I e-mailed this in daily installments to my friends, and this is just a compilation of those e-mails. I have corrected some bits of misinformation, and added some other corrections in square brackets [ like this ].
Monday-Tuesday, May 6-7, 2024 I can’t walk on the plane, but I can’t NOT walk in the airports
My limo driver was very nice, and she drove like a demon, but carefully. It was nice to see someone who knew how to drive fast safely. We got to the airport in plenty of time.
My flight was on a 787. I’ve never been on one before. They have the narrowest aisles I’ve ever seen on a plane. No room to pass anyone. I was told by everyone I should walk during the flight to prevent blood clots. Impossible. I couldn’t walk when the carts were in use, and very little when they weren’t. Fortunately, my seat was 3 feet from the toilet. I got an aisle seat without asking or paying, which was nice.
My laptop was under the seat in front of me and didn’t fit well, so I had no place for my feet. The seat was hard too. I couldn’t fall asleep, though I did close my eyes in an attempt a few times.
I landed at terminal 3 in Heathrow, and my next flight was from terminal 2. There are buses between some of the terminals, but not those two. So I walked what seemed miles and miles just to get to passport control and baggage, then several more miles to get to terminal 2. I tried sleeping sitting up there, but just rested for an hour or two. I had a lunch around three o’clock, which is good. American served a rather nice chicken dinner overnight, which surprised me, and a simple breakfast.
As I write this, I’m flying to Tallinn after 10:30 pm and haven’t eaten since that lunch.
No entertainment on the SAS flight to Stockholm, but I wanted to sleep anyway. No chance. I need to get one of those neck rests. My posture is lousy so my head tilts forward. I can’t lean back and stretch out without a neck rest, and I can’t sleep with my head down.
Stockholm was another marathon walking competition. They have very few signs showing departures, so I had trouble finding what gate I needed. Despite just changing planes, I had to go through passport control and security again. Passport control was hell. Four short lines, so I took the shortest. Bad mistake. There was a guy at the window for over ten minutes. Every other line was just zipping along, but not mine. When I finally got to another window, the clerk didn’t like my passport. Sweden is not making any friends with me.
Then another long hike to the gate, past all the closed restaurants I wouldn’t have had time to eat in anyway. No food on the flight to Tallinn, so I’m hoping I can find something at the hotel when I get there after midnight. I’m writing this on the plane to save time when I get to the hotel.
Later. Much later. It is now 1:18 am in Tallinn, 5:18 pm in DeKalb where my laptop thinks it still is. I have finally reached my hotel, the Mercure Tallinn. I chose it because it’s right by the airport and I could walk to it. Yeah, I didn’t know how much walking I was going to be doing today. I probably could, if I knew exactly where it was. I didn’t. I neglected to print a map showing just where it was at the airport. I asked a girl working in a quiki-mart where it was. She apologized for her lack of English and pointed me down the road.
It was probably a good pointing, but not specific enough. I saw signs for hotels, but not this one. I ended up going back to the airport and getting a taxi to drive me here. Two minutes, ten euros, including tip. I did buy a sandwich from the quicki-mart, so I have something to tide me over till breakfast.
The room is nice, with a huge mirrored wall just inside the door. Weird. There’s a safe in the closet, not that I need it, and a mini-fridge. The desk chair is modern but the other chairs look comfortable.
It’s late. I haven’t had any real sleep in two days. I’m going to bed as soon as I send this out.
Wednesday, May 8, 2024 I learn the bus system.
This bright, sunny morning, looking out my window, I can see the other buildings I knew were the wrong hotel, so I was close. The Mercure Tallinn has a huge neon sign, impossible to miss, but not facing the airport. Which made it very easy to miss. It was worth 10 euros not to spend the night wandering around.
I got eight hours sleep last night. I only wanted 7 so I could get showered and dressed for breakfast. My alarm didn't go off and I woke up twenty minutes before breakfast was over. So I showered after breakfast. Nice big plate of scrambled eggs, a long skinny tasty sausage, some toast. They had a lot of different honeys and I chose one mixed with blueberries. It sounds great, but it tastes only like honey. There was pulp in the orange juice from a machine, and the coffee was good, too.
Now to go exploring. First step was to find the bus. I know there’s a bus from the hotel/airport to the old town of Tallinn and that the stop is nearby. The man at the desk tells me it’s the #2 bus and it’s right in front of the hotel. How convenient. He also tells me the return #2 bus will drop me off a bit beyond the hotel, but it’s a short walk. Remember this, it’’ll be on the test.
I knew the bus wouldn’t actually go into the old town, just nearby. I followed the bus’s trip on my town map, and when the bus took a turn I thought would be away from the old town, I got off. I soon found out I was premature. One more stop would have been better. The proper stop lets me off at a town park, very nice, with odd benches. Half the bench has a back, the other half doesn’t. In the middle is a small table thing sticking out of the bench.
Once beyond the park, I was close to the Viru Gate, part of the old town fortifications. There are other towers and lengths of wall here and there all over the town. This is the most picturesque, and the centerpiece for a large square. On one side of the street leading up to the gate was a block-long flower market, very pretty.
From the gate I went to Katarina Passageway, an old narrow alley. It’s named for a church that used to stand on one side of it. The church burned down, except for one wall which makes that side. Lots of shops, most of them crafts people selling to the tourists. One place sold stained glass pieces, really beautiful stuff. There were other shops offering textiles and leather goods.
The town museum was interesting, set in an old merchant’s house. There’s a lot of porcelain, pottery, and such in the cellar, some of it very nice. On the second floor were some large model ships, Tallinn having been a Hansa town. One room was devoted to the czars who ruled Estonia at one time. On the top floor was the adults only section. I couldn’t think what sort of museum collection could be 18+. It turned out to be the history of prostitution in Tallinn. I think. All the signs were only in Estonian. Most of the exhibits were tame, stuff your maiden aunt wouldn’t blush at.
I did a lot of wandering, and it’s a good town for that. Lots of small buildings, and most were attractive. I wandered out to the most northerly tower, Fat Margaret, a wide tower and associated buildings. Rather impressive. I was getting tired by this time, and hungry. It was only the middle of the afternoon, but I had only eight hours sleep after being up two days. And a nice big breakfast after a skimpy diet still left me eager for something to eat.
I found a place to eat right away, but it was closed on Wednesday. A place that was open was Gelato Ladies, who served me a very tasty chocolate gelato. It wasn’t a big snack, but it helped take the edge off my hunger. There were lots of places for a full meal, but not too many snack stands.
I had felt rested enough when I started out, but I hadn’t really caught up on my sleep. So I was too tired to see all I might have. I did find a really nice souvenir shop as I made my way back out of the old town. I often don’t find good gifts for people until late in my trips, but this shop had some very nice pieces. I gave Dolores a dog once, and I think a horse. This time she gets a different animal, a stegosaurus.
I got to the highway that goes around the old town and looked for a #2 bus stop. Nope, not here. Some stops catered to almost all the buses in town, but not #2. So I went back to the stop I had gotten off when I came into Tallinn, hoping the bus would run a loop and bring me back to the hotel. Nope, again. It dropped me off at the harbor where the cruise ships come in. I asked and was told that the #2 bus would start off again in a short while.
The bus is cool. Just tap your credit card on a thingy and you’ve bought your ticket. There’s a screen showing the next half dozen stops, so you can’t miss yours. The stop near my hotel was at the airport. [But see what I learned the next day, below.] In fact, I got off the bus where I had given up searching for the hotel the night before. In the day, I could see the hotel’s sign in the near distance, but it doesn’t face the airport, which is why I hadn’t seen it then.
So now I know where to get off when I go back into the old town tomorrow, and where to get back on to return (across the street from where I get off). Tomorrow I’ve got a few places to see that are fairly near each other, and I’ll probably have time to just walk around, too. It’s a pretty town and easy to walk all over. They have something I’ve never seen before. At home, when the walk light is running out, sometimes there’s a clock telling you how many seconds you have to cross. They have that here, too, but also a counter for the red light, telling you how soon it’ll change.
Lots of schoolkids. Boys in ones or twos, girls in packs, either for safety in numbers, or to intimidate everyone else on the street. Cars are allowed in the old town, but they’re not a problem for the pedestrians. You need to keep an eye out for them, but not that much. You do need to watch out for the bicyclists, though. Some sidewalks have a bike lane that takes up half the walk. Lots of bike delivery men riding fast to make another delivery. Also motorized scooters and other hazards to walkers.
Dinner was duck breast, served with peas and bacon, and an apple puree. Potato puree was my side. And a nice dark beer to wash it down. Dessert was a cherry and chocolate thing that tasted fine but looked weird.
I’m going to make it an earlier night to help catch up on my sleep, so this is the end.
Thursday, May 9, 2024 Stairs, stairs, stairs
I got caught up on my sleep, too much so, in fact. I was up early, had a nice big breakfast, and headed out to the old town again. I got there just after nine a.m. Too early, nothing opens before ten. And it was chilly. The Info Office was open, and a few coffee shops, so I could get warm and kill time.
I went to St. Nicholas church, which had a very nice enormous altarpiece, and many other fine items in their silver museum. They also had a large painting of the Dance of Death. Only part of it; it was originally much longer but the rest was lost. The church was mostly destroyed in World War II so some of the original stuff is long gone.
Then I wanted to go to Kiek-in-de-kok, an artillery tower as part of the bastions defending Tallinn. It’s very large, easy to see, and hard to get to. I followed my map to where I thought it should be and saw it up above me. But there wasn’t any way up to it. I looked at the map more closely and realized I had to go around the block to get to it.
Around the block and up the stairs. Lots of stairs. But there it was at last. I went in and bought my ticket for the bastion passages and the towers. The ticket lady said to go through the passages first, then come back and do the towers. A bit confusing, but it didn’t seem too hard.
Down some stairs into the bastion passages, where troops used to travel from one part of the defenses to another. Over the centuries they’ve been also used as air raid shelters, a hideout for the Soviet propaganda station, and by homeless people. Not all that interesting in the end. I came out down at the bottom of the hill I’d climbed to get to the tower.
Back up the stairs to see the other towers. They weren’t that interesting, either. Going back down, I was back at St. Nicholas church. I was hungry and cold and found a place to get food and warm. After lunch I went to the Old Hansa restaurant to make a reservation for dinner. Then on to the town hall, which isn’t open to the public.
