Finland   Our only time ever in Finland had been at the end of the second part of our sabbatical in 1972, when we drove the VW Beetle we had bought into the then Soviet Union via the then Czechoslovakia, and out via Finland. We spent a few days in Helsinki and then loaded the car and ourselves on the Finnlines’ Finnhansa for the two-night trip to Travemünde, Germany, eventually shipping the car home via Bremen. On the present trip I wanted to visit Finland again quickly, and also sail once again from one end of the Baltic to the other.

Finland became independent only after World War I. Before that, it had been for centuries part of Sweden, which is probably why people often include it, inaccurately, as part of Scandinavia. Then, for a century and a half, it was a Grand Duchy of Russia.

Again, ethnically, the Finns are related to the Estonians across the Gulf of Finland. Their languages, both of which are Uralic and not Indo-European, are similar to each other. When we were in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, during Soviet times, I remember hearing that Estonians would get the news from the West by watching Finnish television.

People may be aware that Belgium and Switzerland, among others, are countries where more than one language is official. I think most people are unaware that Finland is also a bilingual country. Both Finnish and Swedish are official languages. In 1880, a full 14% of the population of Finland were ethnic Swedes. Today, that figure is still 5%. Each community decides what its primary language is, although of course, few communities have Swedish as their primary language. Up until recently, students had to study both languages, although that too has been relaxed.

All official signs, and many advertising signs, are bilingual, both on the highway and city street signs. Usually, Finnish is first, unless Swedish dominates in that town. You see road signs to Helsinki/Helsingfors, for instance; others include Espoo/Esbo, Hanko/Hangö. On occasion, the names are totally different, most notably with Turku, which in Swedish is Åbo.

Lying between Sweden and Finland at the entrance to the Gulf of Bothnia are the Åland islands (capital Mariehamn), whose situation is unique. They are 100% ethnically Swedish and Swedish-speaking. When Finland was part of Sweden, Åland was administered as part of Finland, which was no problem. It became a problem when Russia took over Finland, but nothing could be done. However, when Finland became independent of Russia after WWI, Sweden thought it was finally time to take jurisdiction over Åland, but the Finns disagreed. The issue was decided by the League of Nations, which said that the islands should remain legally part of Finland, but should be otherwise autonomous, and Swedish-speaking. When my ship from Stockholm stopped in Mariehamn on the way to Helsinki, I was able to count Åland as destination # 105 for the Travelers Century Club (Spitsbergen had been # 104 this trip).

To show how the Finns had not been in control of their destiny, Helsinki had been founded by Swedish king Gustav Vasa (the ship was named after him) in 1559, but Mariehamn had been founded in 1861 by Czar Alexander II. Turku, the oldest city (1229) had been the capital for centuries, but the Russians transferred the capital to Helsinki, since Turku was physically and politically too close to Sweden.

Gabriella   I left Stockholm on the Viking Lines’ Gabriella. The most obvious thing you notice in this area are the islands. In German they’re called Schären. I’ve heard the English word skerries, and I think that may be the same thing. They’re hundreds and thousands of islands, some good-sized, but many just flyspecks. Sometimes you see a little cabin on one of the flyspecks and wonder how it doesn’t get flooded away by a storm. Those are the islands Stockholm is built on, the islands the Juno sailed through going south, and the ones that the Gabriella threaded its way through, rarely going out into the open sea. After a while the islands we came to were part of Åland (OH.land, of course), and we were pulling in to Mariehamn. More of these islands continued to the west coast of Finland, where Turku/Åbo is, and which is a terminal for ferries, too, but the Gabriella swung down to the south coast to arrive in Helsinki the following morning.

