Homeward Bound

Once again there were plenty of ships in the Kiel Canal including these two heading towards the Baltic Sea.

By breakfast time on September 8th our holiday was almost over. It was our 36th Wedding Anniversary and as a detailed description of the celebrations, and of the final stages of our travels, appears on Granny-Anne’s blog I will try to avoid too much repetition here. Ahead of us lay two days of cruising, first, through the Kiel Canal to the North Sea. then our course would take us south to the English Channel and along the south coast and up the Solent to Southampton. The next 36 hours passed very quickly, in retrospect, until later on the Wednesday evening I noticed with some surprise that we were just about within sight of “The White Cliffs of Dover”. I had never seen them from sea level before and we were a long way off in poor light, Even so, I had to try, at least, to take a few photos, one of which is shown here.

Part of our distant view of the White Cliffs of Dover in the poor light of late evening.

One good night’s sleep later and I awoke early to find that we were in the Solent already – another place that I had never been before. I was amused that at such an early hour of the day, one of the first vessels I saw was this ferry (?) seemingly sponsored (or perhaps owned) by IKEA – suppliers of nearly all our bookshelves and other storage units of which a few can be seen here.

This was a tremendous holiday from Page and Moy. It had been a complete change from our normal routine and we had been totally pampered by all the wonderful people who looked after us aboard Ocean Majesty. Though we had done little exploring in some of the ports, we were very happy with the whole experience and would return to any of them for a much longer holiday.
And finally, to my frequent visitor Shoreacres, I haven’t taken many photos of the sea but here are three, just for you!

Berlin

Checkpoint Charlie, in a brief moment when the lone U.S, soldier was not surrounded by tourists wanting to be photographed with him.

The structure of the Berlin Wall was far less formidable than I had always imagined and I took this photo of the end of a surviving section to illustrate the point. It didn't need to be any larger as there had been several thousand East German guards watching every inch of the other side of it.

 

The concert hall at The Gendarmenmarkt, where I was out of sight of our tour group by the time I had wandered off far enough to get it all in the picture.

The German Cathedral, also at The Gendarmenmarkt.

The Brandenburg Gate

On September 7th we arrived at Warnemunde and, after an early breakfast,  set off for a coach tour of the Berlin Highlights. The journey to Berlin took approximately three hours. A fine restaurant lunch was provided for us but the day’s schedule was delayed in the afternoon by heavy traffic.

As everywhere else where conducted tours were taken, I am sure that the selection of the route by the guides, inevitably, will have cast a somewhat rose-tinted light on the city as a whole and Berlin was no exception. It was elegant and impressive. We saw wide streets with many palaces and fine churches and other majestic buildings of an historic nature, many of them restored or rebuilt since World War Two.

We saw parts of the former Berlin Wall (1961-89) and also the amazing amount of reconstruction that has occurred since 1989. There were also many examples of modern architecture in glass etc. which I found impressive – and, coming from me, that is a compliment indeed.

It had been a long day by the time we returned to our ship, Ocean Majestry, for a late dinner.  Berlin was one of the few European capitals that Granny-Anne particularly wanted to see and although there are better ways to get there from the UK, our Baltic cruise had presented the opportunity so we took it.

And finally, some of the many very relaxed-looking cyclists and other pedal-powered transport that I saw in Berlin.

Stockholm

We approached Stockholm at breakfast time in fairly calm water, though there was a brisk wind. The sun was shining and the view was beautiful of all the islands on each side of the ship, with various large and small  houses right down to the water, and many moored boats.

Our docking time was delayed by the overnight storm which had been the first experience on this cruise of anything resembling rough conditions. Admittedly it had just started to become a little bumpy in the North Sea on our outward bound journey, before we diverted through the Kiel Canal, but last night was certainly rougher and as I referred to this in the first post in this series  I won’t repeat it here.

We decided to have lunch on board then take the 1.30pm shuttle bus the short distance into Stockholm. We then had a boat tour of the harbour for about 50 minutes but reflections in the boat’s windows put an end to any thoughts of photography.

