Dubrovnik, Croatia

We had breakfast at the big hotel in Luža Square. It was excellent, they also had good tea :)

Made reservations there for tomorrow’s breakfast in case not much was open on Jan 1. Later on we also made reservations for lunch at Lucin Kanton. So we were all set for food for tomorrow :)

We had plans to walk around the walls of Dubrovnik today, but then found out that the wall was open Jan 1, so instead spent today browsing for souvenirs and art.

There’s some good quality art in Dubrovnik. We were welcomed in one gallery with festive drinks and nibbles, celebrating their opening of an exhibit. We ended up buying an oil-on-canvas by a local artist, it was their first sale of the showing, about which they were quite pleased.

We had reservations for lunch at Bota Sare, a popular oyster and sushi bar. Good thing, cause when we arrived at 2pm they were full. As the Lonely Planet says, you don’t usually associate Dubrovnik with sushi, but they do know fresh fish here, so it makes sense.

We sat outside, with heat lamps and a blanket for our legs. There was a large boisterous table beside us, which made the patio lively. The patio was tucked in an alcove off an alley, with a view into a small square down below.

We had their sashimi and oysters, both were exceptionally fresh. Had an espresso and dessert after.

We wanted to try to catch the sunset from the top of the hill, and had about 30 minutes after lunch. So rushed back to our Airbnb, threw on our warmer jackets, and walked over to the cable car, about five minutes away.

Unfortunately the last cable car runs at 3:30pm (which seems odd, you would think it would run until just after sunset). We were resigned to trying again tomorrow. Another couple in the 20s, visiting from Bosnia, also came by to try to catch the cable car. As we were all walking away, they came back and offered us a ride to the top in their car! It was very nice of them :)

So we whisked up the hill. We had already missed the actual sunset, but still saw the sky turning orange / red, and then dark blue. It’s a beautiful place to watch the sunset over the Adriatic.

After, we rested back at the Airbnb and then later went out for a drink on a patio. There was another band playing tonight for NYE. (We liked yesterday’s music better.)

We aren’t much for staying up for the countdown at midnight anymore, so went back to our Airbnb and called it a night. We were awakened at midnight with fireworks that seemed to be exploding right over our heads. Happy New Year!

Dubrovnik, Croatia

We were on the road today, driving from Kotor to Dubrovnik via Trebinje.

Had breakfast in Kotor and packed up, and then pulled our suitcases around to the parking lot just outside town. We had booked our parking through the hotel, so it was cheaper, 10 EUR per day. (We also had in-and-out privileges, which I guess is useful if you’re exploring the surrounding area). There was a little box to drop off the parking card as we left the lot.

We drove north from Kotor, around the bay. It’s a beautiful drive. There’s small little villages along the shore, and the views of the water are amazing. We stopped at a couple viewpoints for pics of Ostrvo Sveti Dorde (the small island with a church).

Eventually we branched off inland for Trebinje. There were multiple checkpoints getting across the border. First we had a stop to pay a 3 EUR road toll. Next was a passport check at the border to Republika Srpska (one of the two entities of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the other is the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina). A few km later we had a customs and immigration check, where the guy asked to see our passports, car registration and green card (which allows us to take the car across borders). We got our passports stamped and were on our way! There was no line-up at any of the stops, in fact we hardly saw any other vehicles.

It really looked like another country after the last checkpoint. I don’t know if that’s due to geography (we were slightly inland) or economics. But it had a distinctly different feel, like stepping back in time a bit.

We arrived in Trebinje around noon. Found a public parking space, exchanged some Euro for marks; got a parking pass from the machine for an hour and then set out touristing.

It was very windy and cold today in Trebinje, about 3C. I think unusually windy, cause there were lots of small tree branches and twigs on the ground. One four-foot piece actually snapped off and fell on my head! I was okay though.

There was a traditional dance recital in the main pedestrian area. We watched them for a few minutes, per Heather they were very good.

Walked to see the old arch bridge, which is similar to the more famous bridge in Mostar. However the wind was causing whitecaps on the river (!), not very conducive to getting a full circle between the bridge and reflection. Oh well.

Walked through the old town. It’s in early stages of being restored, I can see Trebinje becoming a bigger tourist draw in the future.

Got back to our car and drove a few km to Stara Herzegovina, a restaurant recommended by our Airbnb host in Dubrovnik. It was excellent. We both had lamb ‘under the bell’. This is a cooking style in the region where the ingredients are placed under a terracotta lid and the lid covered with coals. It was delicious, some of the best lamb we’ve had outside of Turkmenistan :) Had a muddy coffee to finish, and then we were back on the road.

It’s under a 45 minute drive to Dubrovnik from Trebinje. The border crossing was straightforward with no line-ups entering Croatia (although lots of cars in the other direction, looked like could be an hour wait).

Google Maps has us enter the city from the north end which threw me off at first. I guess cause we were parking at Gruz Port it made more sense.

I had prepaid for parking at the port over the web, but couldn’t figure out how to use the permit, so just parked at the port and we’ll figure it out on the way out. It’s only 10 CAD / day.

Grabbed a taxi (metered) to Buza Gate, which was 80 kuna (about 8 CAD). I texted the Airbnb guy that we were at the door, he took about five minutes to arrive and let us in. He was rather talkative and took forever to describe the place and where to eat etc. Finally he left.

The sun was just setting so we rushed out to explore and take pics. Dubrovnik is an amazing place to see. Inside the walls, the town is bowl-shaped with all streets leading down to the middle. There was a band playing in the main square (part of their winter festival). It seemed like restaurants and cafes spilled out into every alley and street. Unlike Kotor, which had a very random layout, the streets here are laid out in a grid and it’s much easier to get around.

Anyways it was still very windy and cold, so we didn’t stay out much past sunset.

Later in the evening we went back out for dinner at Dalmatino, a restaurant recommended by the Airbnb. We didn’t much care for it.

Walked down to the main square for the live music. We really liked the band, Urban & 4, a popular Croatian rock musician. It was getting late (for us) so we called it a night.

Kotor, Montenegro

Today we hiked up the Ladder of Kotor, an ascent of 940m.

We dressed in layers. It was about 8C outside, which is perfect for hiking. We started in the morning so the first part was in the shade; at the top it was pretty windy (and probably a few degrees cooler), and on the way down we’d be in the sun. We were glad we took our toques - the wind was pretty cold at the top.

The trailhead starts outside the walls, near the Northern Gate. The path is quite obvious once you get on the trail; if you take a wrong turn trying to find the start (like we did), the locals are quite helpful in pointing out the way.

The trail zigzags up the hill, at a gentle slope. It’s covered with gravel and loose rock, very easy to hike.

At about castle level (260m), we could see the cutoff that leads to the castle wall, where a ladder was propped up to get through a window into the castle itself, where it’s then possible to take the steps down back into town.

We continued up. The path narrowed to about a cow width. Unfortunately there were also a couple cows walking up the path ahead of us so we were limited to their pace. The cows could actually walk up quite quickly, it’s just that they stopped frequently to munch on greens, chew their cud and look back disinterested at the tourists.

The views were great all the way up. Finally, we reached the top! The path continues further to the village of Njeguši, but we were keen to get back into town and have lunch.

We took a selfie (which we don’t do very often - maybe once or twice a trip), and then retraced our steps back to town.

It took us a total of 2.5 hours to walk up and back down, including time for pics along the way. The cows added about 15 minutes; so it’s probably just over a two hour round trip. (This is based on off-season - we saw less than ten other people the whole time.)

We tried another place for lunch, based on tripadvisor. It was average. I think most places inside the walls are varying shades of average, which is typical of a high tourist area. The best restaurants are outside of the walls.

After lunch we walked about 20 minutes around the bay to get pics of the walls at sunset.

Had drinks later on at Cesarica. It was a cosy place with nice atmosphere. Their food was okay but the draft beer was good!

Kotor, Montenegro

Breakfast was so-so at the hotel. I was surprised they had a buffet with so few guests, I thought it would have been cheaper for the hotel to offer à la carte.

There’s a couple of popular walks in Kotor. The shorter walk, variously called the Walls of Kotor, is up the city walls to the castle of San Giovanni (260m); the longer walk, the Ladder of Kotor, follows an old horse path through to the pass to the village of Njeguši (940m).

We did the shorter walk today. It’s off-season so there were hardly any other people on the walk (there were less than five other people at the castle at the top while we were there), although later in the day there were maybe 20 people. It’s also a much more comfortable temperature in December for walking. (It was a high of 11C today).

There’s stone stairs the whole way up (single file), and it took us about 30 minutes to get to the top, including lots of photo stops. There’s great views from the castle.

The pics were better on the way down (it was about 11am by this point) cause the winter sun had finally swung around the surrounding peaks to shine on the whole of the old town.

We went back to our hotel to clean up and change out of our trekking gear, and then headed out for lunch.

Decided to try Galion, around the bay, to get views of the old city from the outside. Turns out they had a five-course tasting menu so we didn’t even look at the rest of the menu.

The food was excellent. Our favourites included the grilled octopus, a mushroom broth, and a seafood risotto, although we really liked every course. We took pics of each, and when we counted them after, there were actually eight courses. No wonder we were full. Six of the courses were matched with wines, all from the Balkans.

After lunch, we did some souvenir shopping in the old town. Heather bought a cool-looking cat bag (a bag with an image of a cat). Kotor is another ‘city of cats’ and they do love their cats here.

We were too full for dinner, so later in the evening just went out for a quick drink. Ended up at the wine bar we saw the first day. They were playing tunes we liked (Manu Chau) and the place had a cool atmosphere. It ended up being a rather full unplanned day!

Kotor, Montenegro

We had a good breakfast at our hotel in Bar, then walked down the boardwalk to check it out. It was fairly busy with locals. Bar is a stop on the cruise ship circuit, and the ocean-front restaurants are built to handle the peak rush.

There’s websites where you can see the cruise ship schedules by port of call. There’s not that many at this time of year so I was able to book our trip to avoid the cruises.

