Northern Europe trip

When did we go….

• May 5-20, 2025

Why did we go…

• Finland has been on the travel bucket list for a long time, and the Baltic countries and Poland were intriguing based on comments from a few friends and fellow travelers
• I wanted to get to 50 countries of worldwide travel, which happened in Latvia and ended at 52 countries, having hit 5 countries on this trip
• the trip was organized by Movis Tours who we had used a few years ago for a Central European trip, and it allowed us to travel with the same guide (Matej)

 

 

How did we get there…

• 9.5 hour flight to Munich, 5 hour layover, and then a 2.5-hour flight to Helsinki (got a cheap $300 upgrade to first class on the ‘over the ocean’ leg, which was very nice despite the noisy family around us who were Oiler fans to boot)
• 30 minute ride to our hotel in Helsinki
• Helsinki to Tallinn (2 hour smooth sailing ride on a huge well appointed ferry where we had seats in the Comfort Cabin)
• Tallinn to Riga (4 hour drive with a 4 hour stop in Parnu for a tour and lunch)
• Riga to Vilnius (5 hour drive due to a stop at the Rundale Palace for an hour)
• Vilnius to Krakow (7 hour drive with stops for lunch and an unexpected border check by the Polish police)
• Krakow to Warsaw (4 hour drive with a couple of short stops)
• 1.5 hour flight from Krakow to Frankfurt (5.5 hour layover) and then a 9.5 hour flight to Calgary

 

 

 

 

Where did we stay…

Helsinki (Mar 6-9)

• Solo Sokos
• located in the heart of Helsinki
• very basic but decent décor and amenities, including a fitness facility, rooftop sauna and a nice lounge area
• huge breakfast buffet

Tallinn (Mar 9-11)

• Palace Hotel
• constructed in 1937
• conveniently located on the edge of Old Town
• the room was a bit strange in that it had no windows but just two skylights above the bed so it felt a bit claustrophobic
• nice spa area (although no cold plunge), fitness facility, lounge and dining area (nice breakfast buffet once again)

Riga (Mar 11-13)

• Avalon Hotel
• conveniently located on the edge of Old Town with some ‘home bars’ on the street as you enter Old Town
• small complaint, but they don’t believe in big view windows in the guest rooms in some of these countries

Vilnius (Mar 13-15)

• Hotel Vilnia
• convenient location on the edge of Old Town
• bar (not great aesthetically) and restaurant but no fitness facility
• very spacious room

Warsaw (Mar 15-17)

• NYX Hotel
• great location in the center of the business district and near Old Town
• decorated with works by renowned local street artists
• very well designed hotel with many modern features, a nice view from our room, a fitness facility, and an amazing breakfast buffet

Krakow (Mar 17-20)

• PURO Krakow Stare Miasto 4
• short walk to Old Town
• very small room on a busy and noisy street
• decent breakfast buffet and nice lounging area in the main lobby

 

 

 

Where did we eat…

Helsinki

• Rioni (dinner, Georgian cuisine, nice ambiance and decent food)
• Solo Sokos (breakfast, hotel, large selection buffet)
• Loyly (lunch, spa overlooking the harbor, average ambiance and chow)
• Savotta (dinner, traditional Finnish food, beautiful setting overlooking one of the main squares and the Finnish Orthodox Church, very fun historic décor, great food and service)
• Harbore (dinner with our local friends Inke and Jyri, beautiful harbor views despite the construction going on around the hotel/restaurant, but fantastic food and excellent service)

Tallinn

• Hiiekivi (lunch, on the main Old Town courtyard, decent food)
• Pegasus (dinner, funky 3 story restaurant in Old Town, amazing rye bread starter, excellent food)
• Palace Hotel (breakfast, hotel buffet, very nice)
• Peatus (lunch, just outside of Old Town on an abandoned tourist railcar patio, good burger and nice place to catch some rays)
• Farm (dinner, Old Town, excellent food, fun open kitchen ambiance and good service, had an amazing musician, two large bachelor and bachelorette groups which was fun to watch)