It was all quite pleasant but we had neither the time nor the walking capacity to see much of the city. In addition it seemed to be a very busy day, partly no doubt due to three  very large cruise ships moored close to the city which could well have disgorged up to 3,000 tourists each into the city centre. Secondly, there was some sort of big-time EU Ministers meeting in the city that day so several self-important looking convoys were rushing about disrupting the traffic (as if paying their expenses wasn’t bad enough, we have to put up with their disruption!) – and doubtless this also explained the presence of lots of police personnel on the streets, many of them apparently armed to the teeth.
On Sunday, September 6th we had a full day of cruising across the Baltic Sea to Warnemunde, in what used to be East Germany. The day started grey and cloudy with a choppy sea but the ship was running smoothly. The wind was quite strong but didn’t seem cold until later in the day. In the Baltic Sea we were rarely out of sight of other ships and on this morning there seemed to be two or three others a long way off but running on a parallel course. 

In the morning we attended a talk by Richard Jarmain on Warnemunde, Rostock and Berlin. After 14 years this was his last voyage on Ocean Majesty. All of his talks were well researched and illustrated and also entertaining.
Lunch was more than ample as usual and was followed by a short nap and then coffee upstairs. Then to the Majestic Lounge for the early quiz in which Granny-Anne and I formed a team with one of our new friends and managed to score top marks – nothing to do with me, I just wrote down their answers for them.
We watched a ritual being enacted by the entertainment team and involving the swimming pool on one of the top decks. This was all about asking permission from Neptune (King of the Sea) to enter German waters. I couldn’t hear what was being said (shouted actually) by the participants but the idea seemed to be that most or all of them would end up being pushed into the swimming pool. There was a very strong wind, which was no longer pretending to be warm.

Around 5.00pm we started to prepare for the evening activities which commenced with dinner at 6.00pm. On booking the cruise we had requested the early sitting for dinner as it suited us better than the later sitting at 8.00pm.  It was the second of three evenings on this cruise for which we were invited to wear formal dress. Meanwhile, the sea had been growing from moderately choppy to much larger swells and I hoped that it would get no worse, at least until both dinner sittings were finished. I had visions of glasses tipping and plates of food sliding off tables – and almost everyone in their best frocks!

Baltic Cruise: Tallinn, Estonia

The day after St Petersburg we arrived in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. After an early lunch on board Ocean Majesty we took the shuttle bus to the edge of the old town. Not far from the bus stop we came to a craft market where good quality merchandise was on sale, including clothing and jewellery.  I almost felt sorry for one of the very helpful stallholders after she had taken the trouble to demonstrate her wares in such a helpful way, only to be told that we would return later. I wonder how many times she hears that each week from people who are never seen again. But we meant it. We called again on our way back to the bus later on to make our purchases.

Meanwhile we had walked up through the old town until we reached the highest vantage point. We passed a very colourful flower market and another street which contained large covered areas with tables and chairs at which people were finishing their lunches and enjoying their drinks. It was a fine day and a good time to be outdoors. We visited a few shops, climbed some very steep steps and, eventually, arrived at a high vantage point that overlooked much of the old city.

Shortly before we arrived there a wedding party with the same idea dashed past in a small group of cars with horns blaring. When we caught up with them they were engaged in a strange but apparently humorous ritual, seemingly being conducted by a weird character dressed like a very colourful scarecrow. We assumed that the actual wedding had taken place already and that this was some sort of local custom being played out afterwards. We didn’t intrude at the time other than to take a photo or two so we are no wiser.

We cast off from Tallinn at 6.00pm while we were heading for an early dinner. We both found ourselves with greatly enhanced appetites on this cruise. which were only encouraged by the excellent food in generous quantities. I am sure that the freedom from both cooking and washing up helped as well.

Our visit to Tallinn, about which more details are on  Granny-Anne’s blog, was too short for us to see very much but it was most enjoyable and we would certainly go again should the opportunity arise.

St. Petersburg, part 3

Today's post starts with a couple of pictures from yesterday's river cruise showing some of the elegant buildings alongside the river.