Checked out of our hotel and drove to Stari Bar (‘stari’ means ‘old’). In 1979, the original location of Bar was hit by an earthquake and they relocated the town about 4km to the waterfront. Stari Bar is now slowly being restored as a tourist draw; it’s cool to wander around the ruins of the old castle that overlooks Stari Bar.

It was then a 90 minute drive to Kotor. Having learned from a couple other stops on the trip, this time I contacted the hotel ahead of time to figure out the parking situation.

Along the way we drove past the Sveti Stefan hotel island. You’ve probably seen pics of this on Instagram. It’s a very high end hotel, and only guests are allowed on the island. There was a convenient lookout point on the side of the road so I stopped to take a pic.

We also passed through Budva. When researching the trip, one of the options was Kotor vs Budva. A few travel blogs recommended Budva. Having driven through it, I’m glad we chose Kotor, it’s more to our liking. Budva I think has a better beach scene but that’s not our thing.

Google Maps showed 6km to our destination and I still couldn’t see the steep hills that surround Kotor. Then, we drove through a 1.6km long tunnel. Ah, that’s why I couldn’t see Kotor on the approach!

There was a bit of traffic entering the city centre. There was a cruise ship leaving at 5pm, the only cruise we’ll encounter.

Parked our car in a lot just outside the old city walls, and rolled our suitcases to our hotel (much easier than carrying backpacks).

Checked in, and then went to explore the old walled city. It’s really magical walking around the narrow alleys. Found a restaurant for lunch, and enjoyed fresh seafood and a bottle of Serbian white. It was excellent.

The sun was just starting to set (it was about 4pm) so we walked around taking pics with the dusk lighting. We just wandered - you can’t get truly lost cause of the walls.

We relaxed back at the hotel. We were still full by 8pm so just went out for some small bites. Had the most excellent olives. I tried a local draft beer which was refreshing.

It was a long-ish day, both of us had forgotten that we had visited Stari Bar in the morning. Also, in case Gerry or Tanya are reading, it’s country number 92 for me :) We were actually in Montenegro yesterday, but I forgot to update the country count until just now.

Bar, Montenegro

It’s a long drive from Berat to Kotor so we broke it up with a transit stop in Bar, Montenegro. Bar is part of the Montenegro Riviera on the coast of the Adriatic, and about a four hour drive from Berat.

We drove through some nice scenery on the way up, with the Adriatic on our left, and snow-capped peaks on the right.

We crossed the border to Montenegro at Muriqan - Sukobin. There was a five-minute wait, and then it was straightforward. I had to buy a Green Card which allows us to take the rental car across borders. It was 40 EUR for fifteen days, covering all of Europe. We did get our passports stamped on entry!

The last 30 minutes stretch to Bar was on a minor road, with barely enough room to pass oncoming traffic. We had to pull onto the shoulder for buses.

And then we were in Bar! There was some confusion driving to the hotel as the street it’s on is now pedestrian-only. So parked nearby, walked over and sorted out parking.

It was almost 4pm, just in time for a sundowner watching the sunset over the Adriatic. It was very nice, it did get a bit chilly (8C) once the sun disappeared.

We relaxed in our room until 8pm, and then went down for dinner. We’re on the coast so it was seafood for both of us, very fresh and tasty.

Berat, Albania

Merry Christmas! I think only once over the past eight years (since we started traveling over Christmas) have we actually had a fireplace (and thus a chimney) in our room. Our room in Berat was warm but didn’t have a fireplace, so no visit from Santa for us, lol.

Breakfast was in the same dining room that we had dinner. The room catches the morning sun and has great 270* views. The food was good, the coffee so-so.

After breakfast we headed up to Kalaja, the walled fortress on the hill, about 200m above Berat. It’s a steep climb up, with the occasional car going by. It took us about ten minutes to get to the main gate of the castle.

Normally there’s a fee to enter but not today, not sure if that’s because it’s off-season, or because it’s Christmas.

There were a couple other groups of people visiting too. We all started in a clump but then eventually spread out on our own ways. It’s an actual village inside, where people live, so really it’s just like walking about town. The highlight was Onufri Museum, set inside an 18th century church with a beautiful iconostasis, and 16th century religious paintings. We’ve recently seen similar artistry in Cyprus and Belarus; Onufri was the best we’ve seen.

Walked back down into town and had lunch at the same place as yesterday (we both had gyros). Called into a woodworking shop we had seen yesterday, to buy a wood carving we really liked, but he was closed. Walked down the pedestrian-only Boulevard Republika. One side is filled with restaurant patios, although somewhat sparsely used at this time of year (it was only 15C today). Heather picked an excellent coffee place where we had coffee and snacks.

We tried to find our way up to St Michael Church, this time using Google Maps, and we found it! It was closed (which we knew, it’s only open from 11am-noon) but it was more about the great views (it’s about 100m up).

On the way back down we tried to find our way out closer to the hotel. Somewhere along the way, I must have rubbed up against a lamp, and an enterprising lady popped out of her doorway like a genie. She started into her sales pitch for jams, preserved goods and raki. It was like watching an infomercial in a different language but still getting the pitch. Actually, it was like being in said infomercial. We had a sip of raki from a plastic water bottle cap (makes me strong), a sip of something else which had some benefit that I forget, anyways, it all made sense in the blur and I think we were lucky to escape with just buying a jar of fig jam, before the lady disappeared back into her doorway.

The spell wore off as we walked home. We threw out the fig jam in case it was a bad luck potion (we actually did throw it out, but just because we don’t trust the canning abilities of random people).

We had our Christmas dinner in the hotel restaurant. Tried a couple other mains, both were excellent.

After we walked down the pedestrian street and checked out the town’s Instagram-ready decorations. There were also classic rides like a merry-go-round. It was very festive.

Berat, Albania

We woke up with the sun shining for the first time on this trip. Had another large breakfast with great cappuccino, and then walked up to see the Zekate House (about ten minutes from the hotel).

The Zekate House is over 100-years old and an example of the great houses from the era. We had help to track down the caretaker (the opening hours are somewhat loose during offseason). There was a movie that had been filming on location and some of their gear was still in the house, for which the caretaker was very apologetic. The house itself was okay to see; the main room upstairs was the highlight with stained glass windows and carved wooden ceiling (it reminded us a bit of the Palace of Sheki Khan in Azerbaijan).

We walked back to the hotel (had excellent views of the castle and old town centre), checked out, and were on our way to Berat by about 11am.

The road was mostly in good shape, except for the cutoff to Berat. I suppose the Gjirokastër-Berat route is only common for tourists and not a major commerce route.

As we approached Berat, we could see the walled city atop the hill overlooking Berat. Then we turned the last bend and had our first view of the white buildings and went whoa, it looked really cool. (Later we read this blog, they had the same reaction).

Our hotel was accessible by car here so it was much easier to park and unload our luggage. Had a welcome drink (Turkish coffee), then freshened up and headed out to see Berat!

We walked across the Gorrica bridge to the southern side of the river, and then through the cobblestone alleys. Visited St Thomas Church (Orthodox Christian), it was okay. Checked out some craft shops on the north side of the river, and then tried to visit St Spiridon Church, but it wasn’t open even though the sign insisted they were open every day (maybe we were at the wrong entrance?). The sun was setting (around 4:15pm this time of year), got some sunset pics.

We tried to find our way up to St Michael Church, but go lost in the maze of alleys. Found our way out of the maze very close to our hotel! so called it a day.

We had made reservations at our hotel restaurant back when I planned the trip, because I wasn’t sure what was open on Christmas Eve, and also cause it’s one of the top-rated restaurants in town.

Dinner was excellent, I tried some lamb dish wrapped around sweet meats (a local specialty), Heather had tavë kosi, another local dish. We also had a bottle of Albanian white from the region.

So far it’s been a great time in Albania!

Butrint National Park, Albania

Today was a road trip to Butrint National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage site. Over the centuries there were various empires that occupied the site, including the Romans. It got me wondering how many countries we’ve seen Roman ruins together. (Only seven as it turns out: Albania, Egypt, Italy. Jordan, Lebanon, Morroco, Portugal).

The weather was beautiful, sunny and about 15C. It’s a 90 minute drive south from Gjirokastër to Butrint, climbing out of the Drino Valley through the Muzina Pass (572m) back down to the coast. The views are really cool, especially of the blue-green waters of the Bistricë river near the pass. It’s also pretty fun to drive, with lots of gear shifting and steering.

We arrived at Butrint around 11:30am. We bought our tickets (300 lek, about 3 CAD) and entered. The ticket lady said we were the first guests for today. So, another day, another site to ourselves!

The ruins are spread out over about a 2km circle, very well marked for independent visiting (most UNESCO sites are like this). Our favourites were the baptistery, the basilica and the museum in the castle, which contain some very well preserved statues from 1AD. The ruins are surrounded by forest which adds to the mystique.

It took us about two hours to walk around, and luckily we had sunny weather the whole time.

We were close to the sea, so stopped in at a seafood place rated highly on Google maps, but it was closed for the season. So went to another place in the centre of Sarandë, which was excellent. Sarandë was a hopping little town, with lots of people walking along the boardwalk. This area is called the Albanian Riviera, it’s very beautiful.

It just started to rain as we got back into the car. It poured for most of the hour drive back to Gjirokastër. This time we were ready and had umbrellas in the car :) and not buried somewhere in our suitcases.

(Because we have a car for this whole trip and it’s all through urban areas, we took suitcases rather than backpacks so we could roll them, except we’re mostly in old towns with cobblestone and have had to carry them around so far).

Relaxed and cleaned up, and then went out for dinner. We ate at Odaja, a cosy little family-run place. It was really tasty (I had the grilled rack of lamb, Heather had sausage in a red pepper sauce). We tried to walk around after dinner but there’s not much for streetlights outside of the old centre, so we just headed back to the hotel.

Gjirokastër, Albania

We were able to sleep not too poorly considering the time difference (all of the places we’re visiting in this trip are six hours ahead of Toronto).

It was still raining. According to the forecast it was 100% chance of rain every hour, as far out as my iPhone gave forecasts by the hour. Luckily we had planned mostly indoor stuff today.

