Russia!

So, we land in St. Petersburg. I had arranged for the company from which I had rented the apartment to pick us up at the airport. A man with a sign with my name on it greeted us and piled us into the back of a single car. He spoke no English, and seemed unable to grasp that we spoke no Russian, as he would speak volubly regarding sites we passed. The courtyard of our building was slum like, but the entrance to the apartment was positively scarey. The woman who provided us with a key spoke no English (are you starting to see a pattern here? Virtually no one speaks English in Russia). Then, our bank card stopped working and no one takes credit cards. But, the next day the card started to work and the sun came out and we came to love St. Petersburg. It is a magestic city. Huge buildings, wide streets, canals, palaces and churches with lots of onion-capped spires.

In Russia, they use the Cyrillic Alphabet. So, not only can you not communicate by speaking, you can't even read the signs. We are getting better at it, as the letters are very similar to the Greek alphabet--and Kim, Ross and I have taken enough math classes to learn some of the Greek Alphabet. For instance, here is a sign I'm sure you will recognize. We learned today of the McDonald's index. People can gauge the cost of living by the cost of an McDonald's burger in a country. Well, the Beattie Index will judge livability by the cost of a commodity far more frequently consumed by the Beattie's--beer. Pivo, in Russian. In England, a pint was about $5. In Norway, beer was $12 (and out of our price range). In Sweden, a beer was down to $6. And, happily, in Russia, beer is about $1. Bonus, it is really good, too.

Perhaps even more challenging is that the letters that are familiar are usually pronounced completely differently. Can you read the name on this boat? We took the picture for Siena's friend Sophia, as that is what the name reads in Russian ("C" is s, "Phi" is F or ph, and the backwards "N" is I). Wild.

Where in the world are Ethan and Siena? This is the second largest museum in the world. It contains almost 4 million pieces of art, housed in the former palace of Catherine the Great. This is the Hermitage museum, specifically, the Winter Palace. We spent 4 hours and saw most of the main part of the museum. The State Rooms that have been restored to their original condition are unbelievable. The word of the day was "opulent", and the Hermitage was all of that. Amazing to go to a museum and have the rooms be the focal point much more than the paintings, even though the collection of paintings was unbelievable. There were so many Rembrandts and Matisses, Picassos and Monets, you couldn't even count.

In keeping with the opulent theme of St. Petersburg, we visited the summer palace of Peter the Great, the founder of the city. As we are a bit tired of touring gorgeous, over the top palaces, we contented ourselves with exploring the gardens. At the rapid Beattie pace, we walked for almost 3 hours and covered only part of the gardens. The fountains were particularly spectacular, all 150 of them! Amazing engineering for the beginning of the 18th Century, too.

It is wild to be in Russia, especially for Kim and me. We grew up as children of the Cold War. In New York, we frequently hid in the closets at school for air raids, and had villains named "Natasia" and "Boris". "Today, we walked through Red Square, and experienced just how much Russia has embraced capitalism. Nice cars, huh? And, they charge for everything, the bathroom, the subway map, entrances to churches, even the Lenin's Library!

And, one more Where in the World are Ethan and Siena?

Isn't this an amazing church? This church sits in the middle of Red Square. It was built in the 1500s and rebuilt in the late 1700s (by Catharine the Great, again!). This is St. Basil's Cathedral (This reminded us of our great friend Catherine's dog Basil)

Vosh strovya!

The Beatties

6 August

I forgot to mention a funny incident early on in the trip. I was driving towards our lodging in the middle of nowhere in northern England. Kim was navigating (a potentially marriage ending combination, I might add…). We had, shall we say, a difference of opinion regarding if the youth hostel was on the road on which we were driving or the one heading south. I pulled into a small café on the corner for Kim to run in and ask where the place was. Kim wasn’t even sure it was a café as there were chickens running around the yard, and a bunch of cows staring at us. He thought it was somebody’s house, but consented to ask inside after my repeated nagging and locking him out of the car. He asked the woman there who was in the process of cleaning a bathroom. She started to answer, “It’s down the road a bit,” then yelled upstairs, “Les, is the youth hostel on the road in Twice Brewed (no lie, that is the name of a town)?” Les yelled back, “No, this is it!” And, that is the true story of how we found the charming, if elusive, Grindel Youth Hostel (see picture to show just how in the middle of nowhere it is). We jumped out of the car and went hiking. This was the hike that elicited the comment of our hiking from pint to pint, and one of the pints was downed in Twice Brewed. If you count that we each had a pint (only those of us legally able to do so, of course), it was actually Thrice Brewed. Anyway, when we got back to the hostel, our innkeeper had been “visiting” with a friend and could hardly stand up. He advised us to go out for dinner rather than eat there, but welcomed our help in setting the table and cooking for the other guests. He kept saying, “I really shouldn’t have had that session with John.” The “session” involved about a fifth of whisky. And, dinner elsewhere ended up being fabulous.