It is hard to believe that it was a whole month ago but on September 3rd we were up early to have breakfast and be ready for the St Petersburg City Tour by 8.00am. The coach tour was provided by Arctur Travel and our guide for the trip was a very pleasant young lady who had a detailed knowledge of her city, a fine command of English in a lovely local accent, a sense of humour and a fashion-conscious image including the big sunglasses so beloved of certain celebs because it enables them to avoid the full make-up treatment before the school run each morning. 

The Winter Palace

Today we saw the exteriors of several churches and of many grand palaces, some of which are now museums or colleges. Clearly a great deal of restoration has taken place and still more continues. There were a few stops to let us out of the coach to take photographs and I took a few shots from the moving coach (like the one above) as well, always a bit hit and miss but worth a try. The parts of St Petersburg that we saw certainly support its reputation as a beautiful city. The architecture was very grand in both design and scale.

The cruiser "Aurora" from which the shot was fired that signalled the storming of the Winter Palace in the October Revolution of 1917. The ship was built between 1897 and 1900.

This city’s continuing reputation was built on the huge wealth of the excessively rich governing families of the past. It would have been interesting to have visited an ordinary area of the city – comparable with our home shopping environment – just to see how it compared. Our scope for shopping was limited to tourist souvenir shops – in locations which appeared to be well away from other shops – in which the main goods were Russian dolls, jade jewelry and various icons, all of variable quality and a major tourist shop that had a very much wider range of goods including fur hats, glass and ceramics, watches, paintings and decorated boxes.

The Church of Our Saviour on the Spilled Blood, named in honour of a Czar who was murdered on the site. The church was built in the 20th Century in a 17th Century style.

We returned to the ship at about noon and almost immediately went to have lunch in the restaurant. After lunch we relaxed in the cabin and reflected on what had been billed as the high point of our cruise.

A detail from the church shown above.

I came away from St Petersburg feeling that I was little wiser about Russia as a whole than I had been on arrival there.  Perhaps this was to have been expected, given the shortage of time, only two days, and the fact that Granny Anne and I had chosen, as first-time visitors, to stay with organised groups rather than obtain our own visas so that we could explore independently. I wonder how much independence we would have been allowed? It was certainly worth going there but I wouldn’t think it worth a second visit just to see grand architecture and a diet of over-decorated interiors.

St Petersburg, part 2, more Yusupov Palace pictures

The fireplace from the bedroom shown in the previous post.

This time a rather fine wooden ceiling

And part of a wooden floor (avoiding the glare from a window).

The corner of a particularly beautiful ceiling.

It must be admitted that this sort of decor makes our plain white ceilings and magnolia walls seem a little lacking in ambition.

Some of the furniture in The Red Sitting Room at the Yusupov Palace.

The ceiling and lights in the art gallery

The Yusupov Palace has its own private theatre where I could have wished for a wide-angle lens or more space to take photos. This is one of the boxes overlooking the stage.

St Petersburg, part 1, The Yusupov Palace

One of many spectacular chandeliers in the Yusupov Palace - one or two of which incorporated real diamonds.

On Wednesday, September 2nd, we arrived at St Petersburg at about 7.30am in bright sunshine but there was a cool breeze. Photography of the  port area was not permitted so I went on deck without the camera to observe the docking procedure. Maybe I should get out more but I found it quite entertaining to watch the ship being rotated through 180 degrees by a tug,  to face the right direction, before being pushed sideways to the dock and secured with two thick hawsers.

A detail from a ceiling

We had our usual breakfast around 8.15am while passengers who should have breakfasted earlier, were busy ensuring that they were at the assembly points in time for their morning shore excursions. For the inveterate people-watchers among us I am sure that the cruise ship provided an interesting environment. At our breakfast table there was a very elderly gentleman complete with walking stick, apparently travelling alone. He informed us, solemnly, that he would not be going on any excursions that morning because he was not feeling well and would be going to see the ship’s doctor instead. Mind you, apparently he hadn’t pre-booked a place on an excursion and his chances of finding a place at the last minute were nil, St Petersburg being the star attraction of this particular cruise. I was pleased to see that he ate a good breakfast – perhaps that was all he needed to make him feel better.  Halfway through his breakfast he turned to me again and enquired whether we had arrived in Russia.

And another ceiling...