Holy Spirit church was though. It has two balconies, one on each side of the nave. Nice, but that’s all it had. Across the street was the Great Guild Hall, now a museum. With stairs. Half the museums are in buildings with cellars and they all feel they have to use that space for exhibits. It wouldn’t be so bad, but the steps are giant sized, nine inches or more per step.
When I finished that place I was worn out. I went back to the hotel and rested for a couple of hours. On the trip back, I noticed the bus was passing my hotel, and had just stopped there. When the desk clerk told me the return stop was just down the road, I didn’t realize how close it was. Just beyond the side door. In the evening I went back into town for dinner. The Old Hansa advertises itself as a medieval restaurant, with waitresses dressed as serving girls and musicians playing period music. It’s nice, it’s expensive, it’s worth the price.
The woman who took my reservation recognized me when I walked in and asked if I wanted a table on the first floor, or the second or third. I told her I was tired of stairs and the first floor would be fine. I had a nice waitress who spoke English to everyone. She spoke English to people who weren’t speaking it to each other, at least one couple who I believe were Estonian, and one who were Danish. But she was good and answered all my questions about the food.
I ordered the bear, and a liter of dark spiced beer. Both were excellent. Dessert was a rose pudding. A pudding with some rose petals. She told me if I ate the rose petals, it would add five years to my life. I ate them. A silly superstition, but why take chances?
A pair of older women were on my right, and while I waited for my food, one of them asked me where I was from. So we talked for a while. She and her friend were from Finland, in Tallinn to celebrate her birthday. After they left, the couple on the other side asked where I was from. They were from Denmark. We talked about our next election mostly. They were replaced by a woman from Wilmette and her husband from Vienna, Austria. I got to talk to lots of people over dinner.
Tomorrow I get a car and go out and terrorize the natives.
Friday, May 10, 2024 I can’t find the Narva Hotel because hotels in Estonia have two Ls.
I got up a little later today, had another big breakfast, and went out to rent a car. I had already made all the arrangements online, all that was left was just signing some papers. How hard could that be? It was like that SNL skit, “No Coke, Pepsi.” I wanted a stick shift, but they gave me a manual drive. I had agreed to a Skoda, they gave me a Toyota Yaris. I had bought a full insurance package from some third party insurer, they didn’t like it. They kept trying to get me to buy their insurance as well. Fat chance of my paying twice for the insurance. This was not some local fly-by-night operation, it was Hertz.
I soon discovered the only thing I forgot for this trip – the cigarette plug adapter for the GPS. I had to plug it into the USB port to get the GPS working and there was only one port. So I had to do without my USB thumb drive with music. I used my Walkman instead and that was just as good.
I had two museums I wanted to see before I left Tallinn, both in a park east of the city. The GPS took me there, well, close to there. There was a lot of roadwork going on and it wanted me to drive through the construction work. It wasn’t the right place anyway. I did find the right place after a bit. Kadriorg Palace was big, with a beautiful oak staircase, and some rather dull paintings. They had a special exhibit on of Spanish painters, some of whom could actually paint. The other museum was across the street and smaller. Most of its contents were copies, works in imitation of someone, or things from the studio of so-and-so. Still they were mostly very good. Even the unidentified sculptures stored randomly in the statuary room were very good.
Finally I hit the road to Narva on the eastern border of Estonia. I made only one little mistake. I was supposed to take the third exit from a rotary, but there were two lanes going into the rotary and I took the short one. Wrong. That only went to the first exit. I had to drive several miles before I could get off the expressway and turn around.
Estonia is fairly flat, with lots of trees. Pines and some tall skinny birch trees just starting to get leaves. The strangest thing about the expressway was the large number of bus stops along it. There were bus stops in places I couldn’t see any houses. There were bus stops where there wasn’t an interchange. Just lots of bus stops.
I usually create a list of places I want to go, with latitude and longitude for the GPS. I didn’t do that this time. I figured, it didn’t matter. I’ll just type in the name of my hotel in Narva and it’ll find it. Nope. The best I could do was downtown Narva. When I got there, I did another search and found, not the Narva Hotel I had looked for, but the Narva Hotell, with two Ls. Estonians like double letters. Lots of aa, ii, oo in their words.
I found the hotel, and the neighborhood worried me. It looked like places I’ve seen on the south side of Chicago. But the hotel is nice, with friendly staff. I had a very nice duck breast with sweet potatoes and berries, and another good dark beer.
The only disaster to occur was that I lost my printed copy of my itinerary. I had it in Tallinn but it’s gone now. I still have a copy on the laptop so I used my phone camera to take pictures of the pages. Better than nothing. Tomorrow I see an art museum and the castle.
Saturday, May 11, 2024 Two castles today – how wonderful!
Today started out terrible. My mouse died. No, it didn’t quite die, but it was very sick. For some reason the buttons weren’t working properly. Sometimes the left button worked, sometimes not. The right button was totally dead. I tried switching to the touch screen but that doesn’t do some things I wanted to do.
I had only wanted to check my email and the weather forecast, so it wasn’t impossible, but I knew I couldn’t use the laptop without a proper mouse. The desk clerk suggested a store that might have computer stuff and gave me its name. The GPS found too many options with the name, but I guessed right and found a big box store. No, a huge box store, a cross between a multi-floor super Target and a mall. I went in, saw an Information booth, and started for it. Right away I saw the store next to it sold computers. Fantastic! I got a new mouse and was so happy!
Then on to Narva Castle. It was built on the border in the old days to protect Estonia from a Russian invasion, and it’s still on the same old border. Across the river you can still see the Russian castle. Narva Castle is open as a military museum. The main, very tall, tower wasn’t included in the ticket. The main building was all I could see.
It was full of military stuff, mannequins in military uniforms from different eras, weapons, models of weapons, weapons that looked too corroded to be real but might have been. The mannequins were dressed well, but they were all blind-folded. No idea why.
The only part that was really interesting was the room that overlooked the river. Large windows gave a good view of the outer walls on both sides, and the Russian castle on the other side of the river. Estonia knows how to make a point, too. On the walls facing Russia are the flags of the European Union, Estonia, and Ukraine.
It was OK, but not much of a castle inside. The outside looked nice, but I couldn’t walk around on it. Anyway, I had another castle to visit, in Rakvere, halfway back to Tallinn. A longish drive, with lots of trucks at first, then slow drivers you couldn’t get a chance to pass. Still, it was a nice sunny day and the countryside is pleasant.
Rakvere is a beautiful town, full of gorgeous houses, all different, painted in interesting ways. I stopped and took lots of pictures of them. The castle was off in back of the town some distance. It looks very impressive as you approach it. The inside is set up to look like a working castle, sort of. I was able to walk through a passageway behind one of the walls, where archers could shoot at invaders who had gotten inside the castle. Another steep staircase led up to a tower top. Nice view, but I had to go back down the same way I’d come up. I did it safely but only because I watched every step.
There were several signs advertising the wars fought in the area. If Sweden, Poland, and/or Russia wanted to fight a war, Estonia was a convenient battleground. I don’t think anyone asked the Estonians their opinion on this.
I was surprised the bar closed at 3:30, but then the castle closes at 4 in May. A couple of huge rabbits in a pen in the yard, and three strange looking geese in another. The castle wasn’t in great shape but I’ve seen worse. The main parts were in good shape, even if the tower tops were ragged. A nice castle, nicer than the one in Narva.
My hotel is the Villa Theresa, a modest looking building, but big inside. Two lounges with overstuffed sofas and chairs. A big dining room, already set up for the night’s feast, with two or three dozens of settings. I found out later it was set up for a birthday party, with a huge turnout. I ate dinner in the lobby.
Dinner was breast of duck again, with veggies and pureed yams. A good dark beer, and some fine chocolate ice cream with blueberries for dessert finished off the meal. More castles tomorrow, and maybe warm weather. Today wasn’t that cold, but the wind was vicious.
Sunday, May 12, 2024 I finally understand Estonian stairs
Another bright sunny day in Estonia, and warmer. I left off my sweater, and took off the jacket in the afternoon. It got up to about 64 late in the day. The forecast for the next week is 60s and even 70s. Yea!
Almost no traffic in the morning, a lot in the early afternoon, then a lot less later on. Church, Sunday driving, then home for supper? I don’t know. But it was a good day for driving. On the highway. Only. My first stop was the castle in Paide and TomTom took me right there. On a road that may have actually just been a pedestrian walk. I made it to the castle safely, actually. The trouble was when I left. The manager told me to continue the route I had come in on, and it had a steep slope I couldn’t see over. At the top of the slope, I was looking at the sky and couldn’t see around the turn right there, and I ran off the road a bit. I backed up OK, but the car took a ding. Later, I missed the way down the hill and had to back up to get to it, scraping a couple of spots.
The castle was interesting. Each floor had a theme, showing the historical development of Estonia. Some of the movies they showed were silly, some of the exhibits were good. They had portraits of every monarch or noble who had anything to do with Estonia and environs. Including King Henry III of France, because he was once King of Poland, and Poland was interested in the Baltic states.
What we see today is a reconstruction of the tower. The original was blown up by retreating Nazi troops. Lots of Estonia got destroyed during WWII by one side or the other, or both in turn. But the reconstruction looks good.
The ticket included a visit to the town museum, which was mostly dull. There was some furniture with very nice carving in one room. Upstairs they had a suite of exhibits about medicine. One thing was odd, the height measuring device. Everything was nineteenth century, so I expected to see metric marks on it. Nope, it was marked in English inches and feet. I tested it to be sure.
On to Poltsama, with the GPS acting weird. It took me past the castle to a parking lot a block away. I couldn’t see the castle from there. I missed it driving past because I couldn’t see the tower. I was also distracted by a lack of money. The cash I had taken out at the start of the trip was almost all gone and I needed to get some more. I tried three gas stations, not a single ATM in any of them. I tried a couple of small groceries, too small for an ATM apparently. I went to one larger grocery, but it didn’t have one either. I bought some stuff for lunch, hoping I could get some cash back on my credit card. I couldn’t, but I had a problem finishing the transaction. An attendant came to handle that and I asked her where I might find an ATM. She pointed me to the even larger store across the street. I had chosen the wrong store.