The Gabriella dates from 1992. My cabin was very nice, and sparkling wine was provided, since it was a nicer cabin. Yet of the three “ferries” I took this trip, I felt a certain malaise on the Gabriella. Once I left my peaceful cabin area, it was very crowded, with what seemed to be a lot of round-trip people, sometimes partying. There was a large duty-free shop that looked like a bargain basement. There was a sort of nightclub, and they were trying hard, but it was smoky and boozy. A singer was belting out “I Will Survive”, and that’s how I felt. Dinner and breakfast were extra, as on the Color Fantasy, but here I had purchased them in advance, which is just as well, since an announcement had been made that all cabins were sold out, as were all buffet reservations (there were also snack bars).

The dinner buffet was good, but regimented. There were four 90-minute shifts between 5 and 9 PM. My computer-generated reservation was for 7 PM, which I would have chosen anyway, but you were seated family-style with strangers (that worked out, since I struck up a conversation with an older Swiss couple in German, French, and English). It was a nice enough ship, the cabin particularly, but do you see the reason for the malaise? The Gabriella experience was OK, but was the least satisfying of my connections this trip.

I noticed on the ship that the Finnish version of “Stockholm” is “Tukholma”. Finnish doesn’t seem to like two consonants at the beginning, and drops one. I also saw that Saint Petersburg, just down the gulf, is Pietari.

Turku   Due to ferry scheduling, I only had two full days and one night in Helsinki. It worked out perfectly, and I even had time for relaxation. That first day, I took the train (with my railpass) to Turku, two hours away. There are several visible heritages from Finland’s Russian period. One is the Orthodox Cathedral in Helsinki, across from the Lutheran Cathedral. There’s also a monument to the visit of a czarina. But since the great railroad-building era fell while Finland was part of Russia, Finland has Russia’s broad-guage tracks. It doesn’t make any difference, since the only rail connection over a border is with Russia, anyway.

The trains were a whiz. Going I was on an Italian pendolino train, which leans into curves for greater speed (pendolino means “little pendulum” in Italian). Coming back I was on a bi-level train, sitting upstairs. The railpass is first-class, and each time I had the car close to myself, with cookies, coffee, and tea. I plugged in the laptop, and wrote. A TV screen in the front of the car listed upcoming stops, and connections, and a female voice also announced everything in Finnish, Swedish, and English.

I’ve always liked the Swedish name for Turku, Åbo. Your one-question final exam in Swedish is to decide how to pronounce Åbo correctly. You may start your test now.

I spent two hours in Turku/Åbo, which is now the fifth-largest city in Finland. (The second-largest is Espoo/Esbo, which is part of Greater Helsinki, and virtually a twin city of it, so that doesn’t seem quite fair.) Turku/Åbo has a Finnish University, and a separate Swedish University, so don’t think this language business is taken lightly. I went to the Lutheran Gothic cathedral (13th Century), and to the indoor Victorian-looking marketplace dating from the early 20th Century. I love going around and looking at the meats, cheeses and vegetables. Everything is up-to-date and in refrigerated cases, and some stalls have little cafés. However, don’t get carried away by the romantic image: there was also a sushi bar and a pizzeria. Lifestyles are now global.

Åbo is pronounced OH.boo. Did you pass?

Helsinki   Michelin describes two areas of Helsinki to see. The second is 20th Century Helsinki, which has a lot of modern buildings, most to my mind of little distinction. It is of only passing interest to me that the Helsinki agreements and the Clinton/Yeltsin summit were held in the Finlandia Concert Hall. The only exception here is the marvelous railway station with the iconic grey giant male figures with page-boy haircuts holding illuminated glass globes in front of them. I think they’ve become a modern icon for the city.

It’s the first area Michelin describes that has the heart and soul, and charm, of the city. Neo-Classical Helsinki is how it’s described, and it’s the part of the city that was built in about the 1830’s, actually, contemporary with Sweden’s Göta Kanal. There’s the four-block long narrow park area with roadways north and south of it, lined with 19th Century buildings. At its east end is the public market place, which is also at the top of the South Harbor, with the huge Viking Line and Stena Line ferries hulking above it. Nearby is the orthodox cathedral, and also Senate Square with the Lutheran Cathedral. It’s a pleasure to walk around these areas on a beautiful summer’s day.

