Author: petitfilula

We like trains. So we decided to take the world’s longest railway journey! The Trans Siberian railway was completed in 1916 and connects Moscow on Russia’s west side to Vladivostok on the eastern coast. It is 9,289 km long, (5,772 miles). It has branches to China and Mongolia also. 

When we first started to plan, we saw that the Tran Siberian Express will take you across in 8 days. I can’t quite imagine being on a train for 8 days even if it does stop and let you off to stretch your legs! So we decided to visit as many places of interest along the way as we could rather than taking the express train. We have a restriction of 30 days to travel on our tourist visa, so we have a flight booked to Seoul from Vladivostok at the end of October. 

Our itinerary includes Moscow, Vladimir, Nihzny Novgorod, Kazan (a slight detour from the main route ), Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Irkutsk, Ulan-Ude, Khabarovsk and Vladivostok. 
Keep ‘track’ of us as we travel…..(see what I did there? Track?!?!….because of the trains?! You’re right, it’s too early in the morning for puns. 🚂💨)

-F xx

I thought it strange to see a ‘metro tour’ as one of the options when looking up activites in St Petersburg and in Moscow, but then I read a little bit more about them. Both cities have some beautiful metro stations, with striking architecture of typical soviet design. There is elaborate artwork and lighting combined with exquisite arches and columns. 
St Petersburg metro system is one of the deepest metro systems in the world and the station Admiralteyskaya is 86 metres underground, which takes about 3 minutes on an escalator. 

Moscow metro system was the first in the Soviet Union and one of the longest in the world! Our guide told us a story about the brown circle line that surrounds the city centre; when the plans for the metro were being drawn up, Joseph Stalin placed his coffee cup on the paper. When he lifted it up, it left a brown ring and the men in charge of the plans were to i frightened of him to ask if he meant to do that. So they built it! Cute story, but not true 🙂 That circle line has the most notable stations, with distinct ‘Stalinist’ features. 

If you find yourself in either city, grab a metro ticket and do a little tour, just maybe not at rush hour! 

-F xx

Things I didn’t know about Finland:
1. They only gained independence in 1917. 

2. They invented the Sauna (I thought it was the Swedes :S) 

3. They are crazy about karaoke (the largest ‘consumers’ of this in the world per capita. 

4. They don’t have a very big population. 

Helsinki was a whirlwind of seasons during our short two and a half day visit. Autumn was in full force, with beautiful colours on the trees throughout the city. Our first day was warm and spring like and then it swiftly turned to winter on day two with cold winds and rain. Luckily, no snow and ice that their winters usually hold! 
Finns love nature and Helsinki is full of parks and green areas for running and cycling. It would have been great to stay a little longer to really explore outside of the city and experience the countryside that the Finnish people cherish so much. 

Helsinki highlights included a stroll around Töölönlahti Bay and Finlandia Park, a free walking tour and a visit to Suomenlinna sea fortress. 

Our walking tour was led by Leo from Green Cap Tours and was really great! He’s a research fellow at the University of Helsinki and he gave us a great introduction to the history of both Finland and Helsinki. We were a varied group of Australians, Germans, an American and a Spaniard. 

Later that day, in the rain and wind, we hopped on a ferry to Suomenlinna. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage site that consists of six islands and is an inhabited sea fortress. It was initially built by the Swedes in the 18th century to protect against Russian invasion. However it was captured by Russia in the Finnish War and was considered an important stronghold by the Russians. This led to it being attacked and bombarded by the allied forces, but it eventually became part of independent Finland in 1917. Whilst looking out into the cold sea, with crashing waves and freezing wind and rain beating down, we could have been transported back to South Shields or West Cork!! The weather didn’t stop the kids who had taken the ferry over to catch some rare Pokemon!
Leg one of the journey is now complete, as tomorrow we travel to Russia for our Trans-Siberian adventure!! 

I wasn’t sure what to expect when we arrived in Stockholm, mainly because it was half past five in the morning, but the city surpassed my expectations. I read a blog that described Stockholm as one third city, one third green parks and one third water. I think that’s probably accurate! The city itself is comprised of fourteen islands, interconnected with more than fifty bridges, and a passenger ferry network.

After dropping our bags at the hotel on our first morning, we set off into the city to explore and found our way to the old town, or Gamla Stan. The Royal Palace is large but understated and the cobbled streets are lined with tall, warm toned buildings. Because Sweden is a neutral country, it didn’t participate in either world war, the city was never bombed, and is well preserved.

We then took an old style tram to Djurgården, which is an island and Royal land that used to be a hunting ground for King Carl XII. It holds many museums and historical buildings and is favourite spot for runners and cyclists. We were pretty knackered at this point, so we headed back to the hotel and had an early night!

Revived by a massive breakfast the next day, we headed on a free walking tour of the city, which was fantastic. Our tour guide, Nora, is from Kyrgyzstan and moved to Stockholm with her husband a year ago to do a masters in economics! We learnt lots of new things about the Swedish Royal family and about Swedish culture. My favourite part of the culture is ‘fika’. Fika can be used either as a verb or a noun and means to take a break, have a coffee and eat some pastry. In Stockholm, there are lots of places for fika and the coffee is amazing! A typical pastry to have is a kannelbullar, or cinnamon bun. I don’t think I could afford too much fika though, as Sweden is so expensive!

We hadn’t run in a couple of days because of the train travel (excuses, excuses), so we headed out for a run at dusk to Skeppsholmen, passing the Royal Palace and the lights of the waterside hotels and boats.

