling along the rocks with only the sheep.
I quickly sketched out a future long weekend.
We learned early in our travels that even though we adore living in big cities, we do have a thing for vacationing in remote desolate places. Iceland, Atiu, and now this place, Vikafjellet.

With an early evening flight to catch, we tore ourselves away and zipped down into the valley on the other side and after a few hours (and many more winding roads) later we reached Bergen.

It may not have been sunny skies and beachy weather, but a weekend in the Norwegian wilderness seemed to satisfy our August Bank Holiday needs.
But perhaps I’m not entirely fulfilled.
After 3 days I’m left pining for the fjords.

We took Friday off to go visit the Roman city, Bath and then spend the weekend in the Cotswolds with Jason’s parents.
More on Bath later when we get our memory card back and have photos to share. As for the Cotswolds, they were quite beautiful, even when flooded.

Evesham, one of the hardest hit towns over the past few days is only 19 miles away from where we were.
Even Oxford where we ended up this afternoon, 45 miles away, had signs of flooding:

Jason’s parents are in town visiting. Today, with Jason, they went up to Cambridge.

This is a shot of them punting along the Cam:

Not the most ideal weather, but they said they enjoyed it just the same.

And it seems not everyone had the best person steering their punt: