On 9-1 we got to Stockholm. The tour was called "Stockholm Beauty by Land and Water". It only lasted 3 hours which is relatively short by most of the others. We saw an overview of the city with talks about various buildings. All of the cities are very clean with beautiful flowers.

On the 2nd we were in Helsinki, Finland. As you might have guessed, I enjoy the combination of land and water tours. It gives a good overview of the cities. The cruise aspect in this case was quite extensive carrying us around the islands with quite a few sights including ice breakers that keep the harbor clear since it begins freezing by last Sept or early October. These cities usually began as fortresses for defence so there's usually a fortress island 100s of years old. After the cruise, we took a bus ride around the town.

On the third, we got to St. Petersburg, Russia. (The name Russia comes from a Viking term for people in this area, Rus). After the Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, this city went through several name changes - Petrograd, Leningrad and finally St. Petersburg again after the change from USSR to Russia around 1991. During WWII, Leningrad underwent 900 days of bombardment by Nazi troops and several thousand people died.

On this tour, we first went to the Yussupov Palace. This was built by a rich man who was very influential. Before the revolution, the Txarina, Alexandra, was under the influence of a man named Rasputin. The royal family trusted him because he helped Prince Alexei who was a hemopheliac. However, he gave bad advise and Yussupov decided to get rid of him. He invited him for a visit and killed Rasputin while he was there.

After this we went on a cruise on the canals and the Neva River which flows through St. Petersburg. The next day we went to the Hermitage, an art gallery begun by Catherine the Great. It was next to the Winter Palace where the royal family always lived. (St. Petersburg was the capital of Russia before the Revolution.) The Hermitage is the second largest museum after the Louve in Paris. It is quite impressive and a little overwhelming!

We had a really nice lunch and bus ride around town.

On Friday, the 5th, we were in Tallinn, Estonia. This country became a republic after the USSR broke up. They are very proud of their freedom after living under Soviet Rule.

We went to Medieval Rakeve. This is a fortress from the 13th century. Very interesting! We had a lunch from medieval times, boiled barley, mashed green beans and saurkraut with dark bread and roast beef. We had ale to drink. The dessert did look fairly modern, cheese cake. After this we rode back to Tallinn and the ship.

Today we are at sea for the second day and tomorrow the first half of the cruise ends. Brandi is coming on board and the second part across the Atlantic Ocean.

More fun to come. TA TA for now.