Christmas vacation... part 1

Ben and I love road trips. It is such an intimate way of seeing a new place. This trip was no exception, and gave some eye opening insight in these tiny, fascinating countries.


We woke really early and took the train to Helsinki. After being in the little town of Jyväskylä for four months, Helsinki seemed like a roaring metropolitan city.

We wandered around the city in awe like country bumpkins until our boat left for Estonia. Unfortunately once we got to Tallinn there was a problem with our debit card and our bank was closed so we couldn't get our car until the next day... so we got a room for the night and completely passed out. There aren't any pictures because we literally went to sleep at 9 pm and didn't wake up for 12 hours. That's what walking around all day with a heavy backpack will do to you.

The next day we finally got on the road. At first we were a little nervous that the roads would be bad, but it turns out that when the Baltic states joined the European Union, they helped fund their interstates to provide some solid infrastructure. However, that help did nothing to help the fact that the worst drivers in Europe are:
Latvians
Lithuanians
Estonians
Greeks

Three out of four. Nice.

A note to my dad: we drove really slow and wore our seat belts the whole time.

This is the Baltic sea, the beach completely covered in snow. It was beautiful, but freezing cold. Finally around 11 we pulled into Kaunas, Lithuania and got into our hotel. We spent the next morning wandering through the city.

It is really interesting seeing countries that feel European but are still trying to gain a solid economic footing. The buildings and monuments are beautiful, but most have a slightly worn look. Every city has charming parts of town with old medieval buildings, mixed in with the cold, repetitive architecture of a former Soviet state.

After going to a military museum we got back in the car for another day of driving. This time we were heading to Warsaw, Poland.

Warsaw was enormous and there was lots to do and see, and the best part: it was devilishly cheap.

The old town was completely destroyed by the Germans in World War II. After the war, the Polish people rebuilt the entire area, brick by brick. We went to an awesome museum there that explained the plight of the Poles during that time and how they were crushed by the German army, and then taken over by the Russians. I left with a new respect for this country that had suffered so much and had never given up.

Finally, we had to hit the road again. Before we left, Ben got some wiper fluid for the car, but misunderstanding us they had given us some sort of weird soap. Every time he tried to wash the windshield our car would get covered with this weird slime and smell like a gas station bathroom x 1,000,000. It was so bad that we were rolling down the windows in zero degree weather and had to pull over and pump it out. Even now, days later when I get in the car I can still smell a faint whiff and it makes me gag.


That last leg was pretty tough. It was to that point where you have eaten too much candy and don't feel good and are getting a little stir crazy... but we made it!