First up was breakfast, in the hotel restaurant seated beside a cosy warm fireplace. Breakfast was huge, which was good cause I was hungry. They made excellent cappuccinos too.

We bundled up for the rain and cold (about 13C) and headed out for the Castle of Gjirokastër. The old town is very compact - it took us about five minutes to walk up to the main gates.

Unsurprisingly, we were the only tourists at the castle today. It was amazing having the whole site to ourselves. Although, the castle has a very dark history, still within memory of current residents of Gjirokastër.

The entry fee includes admission to a couple excellent onsite museums. It took us a couple hours to see the whole thing. The rain and leaky castle walls added to atmosphere, especially in the prison cells.

Next, we attempted to walk to the Zekate House, but it was still pouring and the slate streets had turned into rivers, soaking our shoes through. So we called into a couple craft shops on the way back to the hotel, had lunch at a random open place (which was really good) and that was it for the day.

We were running out of places to hang our wet stuff between yesterday and today. Showered to get warm and clean, relaxed for a bit.

The hotel had recommended a couple restaurants for dinner, of which we tried the pizza place tonight. It had finally stopped raining when we walked to the restaurant - it was an odd feeling not being pounded by rain.

The pizza place was busy with locals. There was also what appeared to be two other tables with tourists! So we weren’t the only tourists in town :) Dinner was okay; we preferred the lunch place.

It was raining again as we left the restaurant so we just went back to the hotel instead of walking around town a bit. The forecast for tomorrow looks better, and then supposedly sunshine for the three days we’re in Berat. Let’s hope!

Gjirokastër, Albania

So we’re off again for another trip, two weeks over Christmas to the Balkans. We’ll be spending most of the time in Albania, and then to the port towns of Kotor (in Montenegro) and Dubrovnik (in Croatia).

We flew last night from Toronto to Frankfurt on Lufthansa. After takeoff from Pearson we had great views of downtown at night, flying over the 401 and then south around the DVP. Too bad my camera was in the overhead bin cause it was a great photo op.

We landed in Frankfurt at gate Z17 and our next flight to Tirana left from gate Z19, right beside it! But we had a three hour layover so it really didn’t matter :)

The sunny morning helped with keeping us awake and getting over jetlag. Had some snacks in the lounge. I’m always amazed at the number of people having a beer in the morning in airport lounges. (Although, they could have flown in from a different time zone.) There was also a line up for frankfurters at a booth in the terminal, which is another thing I don’t think I could have in the morning, even in Frankfurt.

The flight to Tirana was on a 90-seater Bombardier, a bit of a change from the 747 we flew over the Atlantic in. The airport in Tirana was also considerably smaller than FRA. After landing in Tirana we just did a U-turn on the runway and taxied to the terminal.

Got some Albanian leks while waiting for our luggage. The immigration guy was very friendly. There’s no visas required for Canadians (nor was there any entry fee, although the Albanian consulate website said it would be 20 EUR). Unfortunately no passport stamp either :( Still counts as a country though, number 91 for me!

We picked up our rental car (a Fiat), and were on our way to Gjirokastër, about three hours south.

It rained the entire drive. It looked like it could be very scenic if not covered in dark clouds! We passed through some small atmospheric towns along the drive, arriving in Gjirokastër around 5:30pm. Google maps took us down a couple narrow streets before we gave up trying to get exactly to the hotel. Instead we parked nearby and walked over.

The hotel proprietor met us just outside, and warmly welcomed us. (We wondered later if word got out in town about the lost tourists and he went to find us, I think we might be the some of the only tourists in Gjirokastër right now). He showed Heather to our room, and then went back out in the rain with me to pick up our luggage. We also moved the car to a better parking spot.

We cleaned up a bit and then went out for dinner. While we were in Frankfurt, I had sent a message on Facebook to Gjoça Restaurant to reserve a table for 7pm. Good thing I did, not cause it was packed, but because it’s normally closed in the off-season!

Dinner was tasty, all traditional Albanian dishes. In particular I was hoping to try qifqi, which is a sort of arancini with mint, found only in Gjirokastër. It’s on every menu here. Sure enough it was one of the dishes suggested by the restaurateur. Everything was delicious. Finished with some complimentary raki, the digestif of choice in the Balkans.

All in all it was a great start to the trip!

Toronto, Canada

We've been back home for a few days after our trip from Helsinki south to Kiev, and the Azores. We flew into Helsinki, and then went by land / water through Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Our visa for Belarus required us to fly in and out of Minsk, so we flew from Vilnius to Minsk, and then onto Kiev. From Kiev we flew towards home, staying in the Azores for almost two weeks cause it broke up the long flights home.

Highlights included:

Finland and Baltic states
- Menu tastings at restaurants
- Historical old towns of the Baltic capitals (all UNESCO sites)
- Traveller Tour excursions between Tallinn & Riga and Riga & Vilnius

Minsk
- Seeing all the Soviet architecture
- Attending the ballet
- Drinking kvass from a street stall
- Overall traveling in Minsk, it's very untouristed

Ukraine
- UNESCO sites in Kiev (Kiev Pechersk Lavra, St. Sophia's Cathedral)
- Day trip to Chernobyl Exclusion Zone from Kiev

The Azores
- Eating (the fish and meat were excellent)
- Lunch at Bar da Poca on Pico Island
- Driving around Faial Island

We booked and planned out this trip in less than a week. Overall we planned the right amount of time for us in each city, although I would have added a day to Kiev to make up for the day trip to Chernobyl. Luckily we just caught the start of the heat waves when we were in Kiev. We did get more rain than we usually have on a trip, probably because we're going more off-season than in the past. Another change I would make is to book places with a/c in the Azores. It doesn't get that hot (maybe 23C) but it's very humid. I don't think our laundry ever dried in the rooms!

Overall it was a trip more about experiences, and less about major sites. There were only two additions to my Top 100, both in Kiev: Kiev Pechersk Lavra (#55) and St. Sophia's Cathedral (#79). Both were also unexpected as I knew very little about Kiev prior to the trip.

As far as country counts, Ukraine was #90 for me, getting closer to my goal of 100! Heather and I have now been through 42 countries together. Our next trip is to the Balkans over Christmas.

São Miguel Island, Azores

It was our first sunny day on São Miguel, (luckily we had sun today, it was also our last day here). We were waiting for a sunny day to visit Caldeira das Sete Cidades, which is the classic view of the Azores.

Had breakfast and then headed out west. We had driven this route a few days before in complete fog. This time around we could see the scenery! We didn't stop at any of the miradouros on the way up, cause we wanted to get to Miradouro da Boca do Inferno in case clouds rolled in later. The trail to the miradouro starts at Lagoa do Canario. The roadside parking lot was overflowing, we ended up parking on the side of the road a few hundred metres away. The more popular sites have all been overflowing with rental cars, and it's just starting to get into busy season. A side effect of the rainy weather over the past few days is that we haven't seen that many tourists at the miradouros. The Azores limits the number of tourists that can visit Islet of Vila Franca do Campo, they should probably be doing the same thing for other sites on the island.

So we parked and walked to Miradouro da Boca do Inferno. The view was amazing, but overflowing with tourists. Had to wait my turn to get to the front of the miradouro to take a pic.

We then drove a little further to Miradouro da Vista do Rei. It was similar to the views we had from Miradouro das Cumeeiras, just with more tourists. We decided to head down towards Feteiras instead of continuing along the main tourist path towards Sete Cidades.

The road down was beautiful, the roadsides covered by a sea of hydrangeas. Heather used my camera to take pics through the windshield as we drove.

We went back to Sunset Poço da Pedra for lunch, on the west end of the island. There was a funeral taking place as we drove up, with a procession and band walking through the narrow streets. We waited for the procession to pass, and then carried on.

Lunch was really relaxing overlooking the ocean. The natural pools were busier (today was Sunday), with groups of friends taking turns diving 10m from the rocks into the pools.

We got back home and got ready for dinner. There wasn't anyone at the hotel who could call a taxi for us, so we walked all the way into town, about an hour. It's mostly along the waterfront except for a five minute stretch. About half way we got held up by a band for the 2nd time today (!) this one looked like it was for a wedding.

We had dinner at Singular Bistro, the same place we had had dinner on Friday. They were busier today. We sat at a table outside, but then as we cooled down from the walk over, we started to get cold so moved inside. Normally when we go on vacation it's winter in Toronto, and so we try to have dinner on a patio on our last night. However this time it's actually warmer in Toronto and there'll be lots of patio opportunities when we get home :)

On our way home we heard live music coming from the main plaza so wandered over and watched for a while. They were quite good, and seemed to be playing their own material. Later we saw a billboard featuring the band (they're playing a concert here) and figured out the band was Caetano Veloso.

We walked back along the waterfront, a nice ending to our vacation!

São Miguel Island, Azores

The weather was getting better (the forecast just called for clouds, but no rain), the first day without rain in about a week.

We drove east to Furnas, the last of the main three craters in São Miguel. It’s home to Parque Terra Nostra (botanical gardens), thermal baths, and a fancy hotel. Hotel guests get access to the gardens and baths, non-guests just pay a small entrance fee.

It was sunny when we arrived at Furnas so drove up to a viewpoint at Miradouro do Pico do Ferro. It was a nice view, but not as photogenic as some of the other viewpoints on the island. We could see the bubbling mud below, as well as the covered holes where restaurants slow-cook stews in the hot water. (It’s a touristy thing to pre-order a lunch, but supposedly it’s very heavy so we passed).

Drove back down into Furnas and to the gardens. It was close to 1pm so we had lunch first at the hotel's patio bar. It was relaxing, overlooking the botanical gardens with birds chirping away in the trees.

The gardens have a marked walking path that takes you through the entire place, about 45 minutes. First you pass by the thermal baths. The baths here are a muddy orange / brown from the minerals, you can't see through the water. We were just here for the gardens, so continued on our way. The gardens have a wide variety of plants and trees, but not many were flowering. I'm not sure if we were just here at the wrong time, or if it's more of a gardens for people into plants. We found the thousands of hydrangeas growing by the roadsides more pleasing to look at.