So, we leave Norway behind. A fabulously beautiful country, with houses located in the most isolated places imaginable, some seemingly inaccessible from any direction, even by hiking, Norway was impossible to not admire. The food was spotty. The breads were great, but I, personally, don’t think caviar is appropriate for breakfast. You may argue that it is eggs, but still, vodka is made from potatoes and I don’t have it for breakfast either (please do not refer back to the Scotland blog in which I refer to trying whisky before a flight). We met a lovely Norwegian couple on our boat ride, however, most of the Norwegians seemed less approachable. When in Great Britain, we talked to many people and found almost universal friendliness. This was not the case so much in Norway. I am fairly certain it wasn’t a language barrier issue, either, as the Norwegians spoke English flawlessly. Here is a picture of our favorite valley.

The last day in Norway, Ross decided that the opportunity to swim above the Arctic Circle might never present itself again. Despite a cool day with a stiff wind and a decided lack of preparation (read: no towel or suits), he stripped to his boxers and dove in. Now, with the gauntlet decidedly thrown down, I had no choice but to follow him. The water was, umm, brisk! But, we did it! We were less than 2100 kilometers from the North Pole, closer to it than to most of Europe. We then boarded a train, bus, train, subway to reach our hotel in Stockholm, a mere 23 hour trip. Sleeping on the train was kind of fun. It felt like you were on a simulator ride of some sort, with your bed tilting in various planes and stopping and starting.

Stockholm is built on a bunch of islands. These islands are connected by bridges. So far, we’ve been on 7 of the islands. Our hotel is in a boat, directly across from City Hall. This is where the Nobel Prize banquet and dance are held. This picture is from our hotel port hole.

The food in Sweden is similar to Norway, but better. Last night, we had a fabulous Swedish Smorgasbord. There were about 7 kinds of herring, and, yes, Brenda, Siena tried one of them. I doubt she’ll be having more any time soon. The salmon, in all the different preparations, was terrific. They had 3 different smoked salmons, a marinated salmon, poached salmon, and a baked salmon. Reindeer was liked by all, in the various ways we tried it. It does not taste like venison—less gamey and more tender. (I know I will have my hunting friends defending venison, saying that if it is “cooked right” it is great. Well, evidently no one I have met cooks it right, as the best thing I can say about venison is, when it is absolutely at its best, I couldn’t tell it was venison. That doesn’t seem like high praise to me.) The Swedish meatballs are fabulous. We tried Aquavit. This is an alcohol made from caraway seeds. It is served very cold, straight up, and is really very good. And, it gets the taste of herring out of your mouth quickly, an added bonus!

The old part of town, Gamla Stan, is a small, hilly island, with narrow cobbled streets and lovely old buildings. Stockholm is one of the best preserved cities in Europe. This may be due, in large part, to their remaining neutral in both World Wars. In Norway, the departing Germans burned entire cities to the ground. Stockholm was unscathed. It is interesting hearing how the different countries feel about each other. Norwegians are still rankled by Sweden’s failure to fight on their side. Swede’s view Denmark with distrust after centuries of invading each other.
Today we are going to explore some more of Stockholm before leaving tomorrow for Russia. This will be the first place where language will be a major issue. Not only do the people there not routinely speak English, but the alphabet is completely different, too. Wish us luck! And, Skol, (cheers, in Swedish—actually spelled with an “a” with a circle over it) to all of you.

