Baltic Sea Cruise

[Ottermatic]

As I mentioned earlier this year that I would be doing in the 2019 Travel Plans thread, I just returned from a cruise of the Baltic Sea which left from and returned to Dover, England, and featured:

• 1 day in Copenhagen, Denmark
• 1 day in Riga, Latvia
• 1 day in Tallinn, Estonia
• 2 days in St. Petersburg, Russia
• 1 day in Helsinki, Finland
• 2 days in Stockholm, Sweden
• 1 day transiting the Kiel Canal in Germany, and
• 1 day in Amsterdam, the Netherlands

It was an AMAZING trip. Highly recommended for anybody interested in Northern European scenery, culture and history.

I took 1,665 photos over the course of the 14 day cruise. Over my next several posts in this thread, I'll post some of the best for everyone to see. It'll take a few days to get them all up - i'll divide them up by city.

 

[Ottermatic]

posting links to the pictures in my google drive isn't working - i'll have to find a workaround for that - but the first batch of pictures won't be posted before tonight or maybe tomorrow.

 

[Ottermatic]

It's still not working to post photos from my google directly into SportsHoopla, so I'm just going to give you a link to the Copenhagen page of the website I am creating for these pictures

Baltic Cruise - Copenhagen

As each city's page is ready, i'll link it that way

 

[Ottermatic]

Riga, Latvia was probably my least favorite port in the trip. It may just be that I didn't do Riga very well - some other people on the cruise loved it. It may also be that I was just in a crabby mood that day - i didn't get much sleep the night before.

Still got some nice pictures there though

Baltic Cruise - Riga

 

[bamagrad75]

Very nice

 

[Ottermatic]

I really loved Tallinn, Estonia, and was pleasantly surprised by it.

I was expecting a town much like Riga, still recovering from Soviet oppression, where people would not make eye contact.

Instead, I found a city with architecture that looked preserved from its medieval era, with city walls still intact, and a vibe that felt very western, with a definite feel of optimism and prosperity throughout the city.

Baltic Cruise - Tallinn

 

[jvett77]

See any knockout women?

 

[bamagrad75]

See any knockout women?

Geez, he's not AG

 

[Ottermatic]

What can I possibly say about St. Petersburg?

Amazing, Colorful, Extravagant, Opulent, Over-the-top, Take-your-breath-away majesty.

And that doesn't even begin to cover it. Neither do my pictures. If you can ever make it to St. Petersburg, it's an experience like i've never had before.

I visited:

the Hermitage museum (Got in before opening hours with my cruise tour, so it wasnt the mass of moving people it can be during normal hours, so I was actually able to spend time looking at the exhibits), including the Impressionists Collection, which happened to be hosting many of the best exhibits from Moscow's state museum as well....

Peterhof Palace (Peter the Great set out to outdo Versailles, and very well may have succeeded), and

Catherine Palace (the Amber Room, where I wasn't allowed to take pictures, is simply stunning - the walls are entirely mosaics made out of amber),

as well as doing a river cruise through the city.

Baltic Cruise - St. Petersburg

 

[Ottermatic]

See any knockout women?

In terms of hot women, I'd say the #1 city was Riga (by a significant margin), #2 Stockholm, and #3 Helsinki

 

[jvett77]

In terms of hot women, I'd say the #1 city was Riga (by a significant margin), #2 Stockholm, and #3 Helsinki

I’ll add those to my list. I read that Riga was destroyed in WWII and had to be rebuilt like many of the cities in the Baltic states and Russia.