1st October – 31st October
1. Helsinki’s bomb shelters tour
This tour was fascinating. The infrastructure and preparation to house and protect 1,000,000 people in the event of an attack is impressive. That the need for bunkers and preparation for attacks is just part of the culture here is mind-blowing (& also sad). In conclusion, Australia is SO underprepared for any sort of foreign attack/invasion.
2. Afternoon in Bratislava
Taking ourselves on an unofficial food/pub tour, we had a great time wandering around Bratislava. It has such a pretty old town.
3. Curonian Spit
Our day on the Curonian Spit, fossicking (unsuccessfully) for amber, learning about amber and about Lithuanian culture was a lovely day out in beautiful surroundings.
4. Schönbrunn Palace
A touch smaller and less ostentatious than Versailles, and certainly less crowded the morning we visited, we enjoyed this palace much more! The tour was really well put together too.
5. Medieval Old Towns
The old town of Krakow was the prettiest town/market square we’d seen so far this year. Then we arrived in Tallinn, which is on a smaller scale, with more winding roads and lanes and feels more cosy and is more picturesque than Krakow.
6. Mozart Concert
In Vienna, the home of classical music, it is almost mandatory to listen to some classical music. The concert we attended in the basement of Mozarthaus featured music by Mozart, Vivaldi, Haydn, several Strauss’, Liszt and others.
7. Auschwitz
Although not a ‘fun’ activity, it was incredibly interesting and memorable.
8. Finnish Sauna
We thoroughly enjoyed our experience of a Finnish Sauna at Loyly in Helsinki, complete with taking a dip in the cold Baltic Sea between saunas. We eventually built our cold tolerance to about 15 seconds!!
9. Roof of St.Stephen’s Cathedral Vienna
Stunningly beautiful, the colourful patterned roof of the Cathedral has 250,000 ceramic tiles on it, each weighing 2kg. That’s a huge weight for the roof joists to support! We’ve seen this type of church roof in multiple places, namely Serbia, Hungary, Slovakia and now Austria.
10. Serbian/Hungarian Border
Not quite a highlight, but memorable. We’d read reviews, many negative, about this border crossing so were both feeling anxious. However, it was straightforward, yes both countries searched our vehicle thoroughly, with the entire car having to be emptied and every bag opened and checked on the Hungary side, but we were through within 30 minutes and the border officers were not aggressive at all. The car needed a tidy up anyway..
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