Ken and Kim

Have a few hours to kill while waiting at Hong Kong airport to board our final flight home. So it is a good time to tell you a bit about our stay in Hong Kong and finish the blog for this holiday.

Have spent 3 nights in Hong Kong at the Langham hotel in downtown Hong Kong. A very nice hotel with a colonial Hong Kong feel. We changed from a bitter 10 degrees in Tallinn to the mid 30s and humid in Hong Kong. It is difficult to step out onto the streets for a few minutes without feeling like you need a shower and a change of clothes. However, it did not deter us from engaging in the usual Hong Kong shopping practice and making a number of purchases at the market. Copy everything pervades, and there must be at least 2 or 3 Indian suit and shirt tailors on every corner asking whether we want a new suit or shirts made. In addition there are the usual massage sellers and copy watch hawkers.

It is hard to avoid purchasing some of these goods - so you will just have to guess when you see us tauting our Louis Vouitton, Guichi, Chanel, D and G etc as to what is real and what isn't.

Ate at a great restaurant called Hutong which was on the 28th floor of a building on the harbor. Which had great views across to the island and we were treated with the night time lights and laser show on the tops of the buildings.

Yesterday we did a trip across the harbor on the star ferry to Hong Kong island and wandered the small lanes with local food stalls etc. A bit of the old Hong Kong still left.

Last night was Hong Kongs national day which ended in a 30 minute fireworks display on Hong Kong harbor. I think all of the 7 million people who call Hong Kong home were on the streets. Fortunately we walked out of the hotel and found a spot on the street which looks done to the harbor. To our surprise a barge of fireworks were lined up in front of the street so without a great effort in traveling through the crowds we saw a great fireworks display. No one can do fireworks like the Chinese.... Lots of different fireworks than I have seen before. Puts our new years eve display at home into some perspective.

We are now at the airport and Kim has gone off to spend the last few Hong Kong dollars that he has left.

It will be good to be home again and catch up with friends and family. 5 weeks have gone quickly, but it will be nice to spend a few days at home before embarking on work.

We hope you have enjoyed reading the blog, and when I get home, I should be able to upload some selected photos for you to have a look at which will give a different perspective to what we have been writing about.

Ken and Kim

Have just spent 2 days staying and wandering through the old town if Tallinn in Estonia. By way of example, the building that our hotel is in is over 600 years old. The old town is very medieval surrounded by stone walls and towers. We spent our time walking the many cobbled streets, climbing parts of the wall and towers (very steep steps with just a rope as a hand rail), and drinking local beer some with honey. Watched some local dancing and singing in the square as part of some festival and ate some interesting Estonian delicacies. There is a real Russian type feel to the place with influence in building design. Unfortunately it seems that Estonia has been overrun by many of the countries around here including Russia, Finland, Sweden, Danes and Germany.

Kim here. In reality we are at the hotel waiting to leave. Five hours to go but we will head off to the airport in about 15 minutes. Interestingly we were inundated by Finnish military escorted into the hotel by Estonian police and by the looks of it, their secret service. I can assure you we were under surveillance and it was uncomfortable. There is still a Merc full of them outside so I hope we are not followed to the airport.
Can't wait to get to Hong Kong as we commence our journey home. It's about 25 degrees warmer down there.

It seems that we have seen so much in what has been an overnight stay on the boat from Stockholm to Helsinki and 2 nights in Helsinki.

First about the boat trip........

Boarded the Viking line ship Gabriella on Thursday afternoon which left Stockholm at 4:45 pm. This was one if the the parts of the trip that Kim was looking most forward to. The ship has about 11 stories, a couple of decks for cars and trucks, and a few decks for cabins and a deck that has a number of restaurants, pub, casino, caberat and karaoke areas. Kim had upgraded our room to a forward suite. The suite had a large lounge area, separate bedroom and bathroom and large windows facing out from the front of the boat as well as out through the side bedroom window.
After we settled and drank the complimentary bottle of champagne, we ventured out to explore the ship. Our seating in the buffet restaurant was booked in for 7:30. The dinner buffet had just about everything you could think of including about 6 types of salmon and lots of herrings and caviar.

After dinner had a drink in one of the bars and watched some of the caberat before exploring the karaoke bar - not that we did any singing. Given that the ship sailed from Stockholm, I was disappointed that no one wanted to sing any ABBA.

After a good nights sleep woke to nothing but sea around us. We organized ourselves for breakfast and waited to arrive In Helsinki at around 10:30am.

I think the boat met Kims expectations, however he was upset with one of the waiters in the restaurant who told him he couldn't video in the restaurant. On deck the next morning was surprised to learn how many people bring their dogs onboard with them. An upper deck is allocated for walking dogs with a sandpit for those animals who perhaps cannot aim over the side of the boat.

And now about Helsinki.........

Stayed at a nice hotel close the the city called hotel Haven. We had been told in Stockholm not to expect too much from Helsinki, but we were pleasantly surprised about how nice the city really is. We are back to using the Euro and I think that Helsinki is a little cheaper than Norway and Sweden.
We found the Helsinki version of David Jones called Stockmanns and immediately purchased a coat each.... On sale a bargain not to be missed. We figured that you can't go wrong buying a coat in Helsinki given that it would be pretty cold and wind proof.
In wandering the city found their old food hall and fish market on the wharf. Wandering through found all of the great Finnish delicacies including baltic herrings done about 100 different ways, caviar by the truck load, a shop specializing in rain deer and canned bear meat. Deciding not to try any of these, we ate at the hotel both choosing the safe lamb option.