Riga

• Rock Café (dinner, watched the 3^rd period of Canada’s 7-1 victory over Latvia at the IIHF World Championship
• Avalon (breakfasts, hotel, decent buffet)
• Lidojosa Varda (lunch, nice patio in the Art Nouveau district, good food but super slow as it took over an hour to get our food)
• Kolonade (dinner, beautiful location on the park at the edge of Old Town, excellent food and service as well as people watching)

Kaunas

• Bunch Bar (lunch, nice quaint location in Old Town, good food and service, Matej liked the drinking glass so much he bought one)

Vilnius

• Blue Lotus (dinner, Indian & Thai food, decent food and okay service other than the waiter forgetting our drink order)
• Hotel Vilnia (breakfast buffets at our hotel, decent selection)
• Bistro 18 (lunch, very good food and excellent service)
• Plus One (dinner, cool ambiance, very good food and decent service, interesting dynamic of 37 women (smoking/vaping outside the restaurant every 15 minutes) and 4 men

Augustow

• Maska (lunch, traditional Polish food, very tasty but almost didn’t have enough cash to cover the tab since their credit card machine was not working)

Warsaw

• Hektor 1970 (dinner, old style diner with very good traditional Polish food and good service)
• hotel (breakfasts, buffet had a huge high quality selection)
• Zapraszamy (lunch, Italian, decent food and service in the mall attached to our hotel)
• Wybitnie Nieznani (dinner, nice ambiance, live musician who was very good, excellent food and decent service)

Krakow

• Warzelnia Smakow (across the street from the salt mine, tasty pierogies)
• Pod Aniolami (dinner, in Old Town, traditional Polish grub in a very unique old historic building, our waitress was over the top friendly)
• Smakosz (lunch, hosted by our Communism tour guide, excellent and very cheap Polish food)
• Karakter (dinner, in the Jewish neighborhood of Kazimierz, nice ambiance and good food and service, dude next to us had tattoos on every visible part of his body)
• Straka (dinner, back in the old Jewish Quarter, cool venue with cartoon art from local students who replicated a famous Berlin artist, one of the best meals we’ve ever had and a fun server)

 

 

 

What did we do…

Helsinki

• city tour with Paulo (checked out the main Finnish Orthodox church, a couple of libraries including the $90M beautiful and modern Oodi, the Rock Church, the super busy train station, and the Old Market Hall where we bought some bear meat)
• Loyly Sauna (world renowned sauna on the Helsinki harbor, one of Time Magazine’s 100 Greatest Places, four saunas and a cold plunge into the ocean in 7C water temp, nice experience and a good way to mitigate the jet lag)
• forest walk, lunch, smoke sauna, and lake plunge with Alex in Sipoonkorpi National Park (lovely day exploring the Finnish forest and experiencing their passionate sauna/cold plunge culture)
• checked out a couple of coffee shops (Johan & Nystrom, Ekberg) with fun vibes

Tallinn

• got picked up at the ferry terminal by our guide Matej and cruised around Old Town enjoying it’s amazing historic charm

• city tour with Jelena (3 hour tour through Old Town learning all about the centuries of history)
• walked over to the Telliskivi district, checking out the market hall and vibe of this old district
• hung out at the main square at the famous coffee shop Kehrweider chatting with a couple from Calgary, who were on a six week remote working trip through central and northern Europe

Parnu:

• stopped in this town on the southern seaside tip of Estonia for a two hour tour with Veronica (lots of fascinating history on this lovely beachside village)

Riga

• walked around the Old Town at the time that Canada was playing Latvia in the IIHF World Championship hockey tournament which was fun to see the lively bars and a thousand or so people watching on a big screen in one of the main squares

• city tour with Karlis (got a good overview of the Latvian culture, politics, Russian heritage issues, and many historical sites in and around the Old Town)
• drove out to the beach community of Jumali with its beautiful and expansive beach area and swanky houses, as well as through the Jewish quarter and a few other neighborhoods which were generally more upscale than we expected)

Pilsrundale

• visited the massive and opulent Rundale Palace with it’s beautiful grounds

Kaunas

• stopped in for a brief visit and lunch but the main square was being renovated so we missed out on that cultural experience