I was staying here for the one night on Starwood points, at Starwood’s only hotel in Helsinki, the Hotel Kämp (KEMP). When it was built in 1887, it was a showplace. In modern times, the façade facing the park has been retained, but the entire back has been replaced with a modern wing. It’s a beautiful hotel. On my second day, I had time for leisure, so I strolled again in the park, through the marketplace, then set up the laptop in the hotel “library”, which is actually the lounge in the old part of the Kämp, and enjoyed the afternoon.

Finnish   The name of the country is Suomi. The language is Suomen. The national ID that you see on cars, similar to F for France, D for Deutschland, and GB for Great Britain, is SF. This stands for Suomi/Finland, and that second word is Swedish, and only coincidentally, also English. But we now have to make some comments about the language. Simply put, very little is recognizable. When I first made the reservation for the Kämp, it said its address was on Pohjoisesplanadi. (WHAT?) Looking at the map, I saw it was opposite Eteläesplanadi. That was little help. But the alternate Swedish names were also on the map: Norra Esplanaden and Södra Esplanaden, and I caught on: the North Esplanade and the South Esplanade. Later I noted you could also write the Finnish words apart as Pohjois Esplanadi and Etelä Esplanadi. Thank goodness for borrowed words in Finnish such as Esplanadi, which makes it more reognizable. So those were the two roadways, and the strip park I liked so much was called Esplanadi/Esplanaden. So far so good.

Here’s a couple more samples. Later, on the Finnhansa, the sign that gave the opening hours of the restaurant said at the top, in Finnish, Swedish, German, and English:

Three languages are Indo-European, and all Germanic to boot. Each one is as guessable as the others, but not the Finnish word. Another sign said about two of the decks:

Actually, if the English one had used the Germanic version, Freight, the last three would all be similar, but the Finnish one is very different.

Of course, after a while, you do get to recognize even very different words. There was a list of telephone rates to both Eurooppa and to Pohjois-ameriikka. If you can’t figure out that last one, go back a few paragraphs.

That last full day I had time to visit Stockmann, Finland’s iconic department store. When its building went up in Helsinki in 1930, it was a major step forward. I spent most time in Stockmann’s bookstore, which had one of the largest selections I’ve ever seen, not only in Finnish and Swedish, but in English, German, French, Russian, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and probably more languages I didn’t see. I did two things there.

Maj Sjöwall and the late Per Wahlöö were husband and wife. Between 1965 and 1975 they together wrote (in Swedish) ten mysteries featuring Detective Martin Beck. All have been translated, and I believe Beverly and I have read all of them, including the well-known Roseanna. Four of the books were made into movies, including The Laughing Policeman, which starred Walter Matthau. On the canal trip it was mentioned that they had a German copy of Die Tote im Göta Kanal (The Dead [Woman] in the Göta Canal). Since I could use something to read going home on the QM2, and since this sounded appropriate, I asked for an English version by that name at Stockmann’s bookstore, and all she could find was the German version. Then, doing a little detective work on my own, I looked at the front of the German book and found it was a matter of a title change. Only the German version had been given that title. The original Swedish, and English, version was—Roseanna. So I had read it, but it’s appropriate that I read it again, this time in a British printing.

The second thing I did in Stockmann’s was to look at the language section. The Finns have to do a lot of language study, their language being so different, and there was a huge selection of bilingual dictionaries, from which I got the names of lots of languages. What do you recognize?

Englanti, Portugali, Hollanti, Turkki, Italia, Bulgaria, Norja, Espanja, Kreikka, Tanska, Unkari, Puola, Ranska, Saksa, Ruotsi, Venäjä, Viro

I’ve put them in order from easy to impossible. I can’t make any explanations as to endings. Why do some languages look like names of countries? I don’t know. Some are too obvious to mention, but I’ll discuss some others.