Anyway, I paid and went into the castle. It’s empty. Big thick walls, holes in them for the floor joists, window holes, but no floors, or internal walls. Before WWII it had some nice interiors, but war took care of that. One thing it had was stairs. Lots of stairs. I started up just to see what was on the upper floors. Not much, but after a while it just seemed right to keep going up. It was tiring, but the view from the tower top was very good.
Next came the castle in Viljandi. The guidebook fooled me on this one. It showed a carefully cropped picture of a castle wall, and I assumed there was more castle just out of the picture. Nope, that was just the biggest piece of castle wall left in the place. It had been a very large stronghold for the Teutonic Knights, but most of it is gone. What’s left is hard to identify.
They made use of the topography, setting walls on the far side of two deep gullies, which became natural moats. The castle had three baileys, all with walls and gates, but most are gone. There are a couple of rock things at the end of the castle. One very large rectangle of stone, part of some wall maybe. The other looks like a chimney, but I couldn’t see the front and wasn’t going to climb down to look at it.
There was another small bit of rock sticking up with a narrow path leading out to it. On both sides of the path there was a steep dropoff. And there’s this guy taking a picture of his wife. She’s perched on the little bit of rock, and he’s standing on the steep slope, as if it was flat ground. His kids raced up to take his wife’s place and no one fell down and was killed. Now I know the truth about the stairs in Estonia. I used to think it was because so many people are tall that high steps didn’t bother them. No. They’re part mountain goat. Even young children jump from rock to rock everywhere they go. Stairs can’t be steep enough for them.
Finding the castle had been almost impossible. The GPS kept telling me to go to this rotary, take the second exit, and turn right. Except I couldn’t turn right there. I gave up and looked at a sign post. It pointed to the castle, and I found a place to park near it. I had been looking for the picture in the guidebook, but there’s very little left that looks like a castle.
Finding my hotel was also a challenge. TomTom took me right past it. I wasn’t looking up so I didn’t see the sign. I drove down the road, and it said, Here’s your destination. Where? I checked the address it showed, Tartu 29. I drove slowly down Tartu street, found number 29 and pulled in. The neighborhood was kind of run down, but this house looked nice. But it was a house, not a grand hotel. So I got out my phone and checked Google. The right address is Tartu 11. Using that address, I got here.
Dinner was the final challenge of the day. The hotel has a restaurant, but it’s closed on Sundays. So are most of the other restaurants in town. The lady at the desk gave me a list of places nearby that would be open and have good Estonian food. All closed today. I went online to find a place. One very nice one was being remodeled. Another place was open, it said, so I drove there. That was the same place that was being remodeled.
One place had a difficult name but should have been open. I can’t tell you if it was because the GPS didn’t like the name, or the address when I tried that. I ended up going to a pizza place. The pizza was OK, but too small. The dark beer was fine, so that was something. I was still hungry so I stopped at a mini-mart and bought some sliced meat. I had some sliced cheese I had bought for lunch. That made enough of a meal to fill me finally.
TomorrowI head for the west coast and end up on an island. The country is beautiful, lots of trees, no hills to speak of, mostly straight roads. This should be another nice drive.
Monday, May 13, 2024 Drive, drive,drive. Damn, it’s closed.
I forgot to mention something yesterday. I had just checked into my hotel yesterday when I got a phone call, and not from any of my friends. My neighbor Sean, from across the street, called to see if I was all right. No one had seen me for a week and they were concerned. That’s really nice of them. I intended to let him know I was going on vacation, but I hadn’t seen him before I left. I let my next door neighbors know, but that was all.
Another nice sunny day, a little cool in the morning but it reached about sixty by day’s end. It was a good day for traveling, which is nice because I had a long way to go. Over two hundred miles, off to the west coast of Estonia, then to one of the islands in the Baltic.
I went to the west coast town of Haapsalu to see the bishop’s castle. This time I had no trouble finding the castle. There it was, big as life, huge outer walls, nice ruins inside. Closed Monday and Tuesday through the end of May. Rats! The guidebook said nothing about that, which is why I came today, and not Wednesday. No help for it. Closed is closed. If I were younger and more energetic, I might have tried climbing over the fence...nah, not even then.
Today was supposed to be a long day, almost nine hours in my schedule. I just saved a few hours of looking at a castle. Now I was ahead of schedule and got even more ahead when I got back on the road.
On most roads, the speed limit is 90 km/hr or about 55 mph. The roads were mostly empty today, and I had the luck to get behind some speedsters. I was doing just over 90 when the first guy passed me. I figured if I followed him and could keep up, I’d make better time. It was great, he passed everyone, and I followed. He turned off at one point, but I picked up another soon after. He was even faster, sometimes hitting 120 km/hr (75 mph).
I went to Virtsu to catch a ferry boat for the island I was going to visit, and got there just before 3 pm. I had to wait for the ferry to show up, but I was first on, and therefore first off. The trip took about half an hour. It was interesting to see how flat the islands are. There was supposed to be a bridge between the first island and the one I wanted, but it’s more of a wide causeway. TomTom took me right to the hotel, right to the front door in fact. That was too bad because the parking lot was in back.
It’s a nice modern room, with a big window I can open. Too cool for that, but still nice. Wifi is a problem. There’s no charge for it, and no password. It just doesn’t want to work on the second floor. I can’t connect with my laptop, or my phone. The signal strength is good for both, but no connection. I took the laptop down to the lobby to show the desk clerk the problem, and the wifi was working there. Back upstairs, nothing.
So, I’ll write this now, then go downstairs later to check my emails, and send this off. Then I can come back up and goof off. I’ll have some help with a local beer I bought today. I decided I needed to pack my traditional picnic lunch for eating on the road, so I went to a big grocery store. I got some cheese, some ham, and a few rolls. I also went to the liquor department and picked up five dark beers, all different just to have something in my room for after dinner.
Tuesday, May 14, 2024 Beautiful castle, bummer rest of the day.
I sent off yesterday’s email before dinner, because the wifi wasn’t working upstairs. So I didn’t mention last night’s dinner. I had pulled lamb, with another good dark beer. The Estonians do some very nice dark beers. I’d never heard of pulled lamb, and I’m not sure I’ve ever tried pulled pork. But the pulled lamb was good. It was supposed to come with crispy baked potatoes, but they got a bit soft in the lamb gravy. Doesn’t matter, it was very good.
Today was another beautiful sunny day, with very little wind. The temperature was about 68F all day, really nice. I started off with the bishop’s castle here in Kuressaare. It looks rather plain and uninteresting from the outside. Even inside it’s not imposing. Nice, but not imposing. However, go inside and it’s marvelous. The rooms have all been turned into exhibition halls for various shows. Artists, historical events, whatever.
They have a large, deep pit called the lions’ pit. Supposedly they kept lions there once upon a time. Actually they didn’t, it was used for garbage and sewage. A bishop who annoyed the populace was killed and his body was dumped into it. No lions, though.
The main tower is tall, and I climbed to the top. Every step on the way up had a series of jokes about communism, obviously put there after the Russians had left. There were exhibits on life under the Nazis, and then under the Soviets. A sample Soviet apartment, very small and spare.
There were a number of staircases going to various places, all with tall steps and I didn’t take any of them. I measured one step on a short set of stairs, it was over nine inches tall. Imagine that for a full flight. All the steps weren’t that tall, but some were. At the very top of the tower is a cafe. You’d think that was a bad location for a cafe, but in the summer it does good business. People who have climbed up are tired and want some refreshment. A very nice young lady who worked at the ticket desk spoke good English. She said she used to work at the cafe and even she was worn out climbing up there. They serve ice cream, but you have to eat it there. They don’t want slippery ice cream on the steps going down.
A very nice castle, well restored, and well explained. They have a series of pictures showing the site before and after the restoration. Very interesting. The castle was originally just your normal medieval castle. In the sixteenth or seventeenth century, it was remade into a star fort, and the bastions are still there today. It looks very nice.
The afternoon was supposed to be spent looking at churches. I couldn’t find the church at Kaarma. It was supposed to be great, a fantastic church in the middle of nowhere. All I found was nowhere. TomTom took me to a couple of ordinary houses first. I prodded it, and it sent me to what looked like a warehouse. I gave up and started going to the next church. Suddenly, I saw a sign pointing to the Kaarma Church. Five kilometers this way. Great. I drove six kilometers, just to be sure. No church. No sign saying turn here for the church. I did find two cemeteries, but that’s all. I did see the turnoff for Goodkaarma, but it was spelled wrong, so I didn’t have any.
So, on to the church in Karja, the smallest church on the island. I saw it and doubted the claim immediately. It looks pretty big. Unfortunately, it was locked, so I couldn’t go in. One very nice castle, two failed churches, what a day.
So I drove to my hotel for tonight. The roads had been mostly empty all day. Some NATO troops out doing exercises or something. Semis. Only a few cars. I was doing 109 km/hr and a guy passes me. Oh, goody, another speedster to follow! But he wasn’t that much faster. I think he just didn’t like following anyone.
I was second onto the ferry this time. It takes about a half an hour to cross to the mainland, a pretty easy trip. Lots more driving to get to the hotel in Parnu. On the way, I passed the collection of windmills. Not modern monsters for electricity, but old-fashioned Dutch style windmills. They looked nice. The guidebook said there were one of the most photographed things in Estonia. Maybe.
This hotel charges for parking. It’s 20 euros to park in their lot, or 10 euros to park across the street. I saved 10 euros by walking across the street. The room is nice, and I have a balcony. The window opens into a door onto a small balcony type area. It’s not a real balcony, because it’s just a walkway on top of the hotel, and all the other rooms on that side of the hotel share it. But it’s a nice extra.
Dinner was duck breast. Yes, again, but I love it. Two very nice dark beers (the servings were small) and a chocolate mousse finished things off. Tomorrow I go to Latvia. More new things to see. Only one possible problem. I want to go to Dundaga to see the castle. Sometimes the castle allows guests, but not now. I found a hotel not far off, and reserved a room. Then I had an email that I should pay for the room. Fine, I did. Then I got another email saying my payment hadn’t worked and could I do it again. It looked legitimate, so I did. Today I got another email saying I had canceled my reservation and did I want to redo it? So I remade the reservation with another booking company. I should have a room, maybe two. Who knows?
Wednesday, May 15, 2024 The Grand Prix course is back.