Vilnius

• city tour with Skaiste, who shortened it to Sky (excellent guide who took us through the historical sites in the old town as well as some excellent historical and cultural intel as well as a short jaunt into the Republic of Uzupio which was a cool little small town within the city)
• part of the tour included a visit to the city portal, which is a super cool round screen that connects you with people in Dublin, Philadelphia, Lublin Poland, and Piaui Brazil (every city should have one of these)
• walked around town doing some shopping
• drove out to the island village of Trakai, where we got a guided tour from x of this historic medieval castle as well as enjoying a Kibinai (traditional pastries filled with mutton and onion that was popular with the Karaite ethnic minority)

Augustow

• stopped for lunch and a short walk in this charming resort town with a cool name similar to our grandson Augustus (Gus)

Warsaw

• city tour with Daniel who is from Bogota, Colombia (checked out many of the historic monuments and buildings that largely had to be recreated or symbolized due to the Germans destroying almost everything)
• visited the Praga district which is on the other side of the Vistula River from Old Town (working class district that was previously a no go zone until it turned the corner and has become a bohemian and artsy area)

Krakow

• took a two hour tour with Agnes through the Wieliczka Salt Mine (one of the original UNESCO World Heritage Sites, a fascinating labyrinth of caves where they mined salt since the 13^th century as well as artistic creations from the minors)
• walked around Old Town which is one of the largest squares in Europe but is very busy and commercialized

• city Communism tour with Kornelia – her fathers name is Edward but he goes by Edek (toured us into the Nowa Huta ‘The New Ironworks’ area in a 1990 East German Trabant vehicle, which are made out of plastic, the area was repurposed in the early 1990’s and is one of the largest planned socialist realist districts ever built and one of the most renowned examples of deliberate socialist engineering)
• city tour with Krzysztof (walked Old Town visiting historic sites and then into the Old Jewish district of Kazimierz)
• drove an hour to the most famous WW2 imprisonment camp at Auschwitz Birkenau (hard to fathom what went on in these camps and a very moving visit that tied to several books we have read and shows we have seen)
• had post dinner drinks and listened to a fun jazz band at Harris Piano Jazz Bar in a cool basement cellar in Old Town

 

 

 

 

Background:

Helsinki

• capital city of Finland sitting on a peninsula in the Gulf of Finland
• population of 1.6M
• it has historical significance to Tallinn Estonia, Stockholm Sweden, and Saint Petersburg Russia
• one of the highest standards of urban living in the world
• ranked as one of the most liveable cities
• known for its design, innovative urban planning, and sustainable living

Tallinn

• capital of Estonia situated on a bay in north Estonia on the shore of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea

• population of 650,000
• main governmental, financial, industrial, and cultural center of Estonia
• birthplace of many international high tech companies such as Skype, Bolt, and Wise

Riga

• capital of Latvia situated on the Baltic Sea at the mouth of the river Daugava

• population of 900,000
• considered a cultural center and is home to many museums and concert halls

Vilnius

• capital of Lithuania
• population of 875,000
• known for its baroque architecture and considered one of Europe’s largest and best preserved old towns
• was once referred to as ‘the Jerusalem of the North’
• it is an important center for the global fintech industry

Warsaw

• capital of Poland situated on the River Vistula
• largest city in Poland with a population of 3.27 million (6^th largest in the EU)
• most bombed (85%) city during WW2
• it is a major political, economic, and cultural hub

Krakow

• situated in southern Poland near the border of the Czech Republic
• population 1.5 M (second largest in Poland)
• known for its well preserved medieval core and Jewish quarter
• one of the leading centers of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life
• cited as one of Europe’s most beautiful cities

 

 

 

 

What did we not do that is on the agenda for next time:

• explore more of Finland and Poland as they are vast countries

 

 

 

 

Final thoughts:

• the weather was between 2C and 18C and was often colder than we expected so Mare was smarter than me to bring her long underwear
• the landscape was predominantly flat and agricultural throughout all five countries
• the people were generally friendly once you break through the initial crustiness of these societies that have been largely mistreated over the centuries
• the Baltic countries suffered through nearly a century of Soviet and German ruling until the Singing Revolution on August 23, 1989, where nearly two million people joined hands stretching 675 km from Tallinn to Vilnius, which started the process of these countries gaining their independence in the early 1990’s