Friday, August 1, 2008. 1 month of traveling

Today marks the end of our first month of travels. We have been to 4 countries and leave tomorrow for our 5th (Sweden). If the rest of the trip is as expensive as Norway, we will be coming home before the snow falls... I should take a moment and thank the people who have written to me to correct or further elucidate my postings. Alfred Nobel did not invent TNT but dynamite, which I would have known if I had waited until after we had visited the museum. If any of you ever visit Oslo, the Peace Center is fabulous, with amazing technological effects and a message that moved us all. While in Oslo, we went to both the primary art museum for the country and their famous sculpture garden. The Norwegians have this thing for Vigeland’s sculpture. We found it stoic, and vaguely disturbing (babies being kicked by horses, wolves wolfing down children’s arms—you know, pretty stuff…) The Norwegians also love Munch. I must say his “masterpiece” The Scream, left me, and Kim pictured here doing is best imitation, underwhelmed. It is also the most unprepossessing museum I’ve ever been to. But, the weather has been spectacular. We have had an amazing string of blue skies and warm temperatures. In fact, one of the days we were in Bergen, a city known for cold rain, was the hottest day in Norway in the last 30 years.

We heard a funny story about how much it rains here. A man asks a thirteen year old boy if it is true it rains every day in Bergen. He replies he thinks that is an exaggeration. But, he can't contradict it as he is only 13 years old.

After Oslo, we took a train up and over the mountains of central Norway, and a second train down into the valley of a fjord. If this isn't the most beautiful place on earth, it must be tied for the honor. The waterfall above, was one of 8 1000' falls we could see from our hotel room. It is like Yosemite on steroids.

Once we made it to the western coast, we boarded a boat for a 4 day ride up through narrow fjords and snow capped mountains.

Where in the world are Ethan and Siena? If you remember them being at zero degrees longitude, here they are at another imaginary line. We crossed the Arctic Circle! And wore shorts and t-shirts there. We have been swimming in 3 fjords--one of which was 46 degrees! We were gung-ho to swim above the arctic circle, but it is just too cold now. We are a couple of weeks too late to see the actual midnight sun, but the sun only sets at about 11 pm, there is 2 hours of sunset/sunrise, then the sky begins to lighten until we have broad day light by 2 am. So, when was I supposed to find time to write? This picture was taken at midnight when we were at the 65th parallel. The furthest north we got was the 68.5th. Currently, we are only 2100 kilometers from the north pole. Unbelievable, isn't it? I am afraid I cannot continue my review of the booze in this country other than to say it costs too much! A beer is 12 dollars. Wine was $90 for a mid range bottle. Of course, it isn't so bad after all the drinking in Great Britain to take some time off. To comment on some comments: No, I don't make anyone taste herring, as I can't stand it! The water here is fabulous, cold and great tasting, which almost makes up for the fact that we cannot afford to drink anything else. Cheers to all of you, with my glass of water...

The Beatties

Tuesday July 22, 2008

We have left the U.K. and are now in Scandanavia! We had the most wonderful time in Great Britain and regret that we didn’t allow more time for Scotland. We moved on from the ales in England to the whisky in Scotland. We went on a distillery tour and sampled some excellent types of whiskies. I particularly liked the tasting table at the airport. Slainte (cheers in Gaelic). What a great idea! Even though we boarded at 8:30 a.m., I must admit to trying a couple of types. Thanks to Peter, our host, we had the most amazing time. Here we are climbing up the mountain in the background.

Where in the world are Ethan and Siena? Well, I will give you some hints. This location has been memorialized in song. In this song, the shore they are standing on is described as being very, very pretty, also known as the bonnie, bonnie banks. How about, taking the low road? Yep, this is Loch Lomond. In Scotland, a “Loch” is a lake. The mountain in the background is named Ben Lomond. “Ben” means “mountain”. For us, any mountain we didn’t know the name of while in Scotland, was called “Ben Corsan” in honor of Ethan’s friend.