I used to talk about being on a Grand Prix race course when I drove on a very curvy, hilly road. Germany is full of them. Ireland has some beauts, as Winifred can attest. Most Estonian roads are fairly straight, with few hills. Today I got into Latvia, and found the Latvian Grand Prix course. Not any hills to speak of, but the curves are plentiful. They actually cut the speed limit as you approach some curves. In Ireland they had similar signs: Slow. Slower. Damnit, I said SLOW!
It wasn’t that bad really. Traffic was light most of the day. I had some semis to deal with early on, and again after I stopped for gas. But once I passed the last of them, it was my road alone. I made really good time, which didn’t matter because I had only one sight to see, a castle in Cesis, Latvia. The next thing on my list was just too much further that I planned on a stop here.
While I was still in Estonia I made a point of getting a picture of a road sign I’d seen everywhere. Like our deer crossing signs, it’s a moose crossing sign. It shows a moose and has a note for how far down the road you have to watch out for them. I haven’t seen any in Latvia yet. Maybe they don’t have trouble with moose here, or maybe they don’t care if you crash into one.
The castle here was billed as the strongest fortress in Latvia. It was pretty big, with two tall towers, and a third slightly smaller. There had been four originally, but I don’t know what happened to the fourth. They give visitors a map to follow around the grounds. See the catapults (not very good), the vegetable garden, the (closed) artisans workshops, the dry moat.
Then across the replacement bridge into the castle proper. This was done very nicely. They built a wooden bridge for the tourists next the supports for the original bridge, so you can see how it was built. Inside the gate, I was greeted by the candle lady. She gave me a lantern with a lit candle in it, and pointed me to the entrance to one of the towers. The lord’s bedroom and a video show were upstairs, and the stairs weren’t lit. The lantern didn’t really help, either. The lady later told me it was for an authentic feel. Authentic but dangerous. Fortunately, I had a small flashlight in my pocket.
I climbed to the top, and back down. So many stairs, and all on a spiral staircase, so half of each step was too small to put your foot on it. Then I went to the other tower. I returned the lantern first, it was a bother to carry it and my flashlight. The other tower was better lit, but I still needed the flashlight at times.
There was some interesting corbelled vaulting in both towers, but my pictures didn’t turn out very well. I did get some nice pictures of the door to the oubliette, and, shooting through an opening in the door, of the inside.
I went into the museum nearby, but all the labels were in Latvian, so I didn’t know what I was seeing. The castle rooms were all labeled in Latvian and English. Estonia was like that, too. They even had some signs with Russian on them. I went out for dinner tonight, and couldn’t understand the menu. The owner flipped the menu over to show the English side.
I left the castle about three in the afternoon, and got to my hotel fairly quickly. I asked what time dinner was, and the clerk said, they didn’t do dinner here. So I went online and found several restaurants nearby. Unfortunately, none had English menus. Three of them were close together on the same street, so I went there.
The first one was closed. Permanently, maybe. The second one was also closed. The third one didn’t even have a sign on the building any more. I saw one place that might have been fine, but it closed at 7 pm and it was already after 6:30. I kept walking down the street and found the third place on my list had just moved. I had no idea what they served, but I went in.
They served kebabs. It’s like a gyro wrapped in a taco, with salad added. This one had the french fries inside with the rest of the filling. It was pretty good. The meat was almost shaved off the base, much thinner than our gyros. I had a dessert of ice cream with banana slices and big blueberries. Tasty.
I was surprised when I left the restaurant. It was raining. First time this trip. It was sunny all day, and warm. I didn’t even bother with my jacket today. The rain didn’t cool things down much, either, and it cleared off before I got back to my hotel.
I’ve got two castles scheduled for tomorrow, and then I end up in Riga. I should have some time to walk around in the evening.
Thursday, May 16, 2024 Little traffic but lots of speed cameras
I don’t think Estonia had any speed cameras on its roads. Latvia has lots of them. It’s OK, they put up warning signs before you get to them, and TomTom lets me know about them, too. Another difference is railroads. I think I saw more in Latvia in one day yesterday than I did all week in Estonia. I’m sure they have trains in Estonia, but I don’t know how I missed them. They do leave their tracks everywhere they go, after all.
Today started out fine, then it rained and cooled down. In the afternoon it cleared and got warm again. I had a lot of driving again today. Not a lot of traffic, but the speed cameras made me slow down a lot. So did the construction zone in one town. The road was technically open, but obviously under repair. So I went down the next street going in the right direction. TomTom kept trying to get me back on the right road, and it was always a construction zone. Finally the road I was on merged with the one TomTom liked, just after the construction zone ended.
TomTom took me close to the castle in Jekabpils, called Krustpils. It might have actually led me to the door, but it doesn’t look like a castle. I thought it was a church or office building or something else. I looked in the guide book and it showed an address: 216b. I saw a number on a nearby building, 216 and a letter. I pulled in and saw the letter was an “e”. Maybe “b” is in back. Nope. Back on the street, the next building was 216d, then 216c. The next building had to be 216b and it was the one I thought wasn’t a castle.
I went into a small building I thought was the ticket office, but it was just the gift shop. The woman in it pointed me out the door to the castle. She pointed rather vaguely, however. I went to a long building with a big empty room. Next to it was a lot of stuff labeled “military objects”, topped with barbed wire.
There was a silver sculpture of an early 20th century car (really) in front of this building. A man asked me a question about it and I told him I didn’t speak Latvian, and was just looking for the castle. He pointed me to the thing that looked like a church.
I went in and it was the right place, however un-castle like it looked. The two women at the desk were very friendly, and both spoke good English. One later told me she had spent a few years in England. Even the inside doesn’t look much like a castle, but the exhibits were nice. A sample bedroom for an ordinary family had a bed that looked too small for either of the couple.
A series of small signs told about significant moments in local history. Like how the retreating Russians bombed the center out of the new bridge in 1941, and then how the retreating Germans blew up the whole thing in 1944. There used to be two towns, Jekabpils and Krustpils, one on each side of the river. With the bridge, now rebuilt, they merged into one town, keeping the name of Jekabpils.
There were some exhibits upstairs that I didn’t see. My legs were still sore from all the stairs I climbed yesterday. Walking was fine, but not stairs. The one lady kept calling me back to chat. Very friendly.
On to Koknese for another castle. TomTom started me on the way, and I thought it was taking me the wrong way, because a sign pointed another direction to the castle ruins. Looking back, having seen a map of the area, both roads may have worked. I took the longer road, though, winding forever along the river. I finally got to a parking lot and a sign that said I couldn’t drive any further. There was a map of the park and I saw the path led right to the castle, so I walked the rest of the way.
It’s a ruin all right, two big sections facing each other, nothing in between but a lot of air. It’s possible to identify some things, a window, even a window seat, some stairs. But it’s hard to say what any part was used for. It was built at the juncture of two rivers, and it has a beautiful view.
Getting to my hotel in Riga was a challenge. I took the wrong exit from the expressway and had to dodge through another construction zone. I thought it was blocked off entirely, but as I was trying to turn around, another car drove right through it. So I followed him. The GPS finally dropped me off in a small parking lot with no sign of the hotel. I tried the address, and was taken on a long roundabout route that led right to the hotel. Unfortunately, there was no parking allowed there, the street was only one lane, and a squad was coming down towards me. I managed to back down the lane safely and park in a dubiously legal spot.
The desk clerk doesn’t drive so she had no idea of where I might park overnight. She suggested a car park at the train station, which sounded good. TomTom took me to the train station, but I didn’t see a car park. I was about to drive on when I saw the sign for it. It’s actually under a shopping mall, and the price for all day was a lot cheaper than parking on the street and feeding meters.
I needed to get some more euros, and the info desk lady pointed me to two separate areas. One was all I needed. Now I had the car parked safely, money in my pocket, and all I needed was a way to get back to the hotel. I went to a bookstore to buy a map, but it was all Russian. Another bookstore did have a city map. It took a while to figure out where the hotel was and where I was. I took a while driving to the station, but it wasn’t a long walk back.
Dinner was weird. The hotel has an outside eating area and everyone must have been there. One waiter, no customers except me inside, service was slow. I had pork tenderloin medallions, very good, with a nice dark beer, and some cheesecake. I must say, the Baltic people do know how to make good dark beers. I’ve tried several by now, and they were all good.
Tomorrow I start exploring Riga. I’m in the old town, which is why I couldn’t park near the hotel. So it should be easy to walk to everything I want to see.
Friday, May 17, 2024 Riga is beautiful and I wish I had a better map.
When I planned this vacation, I made a list of all the places I wanted to see, and numbered them in order. I put the numbers on the maps for the major cities I’d be visiting, so I’d know how to plan my walks around the towns. I lost my printed schedule, but I have a copy on my phone. It’s not so convenient, but for Riga I have the map I made, with numbers. I tagged the numbers so I’d know what each was today as I roamed around.
I still had a problem. The Google map I had used wasn’t very detailed about street names, the commercial map I bought yesterday was too detailed, and too small a scale. The part I wanted was only about three inches square and hard to read. I used my camera to take a picture of a street map of the old town, which was better. I haven’t gotten lost, but I haven’t always known where I was.
Just now, as I was typing this, I got my second emergency text message today from the goddamn Democrats panicking that Biden might lose, and wanting me to give them money. Fat chance of that happening. I’ve had text messages in the name of Obama, Schumer, and generic Democrats all wanting money. I’d hoped it might stop when I was overseas, but the number doesn’t show where I am. I can’t wait for November when this will end. No, December, after the arguments from both sides about who really won.
Back to the real world. Breakfast was a cramped jumble. Last night at dinner, the room was mostly empty. This morning, it was full. It was hard to get food from the buffet line, the coffee machine had a line, and all the tables were in use. I found one that I thought was unclaimed, until the owner chased me away. Only one chair, so he had it. The couple at the next table pointed to an empty chair at their table and invited me to use it. Very kind of them. He could have had the role of Cyrano, without makeup. Very nice people.
I started off going to Riga Castle. It’s a castle, after all, and the furthest sight I wanted to see from my hotel. The president of Latvia lives there, but part is open to tourists. But not now. They’re remodeling and the museum stuff is elsewhere. I still can’t see it. Later in the day I was at the right address for the museum stuff, but it’s only open tomorrow night for a few hours, and I’ll be gone by then.
That’s OK, I could go down the street to the Swedish Gate. I found it without any trouble, even though there are no signs to identify this huge stretch of wall and parapets. Nice looking, even if unnamed. I couldn’t find St. Jakob’s Barracks, but I did find the Powder Tower, which was attached to a nice military museum. The museum was dedicated to Latvia’s military history from the First World War onward.