A lady (I use the word “lady” out of politeness), a “colonel’s wife” type, the sort that lives in a “hice”, sat down and demanded abruptly “Breakfast now” from the nearest waiter, no please, no thank you. The waiter politely explained that he was not the waiter who was taking breakfast orders (who was busily doing just that only feet away) . She then made a fuss about missing her shore excursion which was due to leave soon. We wondered why she hadn’t ordered an early call and got herself out of bed in time. Hubby joined her a bit later and didn’t have much to say – probably not accustomed to getting a word in. Another gent nearby addressed everyone within hearing distance (which should have been a lot of people) on the shortcomings of Britain’s foreign policy, despite the fact that only about two people within hearing distance appeared to be listening to him. It was all very entertaining, though I didn’t get the full benefit of his fake accent because I tend to become annoyingly deaf in noisy places like busy restaurants.

I have just noticed that I took rather a lot of photos of the Yusupov ceilings, which you will not think surprosong when you have seen them all. Meanwhile, by way of a change, how about a small mantel clock!

We had booked an excursion for the afternoon which included a visit to the Yusupov Palace and a river cruise. The uniformed immigration official  checked our passports etc. while remaining expressionless, avoiding eye contact and saying nothing. The process was much quicker than we had been led to expect but the smiling (and indeed spoken) welcomes that we had received from the equivalent officials in Copenhagen and Helsinki were absent here.
At the Yusupov Palace the “guards”, who seem to have been recruited from Russia’s angriest women (and looking at them it was not hard to imagine why they were angry), barked their orders at us, which our very pleasant young tour guide was obliged to translate. Anyone wearing a “big coat” was despatched to leave it in the cloakroom downstairs before the tour began.

We walked all through the palace marvelling at the sheer extravagance of its interior decor and furnishings.  Our guide gave a detailed commentary  but I left it to Granny Anne to keep up with that aspect while I trailed at the back of the group taking photographs. indeed I was mildly surprised that we were permitted to take photographs so in doing so I made sure  to keep up with our group. The next guide and her group were not far behind and the “guard” who was keeping a watch on us was pretty agitated throughout.

Afterwards we had a boat cruise on the river which was pleasant and enjoyable but not particularly infomative for me as I could not hear the tour guide for most of the time.
The coach returned us to the ship and, on misunderstanding the paperwork requirements as I passed through the customs office, I was bellowed at by another formidable uniformed female with two stars on the shoulders of her uniform. I concluded that Russia’s customs officials have no manners and from that moment on they became know as “Two Star Generals”. My fault had been that I thought we were supposed to hand in one of our two identical “Boarding cards” on each day, whereas the idea was to hand both of them in on the first day. Later I discovered that another passenger had indeed handed in one on each day, without a murmur from the two star general.
I hope that the pictures in this and subsequent posts will give you some idea of the enormous wealth that supported the Yusupov Palace and the beautiful craftsmanship that went into its amazing interior. What a shame that it is so hard to genuinely admire such works while strongly suspecting that the wealth that created them was acquired at the expense, one way or the other, of thousands of the poorest in the country at the time.

Helsinki, Finland (Baltic Cruise, day 5)

Our first view of Helsinki, with the Lutheran Cathedral in the background, as Ocean Majesty docked in South Harbour.

On September 1st we arrived at Helsinki before breakfast and, to conserve our limited walking capacity for later in the day, took the bus provided for us to travel just a few hundred yards to the quayside craft market. This was well worth visiting but I did begin to think that we weren’t trying very hard to be tourists! Having spent far too much time in the market we walked back to the ship for lunch.

After a quick lunch we set off for the pre-booked “Helsinki by Sea” tour.  This boat trip was shorter than normal due to strong winds and rough conditions on the open sea. I don’t know how much this reduced the interest factor but there were few views worth photographing, especially as the weather turned against us, becoming grey and misty and actually raining quite hard for a short time but this stopped before we arrived at the quayside and had to emerge from the shelter of the boat.

We walked towards the city centre and saw the statue shown here which, our guide had told us earlier, is 100 years old and Helsinki’s answer to Copenhagen’s Little Mermaid.  I thought she looked pretty good for 100 years old and therefore took her photograph, whereupon I was firmly told off by Granny Anne (my wife) who then photographed the statue herself! 