There seems to be a T/D relationship. England and Holland seem to influence Englanti and Hollanti. Therefore, Tanska must be (because of Danska), Danish.

There seems to be a K/G relationship. There, Kreikka must be Greek, and Unkari must be Hungarian.

Puola seemed to be Polish, and on inspecting the dictionary, it was.

Remember how the ST in Stockholm shortened in Tukholma? How about Ranska? It turned out to be French, with the FR shortening as well.

My favorite on the list is Saksa, but I’m cheating. A long time ago I read somewhere that Finnish uses PART of a certain country to name the language for the whole country. Does this hint help?

Saksa is the Finnish name for German. It’s based on Saxony. Perhaps the Saxons were the Germans the early Finns had most contact with.

Now for the impossible ones. When I saw Ruotsi, a light went on, and I was right. Somewhere I had noticed once that Ruotsi refers to Swedish. So all signs in Finland are in both Suomen and Ruotsi, or, if you will, in Finsk and Svensk.

Venäjä was impossible until I opened the dictionary and saw a map of Russia. Venäjä means Russian.

But then that Viro. There was no map in the dictionary, and I didn’t recognize the language. What to do?

For the first time in my life, and presumably the last, I reached for a Suomen-Englanti dictionary and looked up Viro. Of all things, it turned out to be Finnish’s sister language, Estonian. Looking again at the Suomen-Viro dictionary, a large number of the words did seem similar. Incomprehensible to me, yet similar.

One additional thing should be noted from this. The further away a language is from Finland, the more recognizable its name is, since its name will be a borrowed word. It’s the immediate neighboring languages around the Baltic for which Suomen has its own native names: Viro, Ruotsi, Venäjä. (Do you still remember which is which? And Ranska? Saksa?)

One last point on Finnish. I had read years ago that Finnish is one of those languages that has lots of cases, something like 15. That is, in order to say IN Helsinki, OF Helsinki, FOR Helsinki, TO Helsinki, OVER Helsinki, and whatever else, it’s done in one word, with a differing ending. Strolling around, I came across a sign in three languages:

One way to express the Swedish version would be just like the English version, but you also could say “Museum OF the city OF Helsinki”. That’s what I’m guessing the Finnish says. “Helsingin” seems to be the name Helsinki in the genitive (possessive) case, meaning “of Helsinki”. From that we could note that “Kaupungin” seems to mean “of the city”, but I still be wary to guess what the basic form (nominative case) for “city” would be.

You may be familiar with the Rosetta Stone, a carved stone that was discovered in Egypt that had the same text in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, Greek, and Latin. It was because scholars could read the Greek and Latin that they were able to figure out what the version in Egyptian hieroglyphics meant, and was a major breakthrough in Egyptology and the understanding of hieroglyphics. What we just did with the sign for the Helsinki City Museum used a similar technique.

Well, now we’ve taken a stab at both Finnish vocabulary and grammar, without hardly knowing a word of Finnish. It’s time to set sail for Germany.

Finnhansa   On 1 August 1972 according to Beverly’s travel diary, she and I sailed with our VW on the Finnlines’ Finnhansa from Helsinki to Travemünde, in Germany, making stops on the way on the Swedish island of Gotland and the Danish island of Bornholm. It was almost the end of the second European part of our joint sabbatical. I thought I’d be sailing on the same Finnhansa on 12 July 2006, but on arrival at Hansaterminaali in Helsinki I found out this is a new Finnhansa built in 1994, making no stops, so so much for nostalgia, which flew right out the window. Nevertheless, that’s just 20 days short of 34 years later that I’ll be crossing the Baltic again diagonally almost from end to end on Finnlines. But yet another boat ride comes to mind.