Yesterday, we flew to Oslo. Oslo is on a beautiful fjord (Norwegian for a valley, carved out by a glacier, filled with water that leads to the ocean--maybe we don't need this word in English...). We met my aunt and cousin (see picture below in front of ancient stave church--I don't know what "stave" means yet) and have been exploring this city. Everyone speaks English—almost without an accent. It makes us realize how weak we are in languages in the U.S. We visited the place where they present the Nobel Peace Prize. Our family finds it ironic that Mr. Alfred Nobel, the inventor of TNT, is the father of the world's most prestigious peace prize. Tomorrow, we are going to the museum honoring the recipients of this worthy award. Hope all is well with you! Skor! (cheers in Norwegian)

Thursday July 17

Where in the world are Ethan and Siena? Yes, they are hiking on an ancient wall, but no, we are not in China. Like the Great Wall of China, this wall was built spanning an entire country to keep the barbaric people living north of the wall from invading. It was built in 144 A.D. and took a mere 2 years to complete the 73 miles. Not only did they build the wall 10 feet high and three feet wide, they also built deep ditches parallel to the wall to help defend the border. This is Hadrian's Wall, in northern England, to protect the Roman Empire's northern territory from the Scots. I'm not sure you can see in this picture, but the wall is built on the ridge of a mountain range. During our 10 mile hike along this mountainous section, we had up to 100 foot straight drops down on the north side of the wall. We stopped part way along for lunch, then cut back to the road to wait for a bus back to our hotel. Our choice of beverages at these stops caused Ethan to reflect, that whilst others walk from peak to peak, "The Beatties hike from pint to pint."

England has a reputation for mediocre food. We have been very happy with the food. We have had lots of pies--cheese and onion, steak and ale, lentil, mint and lamb, beef and Guiness. The food is all hearty. We have tried to have the local specialties, including Black Pudding, which is a sausage made from pig's blood (better than it sounds, but it would almost have to be), yorkshire pudding (yum!), lots of lamb (there are sheep everywhere), strawberries and cream at Wimbledon, local sausage (which are all very different) and local ales (also all different, but all good). We went on the Wensleydale Creamery Tour and sampled all 12 cheeses--the good ones multiple times. I am glad we are hiking about 8 miles a day to work off some of the calories.

Yesterday, we arrived in Scotland. We are staying in Stirling with a friend of my parents. Peter must be an excellent friend to invite his friends' daughter and her entire family to stay. It is wonderful to be in a home after 2 weeks in hotels. And, "hotel" is definitely a compliment to some of our lodgings, so this is especially wonderful. Yesterday, we went to Glasgow and stopped in at the Horseshoe Bar (thanks, Jim and Gillian for the suggestion!) Today, we traveled to Edinburgh. The picture of the family (with Peter) is from the castle.

On a technical note, I understand some are having problems seeing pictures on the blog or responding to us. Please feel free to go directly to our blog site--www.beattieclanworldtrip.blogspot.com. You can also email us at beattieclan@gmail.com.

Internet at last

I have not been very good at posting. London was hectic and each day was jammed with lots of sightseeing and running around. We would collapse into bed and jump up in the morning to start again. Since leaving London, we have had no internet access. The local internet café, as it were, is attached and affiliated with the undertaker (you just can’t make this stuff up!)

For the friends and classmates of the kids, I will include a section titled “Where in the World are Ethan and Siena”. Can you figure where we are in this picture? The line in the background is highly significant. Once the world was proven round, how could a person describe where they were on the globe, or, what time it is relative to the rest of the world? Well, Greenwich, England was chosen as the beginning of time and place. The twenty four hours of the time zones start at GMT, or Greenwich Mean Time. As you travel east from there, time gets later, GMT +1, GMT +2, etc. Traveling west, the time gets earlier. Michigan is GMT –5, meaning it is 5 hours earlier in Michigan than in England. It is also zero degrees longitude. Travel east and you are in the Eastern Hemisphere, from 0 degrees to 180 degrees east. Travel west and you are in the Western Hemisphere, again going to 180 degrees. The imaginary line at 180 degrees (either way you travel) is the International Date line. So, as we stand on the Prime Meridian in Greenwich, England, we are standing at the beginning of time and space, with one foot each in the eastern and western hemispheres..

There were other things we discovered in London. I discovered that half a pint at lunch is lovely. A full pint makes me comatose. We used to have a saying in college, from evenings when we’d go to a happy hour, then return to our room before heading out: Friends don’t let friends stop drinking. Ethan and Siena, not having imbibed at lunch, had no such difficulties. We were able to drag ourselves out later to do a rapid exploration of the British Museum, including seeing the Rosetta Stone!