The next day, we headed to the Vasa museum, which holds the preserved Vasa ship. This is a Swedish warship that was built in 1628 having been commissioned  by the Swedish King Gustavo Adolphus. On its maiden voyage, not far out of the harbour, it sank, due to its high and narrow design and lack of ballast. The ship lay at the bottom of the harbour until it was salvaged in 1961. 98% of the ship on display is original and amazingly preserved, due to the sediment and anaerobic conditions at the bottom of the harbour. Then, sadly, it was time to go to the ferry to make our way to Helsinki! Not that we’re sad about going to Finland, but Sweden was beautiful and I can see why they rank so high on the list of the happiest countries in the world. ❤️🇸🇪

-F xx

It’s now Saturday, I think….Yesterday was crazy. We woke up in Germany, travelled to Denmark to visit for a few hours, then got on a train to Sweden that evening. On paper, that seemed reasonable, but was rather a mad thing to do!

Our first train, from Hamburg to Copenhagen boarded a ferry in order to cross the sea to Denmark, which was an experience! Some people didn’t make it quite that far, as there was an ID check just before the train boarded the ferry and some people had been trying to cross the border without correct documentation. Having seen the customs officers and a few armed soldiers marching these families and individuals to the border control office made me appreciate my very welcome Irish passport!

We visited Copenhagen in December 2014 for a few days and absolutely loved it. It was much warmer this time round and after a rest in the sunshine at Nyhavn, we headed for Christiania, often called Freetown Christiania, and established in 1971 by a group of hippies who occupied some abandoned military barracks on the site. They created their own set of society rules, completely independent of the Danish government and Christiania is now well known for its graffitied walls, workshops, homemade houses and cannabis sellers. I found the vibe a bit weird there. I can appreciate the intention behind it, but I didn’t quite feel comfortable. I doubt that was anything to do with the the Christianites themselves. Nevertheless, we filled up on lamb, hummus and tzatziki to keep us going for our long train journey ahead!

At 21:47 we left Denmark for Hässleholm in Sweden, where we then changed onto a sleeper train for Stockholm at 23:35, disrupting a few of our  compartment companions  who had already settled in for the night by the time we boarded. We arrived in Stockholm at 5:31.

Coffee. Required. Stat.

-F xx

Our first German stop was in Cologne, and it was Graham’s birthday!
We’ve chosen Airbnb’s to stay in for the first part of the journey as they are slightly cheaper than hostels and so far, they’ve been pretty good.

Cologne’s biggest attraction is its cathedral and it dominates the city centre. It is a gothic cathedral and was fully completed in the 19th century, having been started in 1248. Naturally, we climbed to the top of the belfry, 97 metres up. The views of surrounding Cologne were stunning, with multiple bridges of different styles crossing the expanse of the river Rhine.

We were keen for another run that evening and a loop from one side of the river to the other proved worthwhile, as we saw the sun setting behind the cathedrals impressive spires. If I’m not as fast as Mo Farah by the end of this, I’ll be disappointed!

Birthday dinner consisted of German beers and hamburgers, in preparation for our trip to Hamburg. We don’t have much time there, as we have a long trip to Stockholm ahead with a brief stop off in Copenhagen.

Happy birthday Graham!! 🎉🍔🍻🎉

I think lots of cities have little statues or buildings that have become icons to tourists and locals alike. La Tour Eiffel and the Brandenburg gate are two that spring to mind immediately, but there are some smaller ones too, such as Greyfriars Bobby in Edinburgh and Molly Malone in Dublin!

In Brussels there is Manneken Pis! It is a small bronze statue of a chubby little boy peeing into a fountain. He is truly loved in Brussels and even has a section in the Brussels City Museum dedicated to the outfits that he gets dressed up in periodically.

You can buy a statue of him to take home from all the tourist shops or even a chocolate version….was tempted, but didn’t indulge! We did come across some cool street art of Mannekan Pis, called Mannekan Peace. It was quite uplifting, considering that throughout the day we were met by soldiers with very large guns, as a stark reminder of recent tragedies and heightened security throughout the city.

Today, we have started the day with pain au chocolat and coffee, before our train to Cologne, to celebrate Grahams birthday!

– F xx

So when you and your other half decide to move to New Zealand, what do you do?

1.Open laptop

2.Look up flights

3.Book two seats on a comfy Emirates/Quantas plane

4.Pack two large cases and off you go!

It seems that we don’t do normal! Instead of the above, Graham and I have decided to hop on a train in London and travel mainly by land to New Zealand.The real journey starts in Newcastle, where all our travel planning happened on the floor of the living room!  On our journey we’ll be taking in stops in Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Finland until we hit Russia. Then we hop on the Trans Siberian railway and over the course of a month we’ll see 10 stops in Russia, with our final stop being Vladivostock on the eastern coast. Then a quick flight to South Korea followed by a ferry to Japan! From there, our plan is to see Hong Kong to visit a friend who has just moved there. Then hopefully explore some of South East Asia until we fly to New Zealand and see what that has in store for us.

 

Oh, and no suitcases with worldly belongings……just the one backpack with everything you might need for Scandinavia, Siberia and South East Asia. Packing Gods, I need your help! The first thing we packed were running trainers….hence the name ‘Travel In Trainers’. A quick 5k run on a morning in a new city is a nice way to discover places (breakfast/coffee spots) that you might not normally see!

We will do our best to update our blog as we go, so watch this space. I am off to London from Cork tomorrow morning and then the real countdown to the big adventure starts!

-F xx