It was during November 1971, at the end of the FIRST European part of our joint sabbatical. We had returned that horrible Simca to Nice that had caused us so much grief in Eastern Europe, and had taken the train to Genova (Genoa), from which we were to sail, for our one and only time, on a freighter, the Yugoslavian Tuhović. However, there was a strike of Italian longshoremen, and it was three days late in arriving. What else to do in Genova, which doesn’t have that much to see in the first place? We went to a bookstore and got a book to learn Italian. I remember sitting in a park, quizzing each otheron what we were learning. The Tuhović eventually arrived, we stopped in Tangier, then on to New York, over the rough North Atlantic, for a total of 11 days. Then, with a longshoremen’s strike in New York, we were put off in Boston, and bused to New York.

Barring the rough weather, life on a freighter was unique. Freight takes priority, but passengers are very, very comfortable, in large, cozy cabins. I remember seeing lots of freight on open decks as well as being put below, and the passenger area being in sort of a superstructure off to one side. Aside from the cabins, there was only the dining room and the lounge, so you pretty much had to entertain each other. Actually, there couldn’t have been many passengers, maybe 15 or a few more. About half of them were what the rest of us called the “Florida people”, a group, almost a clique, traveling together, loud and loudly dressed, in a cloud of cigarette smoke, boozing and partying. The rest of us got to know each other pretty well, and I’ve written about meeting and playing cards with the elderly traveling couple, the Pennybakers. Life on a freighter was unique, and enjoyable.

My pleasant second day in Helsinki continued in the early evening, when I took a taxi to Hansaterminaali up in the North Harbor to board the Finnhansa. My first surprise was to see the foot passenger entrance closed, and I walked up to the car check-in. I was told at first I was the only passenger on board without a vehicle, although it later turned out there were two older German ladies without a car as well. This was a surprise, because the website had given directions both how to drive to the terminal, and which buses foot passengers could take. I also got the feeling shortly afterward that I was the only American on board. I was put into a van to be shuttled on board the ship.

I took the elevator up from the car desk to the reception desk on Deck 4 for my keycard and table assignment, since all meals are included on this trip—dinner that first evening, three meals and afternoon coffee on the sea day, and breakfast on arrival. As I looked around, I found that this would not be the Color Fantasy trip, and not the Gabriella trip.

Essentially, I was on a freighter again.

I got to chatting with the Purser. He knew New York harbor very well, and had been in and out of it some 38 times. He had run Donald Trump’s yacht for the many years that Trump had owned one, and was also familiar with sailing down to Atlantic City (small world). He told me the Finnhansa had only 34 cabins, with a capacity of only 114 passengers. As of that point, only 58 had boarded, and not many more would.

The atmosphere breathed freighter. He told me there was room for 1.8 kilometers of cars and trucks, which was our “freight”. There were a lot of truck drivers on board, burly, burly, and a number of tables in the dining room said in English “Drivers Only”. My cabin was huge: aside from the bed, there was a full couch and coffee table, wardrobe, and full desk with TV, also a shower and toilet.

Decks 2 and 3 were for “cargo”, as was half of deck 4 (you could see the rear ends of some trucks if you looked out one side of the dining room). The passenger area was in a square superstructure starting halfway back on deck 4, which included the quite comfortable buffet dining room (lots of room—I had my own small table), Reception area, and a taxfree shop. Nothing else. The square deck 5 right above had 26 cabins. Deck 6 had two saunas (men’s and women’s)—this was a Finnish ship, after all—with hot tub and tiny pool. Deck 7 had just four outside cabins on each side, one of which was mine. The purser said all cabins were alike, but being up on deck 7 was even quieter. There were outdoor sitting areas behind decks 5,6,7, and 5 even included a minigolf course outside.

It was quiet. You went outside. You went to meals. You wrote in your cabin. You contemplated. You watched the Baltic go by. You hardly saw any crew. It was very different from the other two ferries, very peaceful, and I liked it. It was freighter life all over again.