So we finished the walk and got back on the road. Our next destination was the Gorreana Tea Factory. It's right off the highway and a popular tour bus stop. They have a self-guided tour through the production process (they have all the old machines here). At the end you can sample a couple of their teas. It was okay, I'm sort of partial to Ceylon tea from Sri Lanka.

We were losing steam so decided not to see the other tea place down the road (Tea Porto Formoso), and instead just went back to our hotel.

We had made reservations for dinner at Singular Bistro. However the couple we've been chatting with at the hotel had had dinner at Tasquinha Vieira and really enjoyed it, and so had booked a table for us for tonight, thinking we might like it too. So I Messenger'd Singular and asked them to change our booking there to Sunday night.

We took a taxi to Tasquinha Vieira, arriving about 7pm. They were getting busy. We had a couple appetizers which were excellent. For mains I had the lamb and Heather the fish of the day (parrot fish I think). Both were excellent too. Unfortunately it then took almost 45 minutes for us to get our bill, which put a damper on our opinion of the restaurant. Finally were able to pay, and then found a little bar to have an after-dinner drink. We had found the taxi stand so we could now get a taxi on our own to get home (taxis are otherwise only hail-able by phone; they don't drive around looking for fares).

São Miguel Island, Azores

It was another rainy day. According to the SpotAzores app (it has webcams across the Azores, very convenient for checking the weather) it was somewhat clearer on the east coast, so we drove to Nordeste. It was indeed only partly cloudy, yay! We had lunch at Restaurante Casa De Pasto O Cardoso, a very local place. I think there was only one other table with tourists. We both had the steak, which was excellent, but we ate too much. (I've been really impressed with the beef here, it's a tough choice between great beef and great fish!)

We left the car parked near the restaurant and walked to Miradouro do Pelado. According to Google Maps it was just a 3 minute walk from the end of the road, but it turned out to be a 30 minute walk through a bamboo-lined path to a viewpoint over the ocean! It was a nice little walk, especially after our big lunch :)

We drove back along the southeast coast, again stopping at all the miradouros. There were a couple vantage points of Lighthouse Arnel, of which I took dozens of pics.

Our hotel had booked us in a small cosy restaurant for dinner; however there was some issue at the restaurant and it had to cancel the dinners for today. So we were on our own on a Friday night :( We took a taxi into town and searched out a place for dinner. The first few places were fully booked, we ended up at Singular Bistro, which had a very cool setting in a century-old mansion. We could only get seats at the bar, which was okay by us. The food was excellent, and the staff were great. We were still full from lunch, so split a selection of their appetizers. We made reservations for the next evening so we could try their mains :)

São Miguel Island, Azores

It was really rainy today so we looked for inside things to do. We remembered that the friendly tourist info folks had given us (amongst other things) and pamphlet on the 'pineapple route'. Hmm, sounds like inside stuff, so that's where we started.

First stop was Pineapples A Arruda, the location of the first pineapple greenhouse in São Miguel. I hadn't realized how long it takes to grow a pineapple, about 24 months! The cool part is how they trigger the flowering -- they create a smoky (aka carbon dioxide-rich) environment which triggers a protective response from the plants, in this case, flowering. Apparently this was discovered by accident. It's convenient because then the entire crop is growing at the same time. Anyways at Pineapples A Arruda there were greenhouses in varying states of growth. They also had some pineapple liqueur for sampling, and a bunch of pineapple-related souvenirs. It was pretty busy with tourists who likely all had the same idea as us on a rainy day.

There's a couple other greenhouses on the 'pineapple route'; we just skipped to the last one, the grandly-named Interpretation Center of Pineapple Culture. It was 3 EUR to enter, which is likely why we were the only tourists (the other sites were all free). The Interpretation Center was nicely done, giving a history of the pineapple industry in the Azores, and how they marketed this exotic fruit in Europe back in the 1800's.

It was still raining after we left the Interpretation Center. We decided just to drive out to the west end of the island, maybe we could catch a cloud break somewhere. It was a really foggy drive up to the viewpoints for Lagoa Azul and Lagoa Verde, we could barely see the road, never mind the view in the distance! Dipped down into the crater to Sete Cidades, where the fog ceiling was about 100m so at least we could see the other side of the lakes.

We continued on to the west coast, where there was some sun! I checked Google Maps for a decent cafe to eat (I was just looking for anything over 4.0) and we ended up at Sunset Poço da Pedra, a little hamburger stall on the coast. The food was great! There was also a nice view of the ocean and waves crashing on the rocks.

We drove back towards home along the north coast, stopping at all the miradouros along the way. One of them, Miradouro das Cumeeiras, went inland up the side of the crater. I drove up, at first thinking it would give a nice view of the ocean. However, it actually was a viewpoint for the inside of the crater, of Lagoa Azul, Lagoa Verde and Sete Cidades which we had previously just seen in the fog. It was a surprise to get such a view given the weather.

We had reservations for dinner at Restaurante Cais 20. The rain had stopped so we walked over, about 25 minutes towards downtown Ponta Delgada (our hotel was on the outskirts of town, in Livramento). We ended up sitting near a couple who are also staying at our hotel, who we've been chatting with. I guess everyone gets the same restaurant recommendations from hotel :) I had the steak, Heather had the chicken, both were good. The restaurant was totally busy with locals, lined up about 20 people waiting for tables. We had a couple espressos to finish and then walked back home.

São Miguel Island, Azores

We had an early morning flight to Sao Miguel, about an hour east of Pico. We dropped off our car rental after checking in for the flight. Dropping off the car took all of 30 seconds.

The flight was on a twin prop, with free seating. The passenger handling is a bit loose here, we walked in disjointed groups past other planes that were boarding. It would have been quite easy to jump on another plane.

Anyways quickly got our luggage and then looked around for our car rental people. (We rented cars mostly from small operations that didn’t have airport booths, it was much cheaper). The very helpful tourist info person at the airport called the car rental agency and let them know we had arrived. She then went through some of the highlights of Sao Miguel island while we waited. Very efficient use of our time :)

The car rental people showed up about five minutes later and we took their shuttle to their depot. On Sao Miguel, we’re now driving a Fiat Panda.

Drove down to our hotel (Solar da Glória ao Carmo) along a highway, which was a bit of a shock after being on the lesser populated islands (I think there’s about 140K people in Sao Miguel vs about 12K on Faial and about the same on Pico).

Checked in and got an overview of island and a suggested itinerary for today (it was nice today but supposed to be rainy the next few days).

Settled in and went to Sunset Beach cafe for lunch, which was really busy, right on the ocean with a beautiful view. They had grilled sardines as a daily special. They were grilled perfectly, reminding us of the sardines we had many years ago in Morocco on our first trip together.

After lunch, we drove to Lagoa do Fogo, one of the three main lake groups on the island. Stopped for the view from Miradouro do Pico da Barrosa.

Drove a bit further to Caldeira Velha, which is one of the many natural thermal pools on Sao Miguel. Bought our tickets (8 EUR each) and then changed to go into the pools. The first one came from a waterfall and wasn’t that warm, maybe 28C. The other two we tried were warmer, about 40C. Some of the other thermal pools on the island are murky from their mineral content; these were pretty clear and no worries about staining our clothes or towels.

We then drove back to the hotel, having had a rather full itinerary for what was a transit day.

We bought tickets online for a national reserve, Ilhéu de Vila Franca do Campo. They limit attendance to 400 people / day, and Monday was the only remaining day available while we were here. The hotel manager actually paid for them as they only accepted Portuguese credit cards.

Had dinner at the hotel (fish soup, then rice with shrimp, matched with wines, and dessert). It was excellent. The dinners were one of the reasons we had booked into this place. Unfortunately, there was a family emergency with the managers, so tonight was the only dinner we were able to have at the hotel over our five days here.

Pico Island, Azores

We finally got around to trekking today, although probably more accurately called a walk (I think the tourism board calls them ‘walking trails’).

We did the Vinhas da Criação Velha trail, which is close to town. It winds through the UNESCO designated vineyards. The vines are protected from the harsh winds by walls of lava rock forming about 10’ by 10’ plots, with gaps in the wall to let just enough air go through. It would have taken a lot of effort back in the day to build. The trail is well-marked.

We had lunch at O Ancoradouro in Madalena. It’s a fancy restaurant with real tablecloths, a nice view of the waves crashing on rocks, and very good fish. We ran into Federico at the restaurant. She runs our hotel, and had recommended this place for lunch.

After lunch we headed back to the hotel and packed up. (We had an early flight the next morning).

We had dinner at Cella Bar, about a 25 minute walk from the hotel. We went a bit early to get a table (they don’t take reservations) and then had a bunch of appetizers as tapas. This restaurant also had a great view of the ocean. We finished our drinks outside, watching the sunset over Faial island. It was a nice end to our visit to Pico.

Pico Island, Azores

We had our tour of Gruta das Torres (lava caves) booked for 3:30pm, so had the morning to fill. We drove out to the east end to see Ponta da Ilha Lighthouse. It’s a working lighthouse. There’s a walking trail that starts there.

Close by is a pottery workshop, Barro Barro. They had some interesting stuff, but we still had a couple flights and pottery doesn’t travel well.

We stopped in at Bar da Poca for lunch. It’s in a great location, down a steep road (over 45* in places), just above a natural pool. We arrived just after it opened at noon, with the regulars drifting in quickly after us. We tried the lapis (mussel-like, served baked in the half-shell with garlic butter and lemon) and grilled tuna, which was cooked perfectly. An excellent lunch, considering it looks more like a beach bar. They even had really clean bathrooms, disguised in a building that looked like an outhouse (actually, just about every bathroom has been great in the Azores).

The locals / regulars were all keen to talk with us at the lunch spot. (It’s at the opposite end of the island from town, so I guess fewer tourists make it here, although it’s only a 75 minute drive). We really enjoyed the east end of the island!

After lunch we had a quick walk down to the natural pool to check it out before driving up the steep road on our way to the lava caves.