Interesting examples of weapons, bits of diaries about events, pictures. They had a photo of some Cossacks on ponies, real ponies or very short horses. Models of military machines, tanks, armored cars, jeeps, planes. A lot of enthusiasm for NATO, which is unsurprising, considering the neighborhood they live in. The first exhibit is a car they loaned to Ukraine a couple of years ago. They got it back with a broken windshield, a seriously bashed in front end, and other damage. It still runs, though.
I went looking for the stuff from the castle museum, and found I couldn’t see it today. But I saw the Latvian Freedom Memorial, and the two soldiers whose duty is to guard it. Very impressive.
I stopped for lunch at an outdoor restaurant. I ordered a small beer, and was told food would take forty minutes. I passed on the food. The beer menu did show options for 3 or 5 liters of beer, assuming you were thirsty enough.
I wandered back to my hotel, passing a restaurant. I had seen its sign earlier, which just said “More beers.” The menu looked good so I went back there in the evening for dinner. Braised leg of lamb, actually lamb shank, with all sorts of beans and something like grits, and berries. Very good. The first beer I tried was fantastic, one of the best dark beers I’ve ever had. It’s called Naktenis, alus no Malduguns. Which means Naktaenis, beer from Malduguns. The second beer was also good, but different. The place was busy, with diners inside and out. The wait staff were always hurrying about, but there was no confusion. Everything was well run.
Tomorrow I’ve got the cathedral and a few other places, then off to my next stop. Riga is definitely worth a visit.
Saturday, May 18, 2024 Storks!
My hotel in Riga was kind and let me stash my luggage while I finished my sight seeing. I had to go to the train station to get my car, and there was no place to park legally for any time at the hotel. So leaving the suitcase there until later was the best option. If you’re ever in Riga, the Monte Kristo Hotel is very friendly. The breakfast room is too small and crowded, the bed was lumpy, but the staff are great.
The desk clerk even told me the secret of the card controlled lights. In some hotels they give you a card with a code to use as your room key. Sometimes, it is also used to turn on the lights in the room. If you don’t stick it into a holder, the lights won’t work. That was a problem for me here, because I didn’t have a window in my room. No light without turning them on. The holder was too far from the door for me to enter and insert the card into the holder. The secret the desk clerk told me was that any card would work to turn the lights on. So I cut a piece of cardboard to the right shape, and it worked.
I went to see the cathedral in Riga first, and got there before it opened. It’s a nice big church, made of brick, which is unusual. The line to buy tickets was slow. I’m not sure why. Some people may have had questions. The ticket seller spent more time on the woman in front of me than on me, for no obvious reason.
The cathedral has a nice cloister, a beautiful pulpit, and some stained glass windows. Most are fairly ordinary, but two were very nice. There were also a couple of ‘guards’ in 16th century garb with spears. Outside, on the steps behind the cathedral, was a statue of an armadillo, out for a stroll.
Across the street from the cathedral was the Art Museum. They have a small copy of Rodin’s “The Kiss”. That’s the only famous piece they have. But they have a lot of good art in their European collection, even if not by famous people. The Asian collection is smaller, but with a couple of nice pieces. The Graeco-Roman collection is even smaller, but very good. There was a special exhibit on of Dutch 20th century art, and they shouldn’t have bothered. It was mostly bad.
In the silver collection, they have an interesting candelabra. It’s in the form of a tree, and represents the owner’s family tree. There is a truly beautiful table from India, modern, made from several semiprecious stones.
I went to the Town Hall, and it’s impressive. Two large buildings joined together, with elaborate facades. I thought about paying and going in, but decided the inside couldn’t possibly be as nice as the outside.
So I drove to Dundaga to see the castle there. Long drive, but a nice day. The temperature started at about 70 and rose to 77. Traffic was mostly fine. Along the road I saw what looked like a big bird’s nest, with a stork sitting on top of it. Just some local art, I thought. Later, after seeing the castle and on my way to tonight’s hotel, I saw another nest, this time with two storks in it. And they moved. They weren’t art, they were real!
I turned around and parked in a long driveway. I walked back to take a picture, but I only got the nest. By the time I got there, the storks had flown off, or hidden under the edge of the nest. I should have parked in a driveway that was closer. Later, I saw another one, also empty, on top of a power utility pole. These things are very large, four feet across probably. They look like a flat tootsie pop. Later still I saw another with the stork still in it. I got two pictures of that one.
Anyway, back to the castle. I had no idea what I’d find. Some accounts online said it was a total ruin, some said it had been restored and was being used as a hotel. Some said it was only sometimes a hotel, but not now. Well, it’s not a total ruin. It looks like a castle, has some nice features, but the sign on the door said “guided tours only.” I went in anyway, but saw a nice staircase and a pair of wooden window seats. The inside was mostly corridors with closed rooms all along it. It didn’t look too interesting so I left.
I was way ahead of my schedule which was good because my trip got interesting. I was going to a hotel several miles from the castle. I was following local roads, but well paved. Then I got onto a gravel road. That continued until I met some houses, where the road was paved again. Briefly. Past the houses, it was gravel again. Until it turned into a dirt road. Fortunately, it was dry. That wasn’t too bad until I saw the semi blocking the road. It was loading a lot of logs onto its trailer, and there was no room for anyone else on the road. I got out and checked the shoulder, and it looked wide enough and flat enough that I could get past the semi that way. It worked. The only bad thing was, I neglected to get a picture of the semi blocking the road.
Finally I reached the hotel, way out back of beyond. It looks nice, with a big comfy bed and a view into the yard. The bathroom sink has an unusual faucet. The water cascades over a disk in a waterfall effect. The landlady doesn’t speak English but is prepared. She used her phone to get to Google translate, typed what she wanted to tell me, and showed me the translation. Pork chops, potatoes, salad, and dessert for dinner at 8 pm. Breakfast tomorrow at 9 am. All with Google translate.
I just finished dinner. She told me I’d have pork chops, I got pork tenderloin, en brochette. Yummy! The potatoes were cut like french fries but pan fried, a little greasy. Dessert was, well, I don’t know what it was, but it was good. There was this red thing shaped like a pear, sticking out of a white base. The red on the red thing was just a coating, inside was something like ice cream, but I’m not certain it was ice cream. In the middle of that was a small dark blue globe. I was not given a choice of drink. There was a glass of fruit juice, probably orange, but I’m not sure. I’ve seen some weird things passed off as orange juice in Latvia. But, all in all, it was a good meal.
This hotel is odd. It’s in the middle of nowhere, yet they have dining space for serving three dozen people. There are three tables for eight, and several tables for two or four. There are tables and chairs on the grounds for a large party. I just can’t figure where the guests are coming from. They’ve obviously put a lot of money into this hotel, so I hope it works out for them.
Tomorrow I visit three castles and end up at a medieval hotel and restaurant in Jaunpils. The weather should continue warm all the rest of my trip, even getting up to eighty later in the week.
Sunday, May 19, 2024 Late breakfast, early dinner, later breakfast tomorrow.
The landlady at my wilderness hotel served breakfast at nine, later than I usually want it on vacation. I wasn’t going to hassle her about it, so I went along with the time. It was a huge breakfast. A large omelet, some cheese on bread, toasted. Tomatoes, sliced cheese, jellied beef, what looked like raw bacon. Plus bread, juice, and coffee.
I was going to Ventpils to see the castle, a stronghold of the Livonian Order. The castle aspects are there, but it’s mainly a museum now. In fact, the first thing I saw was a woman sweeping up the debris from a party they had last night for the museum. She swept up the big pieces, later another woman vacuumed up the rest.
The museum shows off the history of the area very nicely, with exhibits from the stone age onward. There are some very nice medieval jewelry, and an arm ring long enough to cover my whole forearm. They had some stuffed animals, a chair made entirely from moose antlers, and a pair of stuffed birds I didn’t recognize. They’re the size of a large goose or small turkey. I showed the picture to one of the woman working there and her friends gave their opinions. One looked it up on Google, they’re wood grouse, biggest of all the grouses.
I bought some souvenirs here. They had some really inexpensive amber and some other things. I had a 50 euro bill that no one wanted to break. I figured I could buy some stuff and get change. The lady who ran the gift shop didn’t want my 50 euro bill either. Apparently she thought it would break her cash reserves. I added some more items, still not enough. So we tried charging the amount. She apparently doesn’t know how to run the charge device, either. I’m pretty sure she ran the charge through and got it approved twice before finally accepting my cash. I’ll check with Capitol One when I get home. [It went through three times but Capitol One refunded the charges.]
I went to Kuldiga for the town and the castle. Re-reading the guidebook, this may have been one of the castles that wasn’t rebuilt after being burned down. Anyway, I couldn’t even see a sign for it. But the town was nice, with lots of fine old buildings. Many of them seem to be built with cedar and aren’t painted.
Last stop, Jaunpils, site of a nice old castle which is now a hotel and restaurant. I had to drive for a while under a rain cloud, but I finally escaped it. Lots of traffic for a change. At one point I joined a parade of several cars and three semis. All ahead of me, of course. One of the semis turned off soon, which still left two. Eventually I was able to pass them all, just in time to turn off onto another road.
Jaunpils looks like a castle, except for the wrapping. It’s under some serious restoration work and most of the castle is wrapped up in scaffolding, and the grounds are closed. But the hotel is still open. My original plan was to get here late in the day. But I changed the schedule and it worked out that I’d get here a little earlier. Having no castle in Kuldiga, I was even earlier.
This was a very good thing because the pub, where dinner was served, was going to close at 7. So I had dinner at 5:30. Dinner was a big chunk of venison, very tasty, with fried potatoes. Dessert was a big scoop of raspberry ice cream and a wonderful crème brulee. They brew their own beer here, and it was fine, but not special.
Breakfast tomorrow is scheduled for 10 am, the latest I’ve ever had breakfast on vacation. This is good, because the castle museum closed just as I came into it. But it reopens at 10. I can’t tour the whole castle without a reservation for a tour, but the museum guide will show me what she can.
Monday, May 20, 2024 Lithuania! Only one week left.