Saturday, we went to pick up our car. The gentleman helping us urged me to take a larger car as we would be smooshed (FYI: my computer did not like this word and suggested I use “smooched” instead. One must be very careful not to always listen to spell check…) into the one reserved for us, and he would be happy to upgrade us to the next model free, however it would be a stick shift. I declined; driving in a car on the wrong side of the road, going around traffic circles the opposite direction, arguing with my husband about where to go and shifting gears with the wrong hand would be just one thing too much. I also figured the only reason he was offering was because he didn’t have the car we had reserved. So, we gleefully piled our luggage into the available car—a Mercedes, and took off driving out of London.

I swerved to avoid the two double-decker buses converging on us, made a u-turn on a small lane after missing a turn, narrowly missed a man in a wheelchair with suicidal desires who darted out in front of me, braked to prevent hitting two women crossing the street whose peripheral vision was compromised by the chadors they were wearing, but failed to see the curb that moved into my lane, without signaling, I might add. And so, we got a flat tyre (British spelling, not wrong). By the time this occurred, we had traveled a full half a mile from the Hertz office. . But, this proved to be only a minor delay and we continued on our way to Oxford then on to the Cotswolds. By the time we arrived, we had pretty much mastered the round abouts and were able to drastically decrease our number of u-turns.


The day ended far better than it began. We checked in to a lovely bed and breakfast in an idyllic town in the Cotswolds, before heading up to Stratford for a brilliant performance of A Mid Summers Night’s Dream. The word of the day was “bucolic”—perfect for describing the drive in the Cotswolds.

Still no internet! Sorry about missing the meeting yesterday, Gary, Jim, Keith and Peter, but we were climbing up a mountain to see the ruins of Castle Dis Bran, outside the town of Llangollen. The wireless connection was rather weak. We are now in Wales, where a double “L” is pronounced like clearing your throat politely. I am sure you, the reader, can practice up on this. The countryside is very different from the part of England we have seen. It is wilder, more treed, more mountainous, and harder to pronounce. We passed a golf cwrs—who needs any pesky vowels???

Our hopes of climbing Mount Snowdon today are fading as it looks like rain. Of course, it has rained part of every day we have been here. There is no getting our clothing to dry for the humidity is so high, things hung out seem wetter in the morning than when originally hung. We haven’t let the rain stop our activities as Monday we tramped 12 miles from town to town in the Cotswolds, the last 5 of which were in pouring rain. The kids were troupers! When I apologized to Siena for the length of the trek—we had only intended on a 5 mile loop, she replied that it was okay, but, in the future, 8 miles should really be the maximum.

Now, we are spending our anniversary evening, sitting in a dive, blogging to you. Of course, we do each have a pint! Which reminds me, I am going to include a section entitled, "Kim and Wendy drink their way around the World." The beer/ale in England and Wales is wonderful. It is decidedly less bubbly than ours in the US, has a stronger taste and is less cold. We haven't had the same type twice, although I couldn't list them for you. Siena's section is entitled, "Sweet World" (my child with the major league sweet tooth). Her favorite dessert so far is a Welsh specialty, Caramel Ribbon. "It was a cookie on the bottom, covered with caramel and chocolate. I found that there are a lot of ice cream places in Great Britain, and the ice cream is very good here." Unfortunately, the "Blogger" site was down, so the post needed to wait another day to reach the internet.

We spent the intervening day climbing Snowden. It is the highest mountain in Wales or England and a tough walk. It took us 6 hours, up into major fog, rain and strong winds. A bit down from the top, though, the skies cleared and we had beautiful views. We are spending tonight in Chester.

Our First Stop: London

The trip is underway! We flew into London on Wednesday morning and have been running ever since. Our hotel is a bit seedy, in a quaint, convenient way. We dropped off our luggage, met Ross (Ross had spent a week in Paris with friends from high school/college), and have been exploring for the past 3 days. Such a clean, easy to navigate city! We went to Wimbledon, planning to just look at the exterior, but no lines, and decent priced tickets convinced us to stay and watch. Ross and I were walking the first evening, hoping to keep me up long enough to cure my jet lag and happened on a concert in Hyde Park. Jack Johnson, one of all of the kids favorites had just started. The word of the day is "serendipitous".

Here is a picture of us on the London Eye. Tomorrow, we leave for the Cotswolds.