Google maps originally took us down a dirt road that was a bit too rustic for our little rental (it was literally a cow field), so we got back on the main road and followed road signs to the caves.

The entrance to the caves is designed to blend into the surroundings, and is made from the black lava rocks. They’ve done a great job of the building architecturally.

Excursions to the lava caves are limited to groups of 12 for a 90 minute tour. It starts off with a short video (which was okay, but the whaling documentary is a tough act to follow).

Then we got helmets (and a disposable hairnet) and flashlights, and we descended into the lava caves.

They’ve kept the lava caves as-is, with the exception of the stairs leading down. The tour is a 450m circuit. Along the way the tour guide explained the different formations. In the middle, we all the turned our lights off to experience total darkness. (We’d done this before while caving in Borneo, we’re spelunkers, don’t you know). The difference here is that there’s no bats - radar doesn’t work in the porous rock.

Anyways it was an interesting excursion and different from other stuff we’d been doing on the islands.

Had dinner at the hotel again. Unfortunately their tuna was not that fresh, which was rather disappointing. Oh well.

Pico Island, Azores

The whaling industry features prominently in Pico’s history. The last whale was caught here in 1987, using the same methods that had existed for a couple hundred years. We learnt all about the history of the whalers and the whaling industry from a couple a great museums in Pico.

We started at Museu dos Baleeiros in Lajes, on the south side of the island. Along the way, we got held up by some free range cows on the road. Better pay attention to the ‘cow crossing’ signs here!

The museum was free to enter as it was a Sunday. (Admission is only 2 EUR, but still). The tour started with a documentary on the whalers, filmed in the 1970’s. It is possibly the best documentary I have ever seen. It should have won awards when it was released (for all I know, maybe it did). You really felt you were part of the whaling community by the end.

The museum itself contains whaling boats and tools used back in the day. Because that was only 30 years ago, there’s great examples of everything. The museum itself is housed in former boathouses.

Now that we knew more, we recognized the whale watching huts dotting the hills. A whale watcher would sit all day in the hut, sending a flare when they spotted a whale (about 3-4 times a week). The rest of the crew would drop everything in town to race out to the sea. The whale watchers still exist, except now they watch for whales to radio over to the whale watching excursions.

A busload of tourists showed up just as we were leaving, luckily we were ahead of them today! We bought a small souvenir from whale bone (the art form is called scrimshaw).

Next we drove to the north side of the island, about 10 minutes coast to coast. We got held up a couple times again with cows on the road :)

We had lunch at Casa Âncora in São Roque, which was one of the best meals we had in the Azores. I had the steak (the beef is all free range and really tasty here, see notes above about cows on the road), and Heather had the grilled octopus which was the best octopus we’ve ever had.

We then stopped in at the Whalers Museum, which was about the industry side of things. It’s housed in a former whaling factory, where the blubber was turned into oil and whale liver into terrible tasting vitamins. Pretty much the entire whale was processed.

Because the whaling industry came to an end in the late 1980s, and there wasn’t much of a market for used whale processing equipment, it’s all just sitting around looking like it’s ready for the next shift coming in tomorrow (but with the lack of any fishy smell). The only thing comparable for me was the old printing press centre for the Toronto Star, which was sold for scrap metal when it closed.

Anyways the two museums really give a great background into the whaling culture of the island.

We tried to go for a wine and liquor tasting at Adega A Buraca (which does local liqueurs) but it‘s closed on Sundays. Instead we went to Museu do Vinho, which was in Portuguese only, so we didn’t get much out of it. They did have an original grape press, which was cool, as well as a 800 year old dragon blood tree in the grounds.

Pico Island is the Azorean Island most noted for its wines, in particular its white wines, which take on a very mineral/flinty taste due to the volcanic rock and a noticeable (and really interesting) salty taste due the proximity of most of the vineyards to the Atlantic Ocean.

We had dinner at our hotel again, trying some different things from the menu. Good thing they’re closed on our last day here, we would have run out of menu items. We split an appetizer, pasta, and then the pork for our main. It was excellent once again.

Faial Island, Azores

It was still nice weather this morning for our drive to Capelinhos on the west end of Faial, just past the airport. In the 1950’s, a series of underwater eruptions added about 2km to the island. It forced the evacuation of nearby residents, who mostly immigrated to Canada and the US.

It’s now home to an Interpretive Center, which won awards when it was built in the 2000s but now looks very dated. The highlight was climbing the lighthouse. It’s really windy and dusty at the point, so we didn’t stay very long.

We drove back to Horta on the east end, and up Monte da Guia. It was raining and we couldn’t see much through the clouds. We would have had great views if it was sunny!

Had lunch at a random spot near the ferry, Pizzaria California. It was really good pizza, hit the spot. We then killed some time until our ferry to Madalena on the island of Pico, walking down the boardwalk and watching the waves crash into shore.

The car rental guy was there promptly at 2:30pm to pick up the Smart car. We boarded the ferry, using the boarding passes I had received over email when I bought the tickets back in March. We could have just bought tickets at the ferry but it seemed cool to be able to buy them over the web. We had to check our big packs, which was convenient cause then we didn’t have to lug them on board.

We found out why they check large bags, as the 30 minute crossing is a bit rough. Our big packs would have been tossed around and probably injured someone. We sat up top with a clear view of the horizon, so didn’t get sea sick, but got splashed a few times. Oh well.

We arrived in one piece and picked up our packs. On Pico we had a car rental from Ilha Verde, whose offices were just a couple minutes down the street from the ferry. Everything was ready for us, I just had to sign in a few places and we were off in a little Ford Fiesta, which felt like driving a boat after the Smart car.

We drove over to our hotel, Alma do Pico, and that was pretty much it for the day. The hotel gave a great orientation on arrival; even calling to book reservations to see the caves for a couple days out. The hotel has the top ranked restaurant on the island (at least according to tripadvisor, I think that’s partially why we chose the place), so we booked for the next three nights.

Dinner was really good. We split the local cheese board. For mains we both had homemade pasta (it’s an Italian chef) - I had the fettuccine bolognese and Heather had the fettuccine al fungi (this was excellent).

Lisbon to Faial Island

We woke up at 3am to watch the Raptors win. The game finished just before our alarms at 6am, so we just got up, packed, met our driver outside and drove to the airport for our flight to Horta, on the island of Faial in the Azores.

The flight was 2.5 hours west, taking us closer to home. We had great views of Mt Pico and Faial island from the plane.

It was a beautiful day on Faial. The hotel emailed to let us know the car rental guy was running a few minutes late, and then we were off in our little Smart car. It’s actually not a bad little car!

Drove to our hotel, half way around the island, about 20 minutes. The island and ocean views were amazing. Hydrangeas lined the roads everywhere. All the houses and gardens are very well maintained.

We checked in at H18, and relaxed for a bit. Met with the owner who gave us recommendations for restaurants and things to do. It was sunny today and forecast rain for tomorrow so she suggested we try to see the caldera today.

First we drove to the north end of the island for lunch at Aldina Restaurant. The restaurant is popular with bus tours and we were squeezed into a corner. The food was good, we’re having mostly seafood while in the Azores (although the cows are all free range here, so the beef is pretty good too).

So next we drove to Caldeira do Cabeço Gordo, which dominates the island. Because we were approaching from the north, google maps took us through some small roads, barely wide enough for the Smart car. It was really scenic, it’s worth coming here just to drive around.

At the top, we parked and walked through a short 20m tunnel for views of the inside of the caldera. It’s home to more than 20 species of birds and animals. It used to be possible to take a guided trek to the caldera floor but no longer.

It was still nice weather (although about 5C colder than at sea level, and windier) so we figured we could do the two hour trek around the top of of the caldera. Just as we started, clouds rolled in, and after about 15 minutes we decided it wasn’t such a great idea (we weren’t prepared for rain) and headed back to the car.

The weather was much nicer as we descended. Drove back to our hotel, cleaned up and then walked over to Tasca O Capitólio, about 15 minutes in town, for dinner. It was okay, maybe our expectations were higher after the great lunch.

After dinner we walked down to Forte de São Sebastião, which according to our guide book looked great at night with the lighting. The guidebook is about four years old and out-of-date as it’s now a nightclub.

Kyiv to Lisbon

And so ended our southward trip from Helsinki to Kyiv. Today we started our trip towards home, although with a 12-day ‘layover’ in the Azores.

Caught our taxi to the airport at 7am. We found out yesterday that there are actually two airports on Kyiv. We arrived from Minsk at the smaller airport in town. Our flight this morning was from the larger airport about 45 minutes from the centre. Luckily the hotel staff were on the ball last night when we booked the taxi cause at first we asked for the wrong airport.

Went through security etc and had a quick breakfast at the very busy restaurant. We pushed off the gate on time, but then had to wait 30 minutes for clearance from some country (I couldn’t hear which one over the speaker) to fly through their airspace.

Three hours later we landed at Schiphol (Amsterdam), which we’ve flown through a lot. I didn’t realize how often we’ve passed through until I was looking at my passport stamps! Got another Schiphol stamp, probably our last stamp of the trip as we’ll be in Schengen for the remainder. (Maybe we’ll get a stamp leaving the Azores?)

We had enough time between flights to grab some lunch. Conveniently, there was a device charging area across from our gate, and free wifi, so I was able to post my Chernobyl pics. I took almost 700 pics yesterday (I think the most I’ve taken in a day) and used the last flight to edit my favourites.

The flight from Amsterdam to Lisbon also boarded somewhat on time, but then had a 90 minute delay to get a take-off slot. This flight was also about three hours. Used the time to catch up on my blog. (Flights are great for this!)

We landed in Lisbon around 6pm. More bad news, Heather’s luggage didn’t make the connection in Amsterdam and was on the next flight, arriving around 10pm. The baggage people suggested our best option logistically was to come back around 10:30pm to pick up the bag. (An aside from Heather: to friends and family who patiently endured my “lost luggage” years, yes, this is the first time anything’s happened to my bags since meeting Eric in May 2005. I’ve had a good run of my luggage arriving with me, so I wasn’t too bothered with the delay...although I’ve been told many times before that my “delayed bags” would arrive on “the next flight” - and ended up without my bags for weeks sometimes!)