Breakfast was indeed at ten am. No eggs, just potatoes, some cheesy stuff mixed in with them, no ham or any meat, no toast. Coffee and juice. I ate enough, but it wasn’t what I was expecting. Then I went to see the castle museum. The lady I talked to last night was there again, getting ready to do some knitting. They also serve who only stand and wait, as the poet said, but they don’t just stand there, they knit or read. It’s a lonely job waiting for the stray tourist to show up.
We talked some more, and I visited the collection. A few interesting things, but nothing special. The whole castle tour would have been nice but I hadn’t signed up for it. Oh, well.
My next stop was the castle at Dobele, not too far away. Ruins, again, but from the outside it looked fine. Inside was a long front to a major building. The other side of that building was still there, too, but no longer connected. The main building is somewhat impressive. Unfortunately, the guidebook didn’t tell me it was closed on Mondays. Guess what day today is.
On to Rundale. I got there and realized it was what the guidebook said it was, a palace. I’m not so fond of palaces as I used to be. Too much glitz, eighteenth century furniture and paintings of people I never heard of before. And it was huge. So I visited the WC and left.
That was the right decision because the next thing on my list was the castle at Bauska. Wow! This is a great castle. Like so many others here, it’s been destroyed over and over, but it’s been restored. In fact, after the Russians left, the locals repaired the damage the Russian restorers had done. I wandered over almost all the castle, up two of the towers, and into two large buildings.
Once I paid to get in, the desk clerk showed me the way up. She opened a door and there was the spiral staircase. Easy stairs, so it wasn’t too bad. There was some nice Viking age jewelry, some tiles apparently from old ceramic stoves, and a few weapons. Upstairs in one tower were several manequins dressed in period garb. They represented the various dukes of Courland and Mecklenburg in the late 16th century. There was also a chest packed with clothes, so you could see how they packed for travel.
There was a nice piece of embroidery on a frame for working on it. Several nice pieces of lace, and some medieval shoes, including a pair of platform shoes. In the storage rooms in the cellar was a quern, which you rarely see in a collection. There was also a huge chest, almost five feet high and over six feet long.
There was a strange box hanging in the kitchen, with small vent holes. I think it may have been a way to keep live birds alive until the cooks were ready to use them.
The grand staircase in the courtyard up to the main quarters was made for the convenience of the lord of the castle. He got short steps, not the extra tall ones the servants and guards had to put up with. He also got a very nice tile floor in four colors. He also got a very fine bed, something between a four-poster and a closed bed.
The ticket has several check-boxes on it, and each room you enter has an attendant to punch the ticket for that room. I had seen everything, I thought, but I still had a box unpunched. Then I went to the back tower and a guy comes up and punches my ticket the last time. I got into the rear bailey, and the last tower.
I started at the bottom. Looking up it didn’t look too bad a climb. But you start up and there’s more and more stairs. Fortunately, they’re easy steps. But there are a lot of them. From the top, looking down at the cellar, I could see they were doing a slide show on the floor down there. There are wooden window covers at the top, and they were all open, giving a nice view of the castle and the environs.
On my way out, I paid attention to some grooves in the pavement. I had seen them earlier and ignored them. Now I realized they drained the courtyard when it rained, and sent the water out the front gate.
I saw a black bird on my way back to my car. He was not a bit shy and let me get close so I could take his picture. Google says he’s a raven, but he looks smaller than any raven I’ve ever seen and I don’t think his beak is big enough. Maybe he’s young.
Then I drove on to Birzai in Lithuania. Traffic was terrible, if you weren’t going to Lithuania. Lots of semis going into Latvia, mixed with frustrated car drivers who couldn’t pass the long lines. Birzai is famous for a brewery and a beer museum. The castle is another one that looks nothing like a castle. The guidebook did say it was closed on Monday and Tuesday. The sign out front said the same thing. But the door to the ticket office was open and a woman was sitting behind the counter. So I asked if the castle was open, and she said no. Not even a little bit. Why she was there, I couldn’t figure out. Just to irritate people like me who wanted to get in?
So I went to my hotel, which is rather nice. Modern, well furnished. Everything you’d want, except an elevator. I’ve been on the fourth floor several times on this trip, but always with an elevator. Today I’m on the third floor, and no elevator. I managed to haul my suitcase up. Getting it down tomorrow will be no problem, because gravity will help me slide it down.
My room is spacious, with a nice view of the grounds. A king-sized bed, a real desk, a comfortable chair to sit on. The room also has something I don’t think I’ve ever seen in a European hotel, a screen in a window. Lots of hotels have windows that open, but they don’t have screens in them. This one does. Surprisingly, considering the lack of screens, I rarely if ever see flies in the hotels.
Dinner was a hard choice. Lamb chops or pork weiner schnitzel. The schnitzel won out, and it was good. Dessert was chocolate lava cake, with ice cream. Yummy! The beer was an old favorite I had earlier in the trip, Grimbergen dark beer. The brewery dates from 1128. It’s a lager, but very good and well flavored.
Tomorrow is Siauliai for the cathedral, then Klaipeda for the old town and castle.
Tuesday, May 21, 2024 I can drive 80 legally, but it takes gas. Who knew?
Yesterday was so warm that when I got to my hotel room, I took off my undershirt. Today, I didn’t bother putting it on in the first place. I had expected temperatures in the upper sixties, I’ve had upper seventies. I’m not complaining.
I went to the city of Siauliai to see the cathedral. The guidebook said it was really nice. It’s nice, but not that nice. There’s a balcony that runs around the nave, The windows aren’t stained glass, but the plain glass is decorative anyway. The really nice feature is that the cathedral had two Black Madonnas. One is in the sanctuary, one is in a separate chapel nearby. I went looking for the Sundial Square, which is a local treat, but I misread the map and went down the wrong street.
I went back to my car and headed off to Klaipeda, and soon got on a real four lane, divided highway. The speed limit most places is 90 kph, about 55 mph. Sometimes it goes up to 110. Now I’m up to 130 kph, about 80 mph. Cheating, I got up to 145, or 90. Not for long. The road was in good shape, the traffic was light and all the trucks were in the right lane. As fast as I went, there was always someone who wanted to pass me.
After a while I slowed down, a lot. Not because I was afraid of driving too fast. I was running out of gas. I’ve got a nice car, but the steering wheel hides the gas gauge. It doesn’t hide the “fuel low” light and that’s how I knew I was running low. And I had just passed an exit with a gas station. Rats! So now I had to be sparing with my fuel for another 20 km. I made it, but the car said I had only another 20 km left in my range.
I find out Klaipeda is Lithuania’s only port. It used to be called Memel, from the name of a castle built by the Teutonic Knights. It’s a big city, with a nice old town and a castle. OK, reading the guidebook again, there used to be a castle. The mound is still there. And what’s marked on the map as the old town, isn’t very old or interesting. I did see some nice old buildings in town, but not great ones.
All the same, it’s a nice city. I went to the Lithuania Minor Museum. Lithuania Minor is the name Lithuanians give to East Prussia, nowadays Russian Kaliningrad. Tilsit, where Napoleon signed a treaty with the tsar, is on the border. The museum has a lot of stuff about the queen of Prussia, including a dress made specially for her, which wasn’t ready when she died. It’s beautiful, with gold embroidery.
They have a wheel with a handle that is used to make impressions into or onto stuff. The display shows it with a strip of something with the design on it. It’s like a rotary printing press, except the wheel doesn’t seem to be able to go all the way around. Still, it embosses a two or three foot pattern.
There are some moulds for making desserts with a patterned top. The design is on the bottom of the mould, so when you tip the dessert out, it’s on top of the dessert. There’s also a beautiful embroidered tablecloth. Lots of interesting textile stuff.
I saw a cat while trying to find the old town. It was a gray tabby, resting under a bench, next to a food dish and water bowl, both empty. He walked away when I sat down, but not far. And soon after, a lady drove up, got out of her car, and began putting out food and water for him, and his friend. Another cat came out of hiding for the food, a black cat with brown overtones. I’d only seen two other cats on this trip, and both while I was driving and couldn’t get a picture.
The hotel doesn’t do dinner, so I had to go back into town to eat. It wasn’t that far and I knew there were several restaurants. Unlike most European cities, they don’t have menus out front. I finally saw a place with a pile of menus sitting on a counter. I went up and looked the menu over. Mostly seafood, ugh. But they had glazed turkey, with mashed potatoes and beets. It was a great big chunk of turkey, dark meat, with a peanut sauce, and quite tasty. I had another good dark beer, too. And dessert was an apple tart, oh so good.
I’ve just returned from dinner. It’s nine o’clock, and the sun is still well above the horizon.
Tomorrow is a castle in Panamune, then on to Kaunus for a lot of stuff in their old town.
Wednesday, May 22, 2024 A castle and a half today
Last night’s hotel was good, but a little weird. They had a small bird in a cage in the lobby. Not a parakeet or any other bird I recognized. Google thinks it’s a canary, and it might be. They also have lots of books in the lobby on shelves, all of them with their titles hidden, spines away from view. I asked why, and the desk clerk said it was just a display. Weird.
My first stop today was Panemune, for the castle. TomTom brought me to a highway and said, jump in. The traffic was solid, including lots of semis. I was reluctant to just jump in, but the guy behind me knew the road, and he beeped at me. I looked closer and saw there were two lanes each way, and an opening in the near lane was coming up. I jumped in and found myself back on the Formula One track that Lithuania uses as a highway. They’re giving the Germans a run for their money as the fast country.
Then there was the brief interlude when I was off the motorway and driving on a back road. Twisting, turning, and with hills. The speed limit was 90 kph, normal for rural areas. I was doing 13 kph, it was that bad.
I saw a stork on the ground, too. I wanted to get a picture, but a highway work vehicle was doing things in the area, and I had a choice of looking at the stork, or looking at the truck. The truck won out.
The castle in Panemune is nice, two big towers, nothing ruined. In fact, some more restoration work is going on even now. It was once owned, according to a sign, by the General Elder of the Duchy of Samogitia. Whoever owns it now still lives in part of it. They have a display mannequin of a nobleman in Samogitian costume, rather odd. Beautiful oak floors, but I think they’re modern. That, or they’ve sanded the hell out of the original boards. The staircase is definitely modern, but it looks perfect.
The kitchen was in three parts, one for baking, one for cooking, and one for living quarters for the cooks. Eventually, they imported a French chef. They have a sign with a recipe for a local dish, in Lithuanian, of course. I put it through Google translate and got a suitably garbled result. It translated one word as August or September. It said it was a recipe for white peppercorns, even though peppercorns aren’t mentioned in the recipe. I looked up the main word in a Google search and the recipe is for borscht.