After dinner we listened to music by the duo “2gether” in the Majestic Lounge and had a go at a quiz about classic British TV comedies. We went to bed at midnight having put our watches forward for the third time on this cruise.

 

I didn't expect to find elephants in Helsinki so could't resist one of the hand-made specimens from this stall in the market, to add to Granny-Anne's small collection at home.

The Baltic: Days 3 and 4

On the third day of our holiday the ship docked in Copenhagen while we were having breakfast in the enclosed main restaurant on a lower deck. 

Our cabin's window was the second to the left of the top of the gangway.

After breakfast we set off to walk  at least part of the way to the city, only to discover several minutes later that the open top “hop on, hop off” tourist bus actually stopped next to the ship.  A short distance from the ship we came across a row of attractive small shops selling some fine designer goods. After a brief inspection we decided to return later and caught the bus at the next stop along the road.
We stopped to photograph The Little Mermaid (see Granny Anne’s blog) and later saw the English Church and chuckled at large numbers of bicycles parked in most available open spaces – deposited would be more accurate – on our way to visit The Resistance Museum. The museum was a fine tribute to the amazing courage and resourcefulness of those who fought the Nazis during the occupation of Denmark and it was a very moving experience to study some of the exhibits. I found myself reflecting on how lucky we are to live in a free democracy and then I came across a description of the Nazi Party and its methods and suddenly felt alarm bells ringing – though I was not entirely sure why at the time – when I came to the following (which I quote here with due acknowledgement to the Resistence Museum):

Had we seen this view from our cabin at the beginning of the day we might have caught the bus at the ship and missed the shops which proved well worth visiting.

“ The party was anti-parliamentarian, yet the leading politicians made Hitler Reich-chancellor in 1933.  After that the civic rights were abolished and opposition was met with terror. The government legislated without the need for democratic approval. A Fuhrer-state without any legal framework arose. Life according to Nazi doctrine was one endless struggle where the strongest dominated and finally eliminated the weak.”

After the museum we were back on the bus again to return to the ship, just in time for lunch. Then we went shopping. After that we returned to the ship for a leisurely afternoon tea, well, coffee actually, and a rest before dinner. What with the excitement of the past few days, plus getting up earlier than usual and staying up later and losing sleeping time as the clocks were put forward, we were a bit tired even though we had slept well each night on board.

The "English Church" in Copenhagen - actually looking more English than quite a few churches in England - or so I thought.

A view of Copenhagen from the open-top bus.

The fourth day of our holiday was spent at sea, anticipating our arrival at Helsinki the following morning. The weather was fine and the sea a lot calmer since Copenhagen. It was a lazy day. We had lost another hour overnight as the clocks went forward again but I was up at 8.00am and caught up with my sleep after breakfast! What a way to live!  After lunch I found the ship’s gymnasium but wasn’t tempted so browsed in the library instead.
Dress was formal for the whole evening, which included the Captain’s Cocktail Party and Gala Dinner. This included being introduced individually to the Captain (and the event photographed for posterity) followed by wine and nibbles in the Show Lounge where we took our seats  while the Captain introduced the ship’s senior officers and staff. This was followed by a fine dinner in the restaurant where nearly everyone followed the formal dress code and entered into the spirit of the occasion.
Later in the evening we went to the show in the Show Lounge. The theme was “Musicals” and three girls and two men  did all the acting, singing and dancing on a small stage. They were good and potentially very good but the performance was spoilt for me by the usual problem. It was far too loud. Secondly, it seems to be the fashion nowadays to sing very loud while almost touching the microphone so that  it sounds quite unmusical and, more often than not, it sounds flat. All could be rectified so easily.

The Baltic Cruise: Days 1 and 2.