Day 2 had a walk planned that took in most of the sites. It took us 6 hours, but managed to see many of the important sights of the city. In particulars saw a church that is carved out of rock, and the 1952 Olympic sadium which has a 72 metre high tower with a lift to the top where you can get great views of the city. Must have been an amazing stadium in it's day and is very art deco in style.

Decided that we have had enough of fishy type food, we found a nice italian restaurant to have dinner.

We had a text from Sandra and Les. They were on the hydrofoil going from Budapest to Vienna. I am not sure if they had been to Insbrook as yet but saw the weather there was 3 degrees.

Now leaving Helsinki and taking the Tallink line boat across the bay of Findland to Tallinn in Estonia. The trip will take 2 hours.

Will keep you posted....

Ken and Kim

Today is our last day in Stockholm and leave at 5:30 this afternoon on the overnight Viking Line ferry to Helsinki. We arrive tomorrow morning in Helsinki around 10:00am.

We have spent the last few days wandering the old town (Gamla Stan) and using a number of the 57 bridges that connect the 14 islands which make up Stockholm to enjoy many of the sights of the city. Spent yesterday viewing the changing of the guards at the palace. This occurs at 12:15 from Wednesday to Saturday and includes a band, marching of the royal guards as they change their sentries in a number of spots around the palace. In the afternoon we had booked a boat tour that goes around the islands for around 2 hours. Stockholm is an easy city to get around by Tunnelbanna which is the underground. We purchased a 3 day pass so easily mastered the 3 lines (red, green and blue) to get to a number of different parts of the city.

The hardest thing was mastering the booking system for the laundry in the building where Chris has his apartment. As he lives in a high rise apartment, each block has a large communal laundry area with large washing machines, dryers, etc. However you have to use your electronic entrance key to book the time in for when you want to do your washing. You get 3 hours to wash and dry for each booking. Once a time is booked in, the system allocates you a number that is linked to a particular machine. Sounds all very easy - except when all of the commands and information is in swedish. Anyway thanks to Chris and the help of other washers we successfully did 2 loads.

We have now finished our repacking and waiting for the taxi to take us to the Viking line ferry for our overnight journey to Helsinki. This is one of Kims most exciting parts of the holiday - so hope he is not too disappointed.

We had a text from Sandra yesterday and she and Les were in Prague having a good time and were soon heading off to Budapest.

So farewell from Stockholm. We have had a great time, seeing Stockholm and catching up with Chris. It was good to be here also for his birthday and spend some time with him. Will let you know about the boat and Helsinki.

Arrived yesterday into Stockholm. Had an early flight which had us up at 4:30am to catch a flight to Oslo. Unfortunately had to spend a few hours at the Oslo airport for a connecting flight to Stockholm. Definately not a problem for Kim, though there are just so many cups of tea you can have whille waiting.

Arrived in Stockholm at 12:55 pm after a short 50 minute flight. It is always hard to get use to being able to take what is a flight from Brisbane to Melbourne and be in a different country. Unfortunately the rain had followed us and there were very heavy showers when we arrived.

As we may have indicated, Kims`cousin is the lobby manager at the Grand Hotel so he had arranged our accommodation and transport from the airport.

We therefore commenced our stay in Stockholm being met by a driver holding a card with our names and were ushered into the waiting mercedes to take us the 35 minute drive to the hotel in the centre of the city.

We were met at reception by the staff who said to Kim "your Chris´s uncle - welcome and we have a nice suite waiting for you on the 3rd floor. We were taken to what would be the largest hotel suite I have ever stayed in. On opening the door you enter into a lobby area which has storeage space, a large writing desk and a door into the very large bathroom with separate bath, shower etc. Moving from the entrance lobby there is a separate lounge and seating area with a table that seats four people. Large sliding doors then open into the king size bedroom. Off the bedroom was a private terrace that faced the front of the hotel and directly opposite the palace and harbour. I think our suite was the only one with a private terrace. The terrace had seating around a large table for 6 people.

After we found each other while looking around, we then read some of the services and amenities available at the hotel. You can get anything you need including spa, sauna, treatments which include beatings with a birtch branch etc etc. We settled for a drink in the bar. This was also an experience given the range of people at the bar. There were people in furs, tiaras and tails set for a wedding through to us in our jeans.....

Well done Chris we say for organising such a great option for us... We indicated that we were squatting and never leaving - though not sure how long the funds would last. The hotel hosts many celebreties and I understand that Princess Mary stayed in the suite on the next floor above us when she was over for the royal wedding in Stockholm recently. Unfortunately her room did no have a terrace!

Chris took us to a great restaurant for dinner, and had as outlined on the English version of the menu "Pig". Food was very nice, and made a change from the many versions of salted cod that we have had through Norway.

Slept in as didn´t need to be out of the room until 12:00 and went to breakfast as this was included in the room. The hotel has a very extensive buffet including many swedish delicacies including smoked salmon, caviar, smoked hearings in mustard sauce, as well as your staple bacon, eggs, pastires etc. Sampled a lot of it which meant we did not need lunch today.

We are off for some sightseeing around the Gamla Stan (Old Town) with Chris.

It´s Chris` birthday tomorrow and we are having lunch with him. We have brought presents from the family for him and I am glad to get them out of my case. I can now concentrate on spending as from here on in we are back to the 30 kilo allowance as we move back to business class on the ship and also the rest of our flights from Tallinn, Helsinki and Hong Kong. Just as it should be.

Ken is cooking tonight so I am looking forward to steak, PEAS, corn and what ever other vegetable he can find, then a good nights sleep as we have booked the laundromat from 7am to 10am in the morning, as you have to do here in Stockholm