The tower has seven levels, not including the prison in the bottom. I viewed the prison, which was just the bottom level of the tower, with gun ports and all, and a hole in the floor for the oubliette. I was going to climb the tower, all seven levels. I really was. Until I got to the second level and saw the stairs going up to the third level. Steep as a ladder, with narrow steps. I might have made it up, but I’d have to come down backwards, the steps were so small. I decided I didn’t need to see the tower that badly.
On to Kaunas, for the half castle. It’s a nice big tower, with part of the bastion walls. Everything else is gone. I walked up to the observation deck, and was told to go buy a ticket if I wanted to go in. So I went back down, bought a ticket, and went back up on the inside. Lots of steps, not much to see.
Outside was a guy with several remote control vehicles, rather like roombas. He was driving them all over the grassy areas. They climbed steep slopes without any trouble and moved fairly fast.
It’s been so long since I’ve had a decent vacation, I forgot to do some basic planning for this trip. I had all my sites listed, and my hotels picked. I forgot to map out where my hotels were in relation to any places I wanted to go. I parked near the castle here in Kaunas, walked around to see all the stuff I wanted to see, then drove to the hotel. It was within a block of everything I saw, except the castle, that was two or three blocks away. I should have gone to the hotel first.
After the castle, I went to the town hall square. It’s a big impressive building, with a steeple like a church. Lots of nice buildings around the square. I looked at the map in the guidebook, and decided that this one road was the one I wanted to use to see the next items on my list. I should have looked at the street name on the corner. I took the wrong road. I still saw some nice buildings. I also got some ice cream from a shop that didn’t sell chocolate. I found that hard to believe.
I checked the name of the street I was on now, realized my mistake, and went back to the town hall square. I finally read the street sign and made my way to a church founded by some Lithuanian hero. It wasn’t very interesting, though it had some nice groin work over the sanctuary. I also wanted to see the Perkunas House. Perkunas is some pagan god, whose statue was found in the grounds, so they named the place after him. It’s a nice, picturesque place, made of brick, quite attractive. It’s supposed to be open to tourists, but it wasn’t. To learn this I had to climb the stairs to the front door. Tallest steps I’ve encountered so far. They must have hired an Estonian stair maker to build these. I took a photo using my guidebook and my hand to show how tall they are. About twelve or thirteen inches, per step.
I was back to the hotel early for the second day. And for the second day, I lay down to rest, and fell asleep for an hour. I was really tired yesterday, even without lots of stair climbing. I think the daily walking, climbing, and all is wearing me out a bit. I’ve lost some weight, I know. The other day when I took off my undershirt, my pants fell to my knees. And it’s not like I’m starving myself, either.
Tonight’s dinner was alfresco, on the hotel roof. The weather was nice, it was warm enough for that. I had two choices, duck breast or lamb. The duck breast came with cauliflower, so I chose the lamb. It came with barley and minced carrots and celery. Very good lamb. They didn’t have a dark beer. The menu said they did, but they didn’t. I tried a beer flavored with ginger and honey. It was fine, but nothing special. Dessert was easy, only one option didn’t include strawberries. It was vanilla ice cream in a raspberry sauce, very good.
Tomorrow I go to Trakai castle. I’ve seen pictures of it, and it looks fabulous. Then on to Vilnius, capital of Lithuania. Two and a half days there, then back to Tallinn and home.
Thursday, May 23, 2024 If you want to drive, you need roads. That means you can’t drive until we finish building them.
I saw a lot of road construction today, right from the start. For a long way, the other side of the multilane divided highway was on my side. Still multilane, they just squeezed us together. Instead of 120 kph, we were supposed to be doing 70. Europeans aren’t any more tolerant of speed limits than Americans, so 80 or 90 was more common.
My first stop was the castle at Trakai, and I parked with a smart woman. She sells spots in her yard for parking your car, 5 euros a day. The yard is big enough for a dozen cars, so she brings in 60 euros a day just for having some space. No work required. I told you she was smart.
I’ve seen Trakai in pictures, and it looks fantastic. The castle museum has several paintings of it in the old days, half ruined. One big tower is still being restored, but parts are accessible. The castle is large, with a serious moat between the first courtyard and the main castle. One long building has two floors, both with exhibits of medieval items. None are original to this castle, but they make a fine collection. Ceramics, glass, embroidery and bead work, glassware (including a glass box), ivory, and paintings of the castle before it was restored.
There was no porcelain factory in Lithuania, so they imported it from Meissen, Sevres, and Wedgwood. None of the furnishings are original to the castle, but they are all good quality stuff. Some of my pictures didn’t turn out very well, in part because I couldn’t take too many photos. My camera battery was running down, and my backup battery wasn’t taking a charge any more. So I didn’t try to take too many pictures to get a good shot. I did try five times to take a picture of the Wedgwood dishes, but they were worth it. It’s a beautiful castle, well worth seeing.
After that I went to Vilnius, with more road work. Two lanes of traffic coming into the city, squeezed down into one lane for construction. It took several minutes to get through that. I’m at the Congress Hotel, big, modern, with a friendly staff. The desk clerk personally showed me where to park after I put my car in the wrong lot.
I went out for a walk, as it was still mid-afternoon when I arrived. The Cathedral is unusual, more like a Greek temple from the outside. The inside is plain white, with some very nice arches in the nave. There are paintings hung on the walls all over. Not painted on the wall, hanging there like an art gallery. The confessionals are open-air. The priest sits in an open box, the penitent kneels next to the box, nothing is hidden.
I wanted to see the Upper and Lower Castles. The Upper one is a tower, all that’s left of some bigger fort. The Lower one is the former home of the Dukes of Lithuania. Rather nice courtyard. There’s a museum in the basement, so they say. A woman wanted to take the escalator down to it, but it wasn’t working, so she took the stairs. A while later she came back up, apparently without having seen anything inside. I was getting tired and didn’t want to climb stairs that weren’t going to take me somewhere. I came back to the hotel then, a twenty minute walk when I was tired. That’s good because everything else I want to see is further off in that direction.
I made a mistake in my planning, I only reserved a room in this hotel for two nights, not three. The desk clerk said a third night might not be possible because of other guests expected. Then I thought about my plans. I had wanted to drive non-stop from Vilnius to Tallinn on Sunday, all seven and a half hours. That never used to be a problem for me, but I am getting older.
I looked at the list of sights to see here in Vilnius, and realized I can do them all in one day, or one day and the morning of the next. That means I don’t need a hotel here for Saturday night. I reserved a room in a hotel just north of Riga for Saturday night, and I can finish the trip north more comfortably because it’ll be shorter. I still have lots to see here in Vilnius. Most of the sights are fairly close together, too, which will make it easier to see them all.
I was told tonight the dining room wasn’t open because the kitchen broke, or something. So I went online and found a nice restaurant right next door, literally. It’s apparently a Georgian restaurant, and I don’t mean Atlanta. The owner has limited English, which is a shame, because the only other people in the place were also Americans. I wanted the veal chops, but I guess they didn’t have any on hand, so he suggested beef tongue. I’ve never had it, so I agreed. It was stewed to the point of falling apart. There was some yellow sauce. I asked him what it was but I didn’t understand what he said. I had to ask three times for chocolate cake for dessert, and it was worth the hassle. Chocolate cake on top of a layer of raspberry cake, with blueberries. A decent dark beer, too.
When I got back into the hotel, the dining room was open after all. No big deal, I’ll eat there tomorrow night.
Friday, May 24, 2024 Swiss Army Knife – don’t leave home without it, just hide it in your checked bag
I needed my Swiss Army knife today. Despite the large meals and desserts I’ve been eating, I’ve lost weight. I don’t know how much because I haven’t got a scale. The other day, after I got to my hotel, I took off my shirt, removed my undershirt, and my jeans fell to my knees. Today, they were sliding down all the time, so I used my knife’s awl to punch another hole in my belt. This isn’t a weapon, this is a tool.
My decision yesterday to leave Vilnius tomorrow was right. I finished all my sightseeing today. I asked the desk clerk (a woman in place of yesterday’s guy) if there was a bus that would take me to the outer limit of my touring. She gave me the numbers for three buses that stopped nearby and went to the train station, fairly close to my farthest sight. It worked out great, an easy bus ride, a short enough walk, and there I was at the Gates of Dawn. It’s a gate in the city wall, but it’s also an external chapel to a nearby church. A choir was singing overhead as I came through.
Lots of fine buildings along the streets everywhere in Vilnius. For a city that’s been fought over by all its neighbors, it recovers well. There’s another gate, attached to another church, the Basilian Gate, next to St. Basil’s church. Not as nice, too baroque.
Then I went to the Artillery Bastion, which includes a fair stretch of the city wall. My guidebook has the best picture of it, from the front. If I had gone in, I’d have the same picture, but the book said the inside wasn’t worth seeing. The outside is worth seeing, because you have the top of the main building as well as the whole bastion. And that is impressive.
I walked part way down St. Casimir street, old and narrow, with only one thing worth taking a picture of, a big archway and a nice door next to it. I kept moving on, following my map, and came upon an odd fountain. Lots of small jets made a spherical display, very nice.
I was on my way to St. Nicholas Church, but it’s closed. However, they left the doors open when they locked the iron gates, so I got a picture of the inside. Nice, but not great.
The town hall has the same sort of Greek pediment and columns the cathedral has. There was some sort of political rally going on. Elections are coming up for the European Parliament.
Then I stopped at the Orthodox church of St. Nicholas. Nice facade, nothing inside worth my time. But just down the street was the Vilnius Picture Gallery. Now I had something to see. Some nice furnishings, some nice paintings, a gorgeous oak floor in patterns. Some old battered cabinets from some old house, made by a famous artist. Two are cabinets made to be put in corners of the room, triangular in shape.
Upstairs is a big exhibit of the work of a Lithuanian artist mostly forgotten these days. His father was an artist also, and they have his father’s self-portrait and painting of his wife, both very good. The son, the subject of the exhibition, was Boleslaw Rusiecki. They have several of his self-portraits, too. They have several of his painting notebooks, small books with not just sketches, but fully colored pictures, all three by five or so. There’s also a picture of God the Father with his hand on Jesus’ shoulder, as if signifying his pride in his Son’s good job.