North Germany   As I was putting this trip together, it became clear that North Germany would be the center of operations out of which I would work, specifically, Kiel, Travemünde, and Hamburg for their water connections. Then, out of Kiel I wanted to see Rendsburg and the Kiel Canal; out of Travemünde, Lübeck; out of Hamburg, Bremen, with a sudden addition of Berlin for its new station. It’s just as well, since I hadn’t been to this area in many years.

Lübeck   At the mouth of the river Ply in England lies the town named Plymouth, and Portsmouth is similarly named. In the same way, the River Trave (TRAH.veh), which flows past the beautiful old Hanseatic city of Lübeck, flows into the Baltic at the resort town of Travemünde, which is essentially Trave-mouth. This is where the Finnhansa docked. Today, Travemünde is part of Lübeck, so it’s complete name is styled properly Lübeck-Travemünde. The Finnhansa remains on Finnish time during the voyage, so the 8AM arrival in Travemünde (which is plenty early for me) turned out to be 7 AM local time, lengthening your day, which is a pleasant way to “get your hour back”. I took the train to Lübeck Hauptbahnhof, and spent a couple of hours revisiting the city after many years.

Lübeck was the Queen of the Hansa. Hamburg was actually an outgrowth, and in the beginning, a subsidiary, of Lübeck. Lübeck had borrowed the Dutch style of gabled architecture from the Netherlands during its years of Hanseatic association, and further developed what became the Baltic style of brick-construction, including the brick-Gothic style. Lübeck’s several churches, especially the magnificent Marienkirche, was the model for other churches and cathedrals all around the Baltic and Scandinavia. Lübeck’s Rathaus/City Hall was the model for City Halls all around the Baltic and Scandinavia. In a sense, coming to Lübeck at the end of this trip was, historically and architecturally speaking, “coming home”.

Walking into Lübeck you come first to the huge brick (of course) city gate, the Holstentor, with its iconic two slate conical towers. From the beginning, the Holstentor was built far more to impress than to protect. Lübeck’s brick church towers form the skyline. All buildings have long been restored from wartime damage, but the monument in the Marienkirche remains in the mind: when the towers collapsed during an air raid, the huge bells crashed to the ground, almost flattening themselves on the pavement. After the restoration of the church, towers, and bells, the fallen, flattened bells were left as a memorial and an anti-war reminder.

Lübeck is famous for its marzipan, the almond-paste confection. Across from the Rathaus, a marzipan confectioner-and-café was celebrating two centuries, 1806-2006, at the same location. They had a good-sized Statue of Liberty in the window made out of marzipan with the notation that “Lady Liberty” has been a New Yorker since the 1880’s, but they’d been here since 1806.

Berlin Hauptbahnhof   From Lübeck I made immediate connections in Hamburg for a quick side trip to Berlin. I say quick, because in 1990—already after the wall came down--it took over four hours to go by train from Hamburg to Berlin, and now it’s 90 minutes on the ICE, the InterCity Express. But that isn’t the reason I wanted to go, since I was just there last year. It wouldn’t cost anything, since I had my railpass, and I wanted to see the new Main Station that was just opened on May 28.

I’ve explained that with the wartime destruction of the multiple stations in Berlin, there was, after reunification, an opportunity to unify rail service; also, there has been for a long time an east-west service through the center of the city, but with intercity trains stopping at local S-Bahn stations, principally Berlin Zoo, of all things. A new tunnel has been under construction for several years under the Tiergarten, just to the west of Mitte, the old city, which would be used to reroute auto traffic, as well as to supply a north-south service below ground, with a reference being made to Berlin (tief).

The round-trip I had by ICE trains was nonstop between Hamburg and Berlin, which by itself is amazing. They were needle-nose trains, and, since my railpass is automatically for first class, it was a comfortable trip. Going, I had one of the three front seats, right behind the glass partition, so you could not only see the train driver sitting in his office chair at the master console, you could see right through the large window in front of him for the same view he had. To those of us who have spent time standing in the front car of subway trains to see the oncoming view, this, and on a real railroad no less, was heaven.