When we booked this trip, we had debated just continuing on to the Azores (another 2.5 hours), but we preferred to break up the travel. Plus dinner in Lisbon is never a bad thing. With the flight delay and having to go back to the airport to pick up Heather’s backpack, we had only a 2.5 hour window for dinner.

We hoped to get into Taberna da Rua das Flores for dinner. They don’t take reservations, and the line up can be up to two hours, but we had originally figured if we got there at 6pm, when it opened, we’d get in. Our chances didn’t look so hot at 7:45pm on a busy Thursday night, but the restaurant was just around the block from our hotel, so we dropped by. They did have availability for two people, lounging on cushions on the stairs, so we took it!

It’s a tapas restaurant, we had the coriander with clams, sardines, grilled prawns, and then calamari. Everything was cooked perfectly. Had espressos and chocolate mousse for dessert. And we were back at the hotel just in time to meet our driver to go back to the airport! Couldn’t have planned it better :)

We had to wait about 30 minutes in line at the check in counter. Finally it was our turn. They went to the back room to search for Heather’s backpack (Heather - yes, folks, this was when my luggage anxiety really kicked into high gear) and about five minutes later they wheeled it around in a cart. Yay!

Took the taxi back to the hotel (we’ve spent more time with our driver than at the hotel!) and went to bed. The NBA finals game 6 was starting at 2am, and we had to catch a taxi at 6am for our flight to the Azores, so it didn’t look like we’d get much sleep tonight.

Chernobyl tour, Ukraine

Today we had our excursion to Chernobyl. Heather was of mixed opinion about signing up for the tour, whether it was exploitive or not. We hadn’t heard about the HBO series on Chernobyl until about a week ago. We only added Kyiv to our itinerary because we needed to fly out of Minsk; it was a cheap flight and also a place I wanted to see. We found out about the Chernobyl tour after googling things to see in Kyiv. We were hoping that the HBO special hadn’t driven up tourism yet (one of the things I wanted to see was the abandoned city of Pripyat, which is better with fewer people).

So we went down to the meeting point at Dnipro hotel at 7:30am. Now that we knew the drill, we got some breakfast to go on the walk over.

We were lucky and got placed in a 8-passenger van rather than the 18-passenger bus. In our van were three German 20-somethings and a couple of journalists for a German media company. They spent some time interviewing us all at each of the sites throughout the day. Our initial impression was that they were here to cover the tourist boom caused by the HBO series on Chernobyl. The journalists seemed a bit disappointed that this was not the reason that any of the five of us chose to go to Chernobyl. In fact, none of us had actually seen the recent TV series!

Our guide, Nikolai, went through the rules and regulations for the day. The Chernobyl Exclusion Zone is still militarized and strictly patrolled. He also went through the radiation safety checks. He carried a Geiger counter (which measures the current radiation level) and we each got a personal dosimeter (which measures cumulative radiation exposure).

And we were off. Actually, we pretended to leave while the media guys filmed us. Then we stopped and waited for them to get in the van :)

About 300-400 people per day now take the Chernobyl tour; about 1,200 on weekends. Our guide has been running tours for 10 years and has witnessed the increase from 1,600 people a year when he first started.

It’s about a two hour drive to the 30km exclusion zone. There we stopped at the checkpoint while the military checked our paperwork and passports. We also received our personal dosimeters.

Once inside the 30km exclusion zone, we started passing through villages and towns where people were forced to abandon their homes on very short notice and allowed to carry very little. It was hard to recognize the towns because there’s been 33 years of tree growth which now obscures everything. The Soviets didn’t keep statistics, but estimates are that about 130,000 people were displaced from 280 villages.

Next we drove to the town of Chernobyl, from which the reactors take their name. (The largest town in the exclusion zone was Pripyat where most of the engineers lived). Chernobyl is now home to the 3,000 workers involved in decommissioning the reactors, a semi-active town minus things like children (you must be 18 and over to live here).

We stopped at the Chernobyl road sign. None of the five of us were interested in selfies, to the disappointment of the media guys.

In Chernobyl we visited a memorial to the first responders, and those that sacrificed their lives in the early days to prevent things from getting much worse.

We also had a brief stop to see some of the robots that were used to assist in the early clean up. Unfortunately, the robots were not of much use because their electronics got fried with the radiation. The robots on display were still slightly radioactive, but okay to view from a distance.

We next went to a memorial dedicated to the people who lost their villages and homes in Ukraine (Belarus also received much of the nuclear fallout from Chernobyl). The memorial was a replica display of road sign posts for the 280 villages. As you walk towards the centre of the display, you see the ‘welcome to’ version of all the city signs. When you turn around to leave, you see the ‘now leaving’ version, but the city’s name has been shadowed out in black. Because this was the late 80’s and pre-internet, there was also a mailbox exchange set up at the centre of the memorial where people could leave notes for their friends in other villages. (There was no other way to track people back then. Nowadays you’d just create a Facebook group or something).

Somewhere along the way we passed the 10km exclusion zone checkpoint.

Then we drove down an unmarked 8km road to a Soviet radar installation, Duga, built during the Cold War to detect ICBMs. Back in the day, this was a top secret site, appearing as a children’s day camp on military maps.

The radar installation was quite impressive to see. It’s about 50 storeys tall and 450m (?) wide. We were lucky to end up with our guide as I don’t think many tours visit here.

Next we drove to the reactors. From a few hundred metres (about 0.58 on the Geiger counter) we got out of the car for a few minutes to take a couple of pics of the reactors. As we were leaving, a big busload of ‘cliché tourists’ arrived (as our guide called them), and we had to wait for the media guys to film them. (Heather — I found it very disrespectful that a bunch of tourists would take selfies and pose for smiling pics in front of a tragic site. What would make someone think, ‘Hey, I really need this selfie of me smiling in front of this human tragedy which still haunts so much of this part of the world.’

By now, it was after 1pm (I couldn’t believe how fast the day had gone) and we went to the workers’ cafeteria for lunch. There was a radiation check as we entered the building. Lunch was a choice of potato or pasta, meat, coleslaw, and a soup. As our guide said, all comrades eat the same.

After lunch we drove to Pripyat, which most people associate as Chernobyl. It was the city where most of the engineers and management and their families lived (population of about 45,000 at the time). As we drove down Lenin St (the main street), we could barely make out buildings and houses lost in the forest that has grown up over the last 33 years.

We stopped in Lenin Square and started out on foot. All around were ghosts of buildings. Hotels, shopping malls, cafes, theatres, restaurants — all abandoned and left to nature. Most eerie was the amusement park, with a Ferris wheel, carousel, and bumper cars all slowly rusting away. Vandals have accelerated the process in places. It’s very strange to be there, with only a handful of other people.

We also stopped by an abandoned riverside cafe and boat docks.

On the way out, we had two more radiation checks, at both the 10km checkpoint and 30km checkpoint. Our total exposure for the day was 2 microsieverts (as a comparison, a dental xray is about 5-10 microsieverts).

Finally our tour was complete. Our guide was excellent at avoiding the busloads throughout the day - we rarely saw anyone else. I think our experience was influenced by our guide, who was great, and the respectful attitude of the rest of the group we were with.

We still had the two hour drive back to Kyiv ahead of us. We got dropped off at Dnipro hotel and then walked back home. The sun and heat were getting to me, so we just showered, had a quick bite to eat at the hotel restaurant, and went to bed.

Kyiv, Ukraine

Slept in a bit and then went for breakfast at our hotel. It was so-so, just as well we didn’t get breakfast included with the room. It was a bit surprising given how good their lunch and dinner had been.

Heather did some more research on Kyiv and it’s a hotspot for street art. Striletska St was along our way, so we walked down. There’s a few full-length murals on 5- and 6-storey buildings. Heather got a few pics to add to her street art album.

Next walked over to St. Andrew's Church. Unfortunately it was closed for restoration and we could only visit the walkway surrounding the church. There’s a great view of lower Kyiv, with the church perched right on the edge of upper part of the city.

It’s less than a 10 minute walk from St. Andrew’s to St. Michael's Monastery. The three big churches in Kyiv (St. Sophia's Cathedral, St. Andrew's Church and St. Michael's Monastery) are in a triangle, and all 10 minutes from each other, very convenient for tourists.

Bought a ticket to climb the bell tower at St. Michel’s. It’s not as tall as St. Sophia's, which it faces. We would have to have been there early morning to get good pics of St. Sophia’s, as that’s when it gets sun.

The monastery itself is free to visit. It was okay; I think maybe it should be visited before seeing the other UNESCO ones.

We tried to find a random place for lunch, and chose poorly. There’s a food stall area (sort of an open air food court) near our hotel. We tried grilled kebabs with fries, both of which were almost bad enough to make me find the place on tripadvisor to give them a bad rating.

So that was it for our touristing for the day. Showered, took a nap (the Raptors games have been at 3am and 4am our time, ruining our sleep), and then got ready for dinner.

We ate at Shoti, a Georgian restaurant and supposedly one of the more popular places in town. I made reservations, but they weren’t needed on a Tuesday as the restaurant was less than half full. We took a taxi over cause it was still 28C.

We asked the waiter for help with the menu as we didn’t know much about Georgian cuisine. It was a bit similar to Azeri food. (I had to look up the geography, I didn’t realize how close Ukraine was to Georgia). The sommelier recommended a Georgian Cabernet Sauvignon which was excellent. Overall an excellent dinner!

Kyiv, Ukraine

We were up early to catch a taxi to the meeting point for our Chernobyl tour. We were supposed to be there by 7:30am, but got there a few minutes early.

Chatted with some of the other people on the tour, mostly solo and pairs of independent travelers from western countries. Unfortunately for us, there was a mix up between the tour agency we booked through and the operator agency, and we weren’t on the list. They had extra seats (the tour bus fit about 16), but the tour enters the Chernobyl exclusion zone, which is still heavily militarized. If you’re not on the list sent to the military, then you don’t get in.