I had lunch in a restaurant next to a small river. I was surprised to see a path down to the river, and, hout over the river, a large porch swing with a couple of girls swinging back and forth. I didn’t know how they got out to it. The current is fast, but the water is actually shallow. Imagine a fast flowing Kish. They came ashore and four other teens waded out to it for a while.
I had zeppelins for lunch. The menu says it’s Lithuania’s national dish. Potato dumplings with ground pork inside, served with sour cream and bacon bits. Very tasty, with a nice dark beer.
Next I went to St. Anne’s church, and the Bernardine church, next door to each other. The Bernardine church was open, but not interesting. St. Anne’s was beautiful on the outside, but closed. Legend says Napoleon saw it on his way to or from Moscow, and wanted to take it back to Paris because it was so lovely. Apparently his troops didn’t think so much of it and they damaged it.
So I saw almost all of what I wanted. Some things were closed, some took only a glance for me to say, no thanks. Which means I can leave tomorrow, with two days to get back to Tallinn. That’ll make for a more leisurely trip, most of it along the Baltic coast.
The weather has been wonderful, temperatures in the eighties, if you can believe that. I needed a sweater and a jacket in Tallinn, and now I wish I had my short sleeved shirts with me. The weather is supposed to stay nice all weekend. Tallinn will be a bit cooler, but still in the mid-seventies.
Well I just got back from dinner. Not here in the hotel, mind you. That might be too ordinary. Last night they told me the kitchen was broken, tonight they said some group doing a conference here had the whole dining room to themselves. That’s rude. That’s not what I expect from a decent hotel. When I came back from dinner, I saw a few empty tables. Why couldn’t I have had one of them? Why couldn’t they have served me in the lobby? Or in my room? I sent them an unhappy review to let them know they failed in a very basic part of running a hotel.
The desk clerk did offer me a choice of two other restaurants for Lithuanian food. One was closer so I went there. All the Lithuanian national dishes involve potatoes. It’s worse than Ireland. And beets, which is fine with me because American restaurants rarely offer beets. I had rabbit stew, very tasty, with mashed potatoes and lots of beets. The dark beer was good, too. And for dessert, a millefeuile, or Napoleon. Very tasty also.
Saturday, May 25, 2024 The German Pass is back!
For those of you who haven’t driven on the continent, or never saw it when you did, what I call the German Pass is an unusual car maneuver. It looks scary and dangerous. But if everyone involved knows what to do, it’s easy, safe, and a great way to pass when you really can’t.
It works like this: Driver A is slow, holding up Driver B, who would like to pass. Driver C is coming toward them in the other lane. In the US, this means Driver B is stuck, he can’t pass. In Germany, he just needs to pull out into the middle of the road, driving down the center stripe. Driver A pulls partway onto the shoulder on his side. Driver C pulls partway onto the shoulder on his side. Driver B drives between them, with plenty of space. As long as all three know what they’re doing, it’s perfectly safe. I saw it again in Lithuania, at least three times. And in Latvia, at least twice, plus once when I pulled over onto the shoulder, and one more when a semi pulled over for me. But he didn’t have to, the road was clear enough I passed him before the oncoming cars were even close. Three weeks of driving before I see this. Wow!
I saw another stork, this time flying. He was just rising from a ditch along the highway, so I couldn’t get a picture.
I picked a hotel, the Porto Resort, north of Riga for tonight, not quite halfway to Tallinn. It looked nice on the web, and the price wasn’t bad. I had the name and put it into TomTom. TomTom took me to a bunch of office buildings and a dodgy looking neighborhood in Riga. Wrong. I went into a grocery store there hoping they had wifi, and they did. I used my phone to try to find the right place, but I kept hitting the wrong button or link. After getting dumped out for the umpth time, I went and got my laptop. Now I couldn’t get a wifi link. But I had the email confirming the reservation, and that had the address of the hotel. And TomTom could find that.
It was only mid-afternoon, so I thought I’d go see something else today. Nearby is a town with a museum in honor of Baron Munchausen, which sounded just lots of fun. So I drove there. Well, maybe. TomTom took me to some farmer’s yard, with a nasty looking dog letting me see his teeth. This was the right town, and there were signs on the highway leading here. But there are no signs in the town. Maybe it’s just one of the Baron’s tall tales.
My hotel is very nice. I have a room overlooking the back yard and river. It has a separate lounge area with a sofa. Wow! Nicest room I’ve had on this trip. I was worried because the receptionist told me I was on the third floor and there was no elevator. I needn’t have worried. In France, I’d be on the first floor, since the French count street level as zero, the first floor being the first one upstairs. So in France, I’d be on the first floor. Only one flight of stairs, so it wasn’t too bad.
I just came back from dinner. It was great. I had a pork schnitzel, pretty ordinary, right? Not this one. It came with a fried egg, sunny side up, several slices of bacon, some pickle sliced very thin, and I think some swiss cheese. A very nice dark beer, and a chocolate fondant for dessert. Chocolate cake filled with molten chocolate, and a scoop of ice cream on the side.
Tomorrow is the last day, driving back to Tallinn. I’m almost halfway there from Vilnius, so the rest of the way shouldn’t take too long. Then I get to repack the suitcase. That should be fun. The jacket and the sweater have been in the car’s trunk for two weeks. Now I have to find space for them in the suitcase, along with the souvenirs. Fortunately, clothes can be mashed.
Sunday, May 26, 2024 The end of the trip
I had breakfast outdoors this morning. It was a nice morning and no one else was inside. It was pleasant, warm, and sunny. The main dining room had two big windows facing the outside patio. I was surprised to see them shake when anyone slammed the door, or the wind blew hard. I went over and checked them out. They weren’t glass, they were heavy clear plastic sheets. They looked and acted like windows, but they could be rolled up like blinds to open the whole indoor restaurant to the outside. Clever.
I thought I’d have a scenic drive today along the Baltic coast, but the highway wasn’t that close to the shore. In one or two places, I could see the water through gaps in the trees or buildings on my left. It was still a nice day for a drive. All three Baltic countries have a bad habit with the speed limits on their roads. I expect a slower speed through a town. But sometimes the speed limit drops just for an intersection, even in the middle of nowhere. Sometimes it drops then goes back up soon after for no apparent reason. If there are speed cameras, the limit often drops just ahead of the camera. Sneaky.
I’m glad I split the return trip to Tallinn into two sections. I was getting tired even with a shorter trip today. I had about three and a half hours today, and I did so well on the time that I got to Tallinn before the normal check-in time at the hotel. They didn’t mind, there was a room available anyway.
I had had an early breakfast and I wanted lunch. The hotel restaurant only offers dinners, though, all day long. So I had a burger as the smallest meal possible. It was grilled nicely, medium rare. The fries were also good. As was the dark beer. They don’t have many stouts or porters up here, but they do have a lot of good dark lagers.
My laptop is dying, slowly. I keep having trouble turning it on. I’m hoping it’ll last until I get home and download everything from it. The travel diaries are safe because I can get them from my email account. The pictures are another thing. I’d hate to lose them. I’m copying them now to my music thumb drive.
I’m also not happy with the way my GPS device has been working. Taking me to the wrong places, asking me to turn down one-way streets going the other way, giving me bad directions at times. TomTom keeps updating their maps, but they don’t make the devices any more. The car I rented had a button for “map” but it wasn’t activated. I wonder if renting a car with an active GPS built in might be a better option in the future.
I paused this edition of the diary for dinner. I didn’t think about it, but I should have gone into the old town to visit the Old Hansa again. But I forgot, so I ate at the hotel. Like my first stay here, I had the duck breast. Still great. The dark beer is good, but not as good as several others I’ve had here. I’m getting fussy. Dessert was a millefeuille, but very different from last night’s. Tasty, but weird.
Anyway, tomorrow morning I get up at 4:30, shower, dress, and head for the airport. It’s a fifteen minute walk. I am theoretically checked in already. I tried downloading the SAS app, but I can’t use it as except as a guest. They’re supposed to send me a code to register, but it never arrives. As a guest, I have my boarding pass on the phone. I’m going to try to get to sleep early tonight to be ready for a long day of travel. It might happen. This morning I was up early and couldn’t get tired enough to fall asleep again. Next time you hear from me, I should be home.
Monday, May 27, 2024 Home at last
I don’t normally add much to the end of these travel diaries, but this was a more hectic trip home than most have been. Since I’m home by the time the day ends, I spare my friends a written account of the day. (They still have to listen to my story in person.) This is the tale of that trip home, written now for the first time.
My travel plans were to fly from Tallinn, Estonia, to Stockholm, Sweden, then on to London, England, and finally home to Chicago. Lots of flying, with some breaks along the way. And the only way to pack all that flying into one day was to start early. My first flight was at 6:30 am. Even with only a fifteen minute walk to the airport, I had to be up at 4:30 to be sure I could get through all the screening stations and all that.
That was too early for breakfast at the hotel, but I’m tough. I got a snack somewhere during the morning, but I forget where. Anyway, no airline meals (maybe a snack) all the way to London. Stockholm was dangerous again. This time I didn’t have a long wait at passport control, but I still had to stop there. It only exists at that spot for maybe half a dozen gates. I couldn’t leave the airport from there, so why check my passport? Anyway, on I went, and just barely made my flight to London.
In London, I had lots of time. My flight back to Chicago didn’t have a gate assigned yet, but I wasn’t worried about that. What I wanted was food. I found a restaurant offering a nice breakfast and started to go in. The woman at the door told me to get in line, England and queues, you know. It was five minutes to eleven, when breakfast stopped. By the time I got inside, it was five after eleven. A very nice waiter made sure I could still get breakfast, and it was good.
Back out on the concourse, I looked at the info signs for my flight. It was gone. Nothing. I started to panic. Had it already left while I ate breakfast? I didn’t think my wait time was that short, but what happened to my flight? I looked for an information booth, but all the information things on the airport map were the screens showing the times for flights.
I finally stopped an airport employee and asked him where I could get some information from a human. He was extremely helpful, leading me on a long trip through the concourse to the airline’s club room. The woman at the desk told me they had just taken the flight off the list, but it would be back up soon. A couple of minutes later, there it was. Whew!
After that, nothing important happened. A safe flight to Chicago, a limo ride home to be greeted by two cats who said, “Where the hell have you been all this time?” And a lot of sleep.