On the first day of our holiday, August 28th, we were up at 5.00am and starting our journey an hour later. We were due to meet our coach for the journey to Harwich at Cardiff Gate Services coach park at 6.30 and our daughter, Jennie drove us there, arriving more than 15 minutes early.
Unfortunately, the coach drivers (two of them – from Swansea, all of 45 miles away) didn’t know the difference between Cardiff West Services and Cardiff Gate Services. Both are on the M4 motorway but Cardiff Gate is to the east of Cardiff and Cardiff West is…    …you guessed it…      …and the distance between them is (I am guessing here) about 10-15 minutes driving time. So the coach didn’t arrive at 6.30. or even by 6.45, when I phoned our travel company, Page and Moy, to find out what was happening. The lady who took the call quickly put the coach driver in touch with us and eventually Jennie rescued the situation as she described in her blog  later the same day. 
Eventually the coach picked us up just after 7.00am so my guess is that the people who joined us at Newport and Cheltenham had also been delayed  and I can only hope that Page and Moy’s fine reputation wasn’t undermined, as it was not their fault. After further stops at Oxford and Watford we arrived at Harwich just after 2pm.
At the dockside  we were met by a Scottish piper in full kit and piped aboard “Ocean Majesty”. This was a nice touch though it did feel a little incongruous at the time. Boarding was straightforward and our main luggage was transferred from coach to ship for us and awaited us at our cabin.
We were directed to the self-service restaurant on an upper deck where we confined ourselves to light snacks knowing that dinner was scheduled for 6.30pm. Having allowed time for luggage to be distributed to the cabins we found our cabin and started unpacking. At 5.15pm, as we were leaving Harwich, we were summoned (having been forewarned some time earlier) to the mandatory emergency drill in one of the lounges, so that a roll call could be taken and we could be instructed in how to wear our lifejackets, which we had brought from the cabin.
Our first impression of the ship was very favourable and I must say that our opinion of it improved throughout the cruise.  After an early dinner at 6.30pm we went to a presentation in the Show Lounge in which it was explained to us who was who and who did what on the ship. After that we had coffee in the Majestic Lounge and took part in a quiz (an almost daily occurrence for us).  Later, we watched the slightly rough sea from one of the open decks by the lights from the ship. Although Granny Anne and I have known each other for around 40 years I don’t think that either of us realised before just how much we both are fascinated by the sea and love to be on it.
Hurricane Bill had gradually calmed down during the previous few days while crossing the Atlantic from the east coast of America. The remnants of that storm had passsed over northern England and Scotland and, according to the British Meteorological Office, had finished up in the northern section of the North Sea as a gale force 8, possibly increasing to storm 10. The centre of the remaining storm was forecast to be just north of where we had expected to turn east away from the North Sea. On our first evening aboard we were informed that we would be leaving the North Sea further south than originally intended and passing through the Kiel Canal on our way to Copenhagen, our first port of call.
The next morning I was up at 6.40am and had explored the decks and taken some photographs before an excellent breakfast at about 8.30. It was mainly a day to relax. Although we had not booked any shore excurions for Copenhagen we attended the talk given by our Port Lecturer about Copenhagen.  After a light lunch in the poolside restaurant where we had failed to anticipate that it would be a bit windy (and even rained briefly) we both returned to the cabin to rest until we approached the Keil Canal in the early afternoon.

I had hoped to find a better vantage point from which to get pictures of the Keil Canal locks but it was not to be. However, the picture above is best described as follows: The ship is in one of the two channels through the lock which are separated by the strip of “land” on which you can see a couple of small buildings here. To the right of centre of the picture the green object is the roof of the starboard (righthand) extension of the ship’s bridge. The dark grey objects ahead and to the right are the lock gates which slide to the left and right respectively when opened. In the much narrower inland waterways of the UK we are more accustomed to lock gates that swing open and shut.

As the pictures above and below show, the Keil Canal is a very wide waterway and it does carry a lot of traffic. I was surprised and impressed by the fine condition of most of the ships that we saw at close quarters.

One of the great pleasures of this cruise was the very fine meals on board, all of which were included in the price of the cruise, even when we were in a port and could have eaten ashore. 
Late in the evening I explored a bit more of the ship and paid a short visit to the Observation Lounge on Deck 8, the highest deck accessible to passengers. Here the pianist Emily was making good music on a baby grand piano. This was fine for 20 minutes or so but as the lounge filled and the noise of umpteen conversations began to drown the music it became depressing. So I went to bed.