We decided to grab breakfast at McDonalds and figure out what to do next. I used the free wifi to email the tour agency. By the time we had finished our McMuffins, we were rescheduled for a couple days out (luckily we were in Kyiv for three days and this was our first day).

So it was 8am and we were ready for touristing, the earliest start we’d had in weeks. It was good to catch the cooler morning air as there was a heat wave in Kyiv, with a highs in the low 30s the whole time we were here. Plus we were half way to Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, one of the sites we wanted to see.

We walked over to the site, caught up in the rush of office workers walking to their offices. We looked distinctly non-local with our hiking shoes, sun hats, and day packs, with everyone else in office attire.

Bought our tickets to Kyiv Pechersk Lavra, which included climbing the bell tower and a camera pass ($10 CAD) (although no one asked to see the camera pass throughout the day).

The bell tower wasn’t yet open, so we checked out the main church. The interior was as amazing as the outside. There was a mass (?) going on in the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and the singing / intonations added to the whole atmosphere.

Next up we climbed the bell tower, which helped us get oriented. It’s a little different seeing larger sites without a guide book! There was a map at the entrance (we took a pic), but it didn’t really tell us what the highlights were out of the 60+ items listed at the site.

Walked around the structures near the bell tower. They were all quite amazing. We were only maybe 30% of the way through the entire Kyiv Pechersk Lavra complex and already it had blown us away. I didn’t even know the place existed!

We walked over to the lower caves, about a ten minute walk. It was tiring in the heat and sun. Took us a while to figure things out, there wasn’t much signage in English.

The caves are old burial spots where people come to pray. The only lighting comes from candles people carry through to place at selected burial spots. It was also super bright outside in the sun, so my eyes didn’t adjust very quickly. At one point, a monk (?) dressed in a black robe, sitting in the corner, pointed the way. The only thing I could really see was his hand and face in the darkness. It was very eerie.

By the time we got to the upper cave section of the complex, it was about two hours in and we were losing steam.

We took a taxi back to the hotel (instead of walking one hour in the hot sun), washed up a bit, and then looked for a place for lunch.

We ended up at an Italian restaurant near the Golden Gate. It was quite good. Their double espressos were large, almost like quadruple espressos, and they had very refreshing sorbets.

We had enough energy to see one more thing, so walked over to St. Sophia's Cathedral for our 2nd UNESCO site for the day (Kyiv Pechersk Lavra is also a UNESCO site).

The Cathedral grounds consist of a bell tower guarding the entrance, with the cathedral itself inside the walls. Bought tickets for both the bell tower and the cathedral interior. The cathedral was 5 CAD, which seemed a bit steep compared to other ticket prices, but more on that later.

The bell tower was tall. I was out of breath when I reached the top. (Maybe also a reflection on my fitness). There were a few wooden beams that cut over the stairs, about head height. Obviously there were different building codes back in the 11th century.

Anyways there were great views at the top, especially of St. Andrew's Church. (Actually, the pics of St. Andrew's were better from the first viewing level cause at the lower levels the buildings behind the church are hidden from the frame).

Then on to the cathedral. Inside was amazing, with mosaics and paintings preserved from the 11th century. You’re even allowed up to the 2nd floor for better views. We now understood the pricing and why some blogs said it would take two hours to visit!

So not a bad day at all of touristing, with two UNESCO sites that we didn’t know about that were amazing.

We got home, pretty tired from the long day and the heat. We just decided to have dinner at the hotel; we had no get-up-and-go to look for anything else. Dinner was excellent.

Minsk to Kyiv

Our flight to Kyiv was at a good time (1:30pm) so we had time to sleep in and have a relaxed breakfast before packing and checking out. We took a hotel transfer for the 45 minute drive to the airport, passing by many of our favourite Minsk buildings along the way, like October and the National Library. The hotel offered us water for the ride which is easy for them but we thought a nice gesture (first time we’ve seen it).

We checked in and then went through security and immigration. The immigration officials were just as deliberate on the way out, verifying all the anti-forgery stuff on the passport, including checking every page of mine to make sure they were all there! They didn’t look at the stamps, just the page number.

We debated having a snack at the airport cause the flight was around lunch but there wasn’t much selection. Anyways we had just had a big breakfast so we weren’t even hungry.

There was a lot of rain today, but luckily it stopped when we had to board, cause we had to walk on the tarmac. No Cobus 3000s here, I guess they use the Russian equivalent for the buses that carry passengers from the terminal to the plane.

The flight took off a bit early. It was only an hour but we still got served a little Joe Louis-type snack and a tea.

We landed at 2:30pm and beating all previous records were at the hotel by 3:15pm. Yes, it took 45 minutes to get through immigration, pick up our bags, meet our driver, and get to the hotel. It helped that the airport is pretty close to town.

We decided to have a larger lunch and then a small dinner cause of the time. Just ate at the hotel top floor restaurant with a nice view of the city. We both liked the feeling of being back in a big city (Kyiv is about the same population as Toronto). Minsk is also fairly large, but Kyiv has a much denser core.

Anyways the food was good at our hotel. The rest of the afternoon we did some research on places to see in Kyiv.

Later in the evening we walked down Volodymyrska St, the main street in Kyiv. It was closed to traffic, we suspect it’s pedestrian-only on Sundays. There were thousands of people enjoying the evening with buskers along most of the route. The sun was just setting and it was quite beautiful.

Got back to the hotel, I was a bit peckish, Heather was still full from lunch, so I just went to the hotel restaurant for a quick snack. Tried salo, a popular dish/snack which is sort of a cured pork fat, served sliced with pepper and other spices. Very good with beer :)

We had an excursion to Chernobyl early the next morning so went to bed around 11ish.

Minsk, Belarus

We didn’t have much left on our list for Minsk as we had covered quite a bit on our first day here.

We started at the central market (Kamaroŭski Rynak). We took the subway, to use up our 72hr passes and also to check out additional subway stations. (Also it was about 5km).

The market building itself is an attraction, an old 70s structure, with the title in the cool red font that’s common here. Inside it was the usual meats, dairy, baked goods, pickled stuff and more. Just outside were the fruit and vegetable stalls. The strawberries in particular smelled amazing, but it’s one of the foods that is not a good idea to eat when travelling cause they are difficult to wash.

There was another Lido restaurant beside the market, so we decided to have lunch there. It is sort of an institution in Minsk. It was cafeteria-style where you choose what you want and pay by weight / item. We found the food a bit oily and preferred the Library restaurant to Lido.

On the walk back to subway, we passed a street stall selling kvass. We tried it in the Baltics; it has sort of a root beer / bread taste and is only slightly alcoholic (1%). Anyways there were people lining up for the stall (usually a good sign), so we did too. It was 60 kopeks for a 333ml cup (around 40 cents); it was our favourite kvass we’ve had, definitely hit the spot!

We took the subway down to the train station to check out the exterior. If we didn’t have the visa requirement to fly out, then we likely would have taken the train to Kiev. Oh well. The train station is now in a new building, but there was a nice view of the ‘gates of Minsk’, twin big old buildings across the street that frame the entrance to the city.

Walked over to the nearby Lenin Square and the statue of Lenin. Supposedly in the past you couldn’t take pics, but everyone was, and the security guy didn’t seem to care.

Next to Lenin Square is Saint Simon and Saint Helena Church, aka the red church (it’s a red colour). We stepped inside cause we were there. The church features in all the lists of things to see in Minsk, but I didn’t find it too special.

That was it for our touristing. Took the subway back to the old town and looked for souvenirs. There was a festival or celebration of some sort going on, with live folk music and dancing and lots of stalls selling food and crafts. Straw crafts are popular here, and we got a little talisman. We also bought a small talisman doll made from fabric. After we bought it, the stall owner ran after Heather and gave her a necklace talisman for free :)

We walked back towards the hotel through the side / back streets so we could have a drink at a craft beer place listed on the hotel map of things nearby. Their beer was good. I also ordered something called pig ears. I was hoping it was just lost in translation and maybe pork rinds, but it was in fact thinly sliced pickled pig ears. They were tasty but the texture is not to my liking.

We liked the beers and the rest of the menu looked good, so we booked in for dinner.

So a few hours later walked back. It seemed like we were the only tourists, which was nice. Heather had the chicken Kiev (a city early :) ) and I tried the Belarussian pork. Both were tasty. It was just the kind of low key place we were hoping for.

Minsk, Belarus

We had a late start to the day, taking advantage of the longer breakfast hours on the weekend. It was just as well, as the Belarusian National Arts Museum didn’t open until noon (!) I guess the arts folks aren’t morning people.

The Arts Museum was just 1km down the street from us, so we walked down. There was a 10 minute line up to buy tickets; I think the backlog from others who showed up prior to noon thinking it would be open already.

As a bonus, the museum had a special exhibition featuring Salvador Dali! We went through the Dali exhibit first. It was pretty extensive. We’ve been fortunate with the special exhibits on our recent trips, including a Picasso one in Rome.

The rest of the museum was good, although somewhat haphazardly arranged. They did have a nicely curated section on Orthodox artwork.

We debated eating lunch at the museum, but didn’t feel like local food, so decided to try out Svobody 4, about half way back to the hotel in the old town. In an odd sequence of the events, the wine bar had been recommended to us by a shop owner/photographer in Istanbul who we chatted with about travel on our last trip.

The food was really good at Svobody 4. I had a pasta with shrimp and Heather had a salmon and couscous salad. We liked it enough (and the kitchen was open late), so we made a reservation for dinner (we had tickets to see the ballet tonight).

After lunch we browsed around the craft stalls in the old town, but that was cut short when we heard a loud clap of thunder and decided to boot it back to our hotel. We needed to get back anyways to get ready for the ballet.

The skies cleared by the time we headed back out, so we just walked the 20 minutes to National Academic Bolshoi Opera and Ballet Theatre. It looked like most people either walked or took transit. There was a buzz in the air as we got closer to the theatre, similar to going to a sports event. Most people were dressed up, but there were a few in jeans so I didn’t look out of place.

