This is the ship we came to Helsinki on!! BIg hey?
DAY 183
Helsinki, FINLAND
After we left the Nordic hotel we caught a shuttle bus (3.30pm) to board the Mariella ship (Viking Line) from Stockholm to Helsinki...and that was so SO...beautiful!
It was a couple of hours before we even left the beautiful Swedish islands and reached the open sea...and the view was just so beautiful. More lovely than sailing through from Sydney on our way out to Vanuatu or from Vancouver to go inside passage sailing in Alaska...this trip surpassed them all....
And i tell you...if you can EVER get the chance to sail out of Stockholm..please do it. It's honestly something that should be on the top of priorities if you want to sail amongst beautiful islands on a ship. I actually was all a bit noneplussed about catching this ship, thinking it would be something like catching a ferry to go to the Greek Islands...which of course is beautiful..but not like this...
The islands were so full of quaint houses and were green..and the water travelling along the canal was calm...and the ship was so BIG and full of excitement.
Anyway, as you can tell..we had a wonderful time!
Until we tried to sleep in our cabin..which was on top of the propellers but i won't destroy the image and go too much into that...except we didn't sleep very well listening to the propellers, hydraulics and thinking the ship was doing a TITANIC!!!
I was thinking...thank god we knew where the exit was....as we'd made a wrong turn and got out the escape door earlier (and got told by staff to go the 'right way' in future..hmm.) ANd we'd checked out the liferafts and where they were...!
Thinking about it, unlike other ships i'v e been on (the Pacific Sun from Sydney to Vanuatu that we went on for our honeymoon and the MS STatemdam when we went inside passage sailing in ALaska) there was no lifeboat or safety drill...hmm..i wonder why...
Anyway...i would say, it's not recommended to take the lowest cabin......it was CRAP. As we're on a budget and travelling, we chose that..but if we were to holiday there again and plan to take a ship to Helsinki...(which is a common way of travel from Stockholm outwards..) i'd get a better class cabin just to be able to sleep OK!
BreaKfast this morning was good (as was dinner) .. Expensive as ships are...(meals not included) and we docked safely at 10am...
And at the moment...we're both here on two computers in Helsinki waiting to get into our prebooked accomodation which doesn't have reception available until 2pm....
So.................not long to go before we check in.
We're now five hours behind you guys in Perth...Helsinki is either not on Daylight saving, or it has finished today..not sure..?
Also, Helsinki works on EUro´s...so back to a currency we're familiar with, thank god!
Will blog-email again soon...but for now...we're off to check in and see what our accomodation is like......
Our luggage is currently dumped at a reception place next door to where we're staying so i hope it's safe!!! Trustworthy aren't we....or silly..or both!
Hope everyone´s going well......
Send us some emails...our inbox is hungry! :*)