We arrived at 6:40, giving us some time to look around the inside before taking our seats. They started promptly at 7pm.

Tonight’s performance was Anyuta. We both really enjoyed it; I preferred it to the opera.

Later we walked over to Svobody 4 and for food and wine. It was a great place to finish off the evening.

Minsk, Belarus

We hadn’t done much (any) planning for Minsk so after a nice buffet breakfast we sketched out a bit of a plan, getting tickets for the opera, and then subway hopping to get pics of old Soviet buildings.

Minsk is a bit deceptive in that things look close but are quite far. First we walked over to the Opera and Ballet Theatre to get our tickets for the ballet for tomorrow. This looked close on the map and we could see roughly where it was from the lounge yesterday evening; but was actually a 20 minute walk.

We had tried to buy tickets over the web when we first booked the trip but had issues using our credit cards (I think the website only accepted Belarussian credit cards). Anyways the seat selection was less but we still got good seats for Anyuta (although not 5th row centre like we sat at the opera in Tashkent!). It was easy to pay in person, they even took Apple Pay.

Just down the street from our hotel, and before we got to the Opera, we passed by the KFC with a huge concrete Soviet facade. It’s one of the buildings I wanted to see here. I hadn’t googled exactly where it was, so it was lucky that it was so close.

Next we walked over to Victory Square. Took some pics, although with a cloudy background. Then we bought transit cards, with much pointing and gesturing as we didn’t speak Russian or Belarussian. At least we could somewhat read Cyrillic.

So we entered the subway. There were a couple of security people at the entrance but they pretty much ignored us once they heard us talking in English. We both had our day packs which they glanced at, but didn’t ask to look inside or anything.

The station wasn’t as photogenic as the Tashkent subway but I took some pics anyways. (The security folks didn’t mind this either).

We went five stops to Uschod. The subway was packed and I didn’t get a good look at the other stations. Uschod was pretty plain looking. Supposedly there are some great looking subway stations here, just not this one :)

We exited and walked over to the National Library of Republic of Belarus. Every blog or article I read on it mentions that the library's main architectural component has the shape of a rhombicuboctahedron, so consider yourself now duly informed.

I wanted to visit just to get a pic; while not of the Soviet era it’s still an unusual building. One of the blogs we read mentioned it had an observation deck, so we searched that out. The entrance is around the back side of the structure, not through the library. It cost 3.50 EUR for a ticket to the 22nd floor.

There’s a short walk up to the 23rd floor and the observation deck. The library is about 8km away from the centre of town, so there’s not much detail to be seen from the top, just a bunch of buildings in the distance.

There was a cafe on the 22nd floor so we had lunch there. It was really quite enjoyable, with cool music. We both had draniki, the national dish, which is sort of a hash brown with a topping. Heather had hers with smoked salmon, I tried it with caviar. Both were tasty.

We took the elevator back down, and then took a bunch more pics of the rhombicuboctahedron-shaped building. While we were lunching, the sky had cleared and the pics looked much better with a blue sky background.

Took the subway a couple stops back towards our hotel to Akademija, where the October theatre is. That’s another Soviet building I wanted to see. It happens to be directly opposite the Museum of History of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, which has a long name but also warrants a pic. It was into the sun so it didn’t work out though.

Because of the now nice weather (we took our umbrellas to start the day) we decided to walk down Prospekt Nezavisimosti the rest of the way home, about 5km. The architecture is great on this street, one of the main thoroughfares in Minsk. Along the walk we passed by Hospital No. 1 (the government buildings are all numbered here, ‘School No. 91’, or whatever), Belarusian National Technical University, Lido (where all the blogs suggest eating - we looked inside but it didn’t appeal to us), Museum of Contemporary Art, Gymnasium No.23 (I’m not making this up), Victory Monument (much better pics with the clear blue sky), Belarusian State Circus and the Labour Union Palace of Culture.

Then we turned down Lenin Street towards our hotel, passing through the very small old town.

Finally we got back to the hotel. I thought we had walked a lot but my phone said only 13.3km. Maybe cause it was in the sun it felt longer.

We had booked dinner at our hotel cause the forecast had called for rain at the time. Plus they specialize in steak, and between the ads in the elevators and the dry aging steaks in the breakfast area, I had a hankering for steak.

We thought it would be a low key affair but it turned out the restaurant is the place to be. The restaurant spills out onto the 7th floor terrace with a beautiful view of the sunset and the Svislach river which cuts through the middle of the city. There was a live jazz band which was awesome. The steak was done perfectly, which we had with a Chilean Malbec. It was a fun night.

Minsk, Belarus

We had a late afternoon flight from Vilnius to Minsk. Vilnius International is a small airport, with only eight gates, and not much for souvenir shops or cafes. They did have free wifi though!

The flight was only 35 minutes, one of the shortest international flights I’ve taken. Belarus is another country that’s recently relaxed visa requirements and is making an effort to encourage tourism. The visa still requires you to fly in and out of Minsk, thus the short flights from Vilnius-Minsk and Kiev-Minsk, where we might otherwise have gone by land.

We were through the airport in record time, less than an hour after touching down. It was a small plane (an Embraer jet), so there weren’t many other passengers. Before we went through immigration we had to buy mandatory health insurance from a desk on the left. (4 EUR each for 4 days, and they take credit card or Euro, but no tap). They scan your passport to skim your name etc, it’s very slick and fast.

Next was through immigration. The official only asked us how long we were staying. There’s no visa fee for less than 30 days for us (and about 80 other countries). The official was very thorough in checking all the anti-forgery things on the passport, like the holograms etc, even using a mini magnifying glass. But he didn’t bother or care with any of our past visa stamps or trips. We got a stamp on the back page, just like in the old Russian days. The internet had us a bit concerned about getting through immigration but it was very fast and professional.

Our luggage came out as we arrived at the conveyor. There was only one other flight that arrived around the same time, it’s not a busy airport (I think Belarus is in the bottom ten of least-visited countries). The carts were free too!

We had arranged with the hotel for airport pick-up cause it wasn’t that much more than a taxi. Our driver was waiting with a sign with my name, and we were off to the hotel. It’s about 45 minutes from the airport to central Minsk.

We booked at the Hilton cause boutique hotels aren’t yet a thing in Minsk. By the time we checked in and cleaned up it was almost 10pm, so just ate at the hotel restaurant. There were two options, the restaurant on the 7th floor or the rooftop lounge on the 31st floor. It was a clear evening, so we opted for the lounge.

The high top tables were all reserved (on a Wednesday!) so we sat at a couch and had some munchies. I had a local draft which was good, Heather tried their cocktails which were excellent.

Vilnius, Lithuania

Each of the Baltic capitals is slightly different, but similar enough that we were getting restless by the time we got to Vilnius. There’s a lot of grand churches and cathedrals in Vilnius. The old town is less distinct from the city proper here as well, which has pros and cons - you feel like you’re in a city rather than a disneyfied historic centre, but it’s also less photogenic. If I had time for just one, I’d recommend going to Riga, but that’s just my preference. You can’t go wrong with any of them :)

Over our three days here we saw the main tourist sites, including about a dozen churches, went up the Bell Tower of St John’s, and walked to the top of Gediminas Castle Tower.

We did all four tours of the National Museum of Lithuania, which was very extensive and in a great setting amongst the excavated walls of the old castle. Tour I covered the history, archaeology and architecture of Lithuania. Tour II was through reconstructed rooms of the castle. That took us about two hours, after which we had lunch in the museum café. We walked quickly through Tour III (weaponry, music) and then took our time with Tour IV, a special exhibit featuring old churches from Poland and Lithuania (which were a combined country around 1700’s ???). There were very few other people. The museum path winds around like an IKEA showroom and there was a possibility we might get lost and never find the exit. In the middle of Tour II you go up to the 6th floor observation deck which has great views of the city.

We also went to a couple art galleries, including MO Museum, which was designed by architect Daniel Liebeskind.

We had booked dinner for the three evenings we were in Vilnius, although as it was Sun-Mon-Tues the restaurants were mostly empty and we didn’t need them. We had the 4-course tasting at Ertlio Namas (pretty good), a 3-course set menu at Lauro Lapas (meh), and lastly at Sonnets, (our hotel restaurant), which we really enjoyed.

The weather cooperated for us here - it was comfortable and sunny the whole time. There was a heat wave coming in when we left, with temperatures going over 30C. (We’ll get the heat in Minsk and Kiev).

We didn’t get the Vilnius Card. The 72-hour pass was 35 EUR and we spent about 20 EUR on admissions. Unless you’re speeding through everything, it would be hard to make the Vilnius Card worthwhile.

Overall we liked our time here in Vilnius. We spent more time relaxing than in the other capitals as there was less on our list to see, there’s a nice vibe here to just kick back and do nothing.

Riga to Vilnius

We were up early to meet with the Traveller Tour excursion from Riga to Vilnius. We really enjoyed their Tallinn to Riga tour and were looking forward to this one.

It’s a 12-hour excursion, from 9am to 9pm, but it doesn’t seem that long. The drive itself is only about four hours.

Traveller Tours does a great job of arranging a varied itinerary. They also give you an overview of the recent history of the country. The guides are great at explaining the culture and not just a bunch of facts about each site.

We stopped in at four sites along the drive:
* Salaspils Memorial for victims of Fascism. This was very well done
* Rundāle Palace, it’s a common day trip, lots of tour buses stop here
* Hill of Crosses, a pilgrimage site, it’s a unique site
* Kaunas, a charming town

We arrived in Vilnius around 8:30pm, and our driver very kindly dropped us all off at our hotels (we were a five minute walk from the normal drop off point, but it was nicer not to have to carry our bags).

I had researched places that had a late kitchen, and so we walked over to Cozy. Our hotel is just off one of the tourist drags which was filled with people on patios and very lively, but without the partiers more prevalent in Riga and Tallinn.

Cozy was perfect for what we were looking for - small bites, craft beer, cool music (oh yah, and cozy, haha). It was a great start to Vilnius!