Where the east-west lines cross the outer S-Bahn ring, the stations are known as Ostkreuz (East Crossing) and Westkreuz. Last year I had visited the former Papestrasse station on the ring, which, when the new lines crossed it, would be known as Südkreuz (South Crossing). [There is no Nordkreuz; the Gesundbrunnen station serves that purpose.]

About ten minutes before arrival we passed the Berlin-Spandau station, then turned further south and underground. I didn’t get off at Berlin Hauptbahnhof yet, since the next stop would be Südkreuz before continuing on to Leipzig and Munich, among others. I got off at, and checked out the new Südkreuz station, then caught another train back to the intermediate station, the new underground railroad station at Potsdamer Platz, where I went up above ground to look around again for a few minutes. I hadn’t noticed before that the red Walk and green Wait signs at pedestrian crossings, which usually show stick figures, showed the Berliner Bär, symbol of the city, walking or waiting. Then I got another train back to Berlin Hbf.

It’s quite spectacular, all glass and steel. There are five levels. From the bottom up, Lower Level 2 has the new north-south tracks (with single-digit track numbers 1-8); Lower Level 1 has shops and serves as a crossover point for tracks below; Street Level has shops; Upper Level 1 then serves as a crossover point for the tracks above on Upper Level 2 (with double-digit track numbers 11-16). You can see all levels from many points, and I found it strange to look up and see trains moving in one direction, then down, to see others moving perpendicular to them. In addition to all the escalators, there are also several large glass elevators going from top to bottom, which are fun to just ride. The trip cost nothing, I had the time to do it, and I got writing done on the trains both ways, making it a pleasant afternoon.

Wedel   I had booked a Hamburg hotel out of Michelin, which was right across the Hamburg Hauptbahnhof, a convenient location for all my comings and goings by rail. I was very happily surprised when the hotel automatically gave you a free three-day transportation pass for all the Hamburg S-Bahn, U-Bahn, bus and other connections. I had time that first evening, and walked across the street and took the S1 S-Bahn train to its westernmost last top in Wedel (VE.del, VE- rhymes with cafE). Wedel is well-known for having a Schiffsbegrüssungsanlage (ship greeting area) to serve Hamburg and the Elbe in general, just like the one in Rendsburg served the Kiel Canal.

The station in Wedel turned out to be quite a hike from the river, and I asked several times if I was on the right way. Finally, when coming to a three-way fork, I asked a young couple with a little boy, and they told me they were going there, and we went together.

On the way I noticed that this weekend Wedel was having its seventh annual Hafenfest (harbor festival). It was also pointed out that the fest would coincide with the visit of the QM2, not a minor point.

I went out onto the dock into the river, but no ships happened to be entering or leaving while I was there. The couple introduced me to one of the ex-captain volunteers who regularly announce the ships. They raise the flag of the ship in question, and have a large bank of recordings behind them that greet the ship in its own language, and play its national anthem, while automatically honoring the ship by dipping the Hamburg flag. I found out Wedel, which is 25 kilometers downstream from Hamburg, has been greeting ships since 1952. Only non-local ships greater than 500 tons are greeted. The couple said they’d be there when the QM2 sailed, and we agreed to wave to each other, even though we knew we wouldn’t see each other.

Bremen   The next day I used my pass to take the train to Bremen (BRE- rhymes with cafE), whose port is second only to Hamburg in Germany. By far, the main business of the port is container transport and the shipment of cars, and it is Europe’s leading port for the turn-around of vehicles, so apparently we fit in quite well when years ago we sent our new VW after Russia and Finland from Bremen to New York.

The day was a beautiful summer’s day. Crossing the old moat into the old city (the moat area is now a park, since the city walls are long gone), there was to one side a working full-size windmill, now used as a restaurant, totally surrounded by very colorful flowers. There were two historic churches next to the Marktplatz where the Rathaus/City Hall was. One church had a Saturday flower market going on around it. The Rathaus is Gothic, modified into what is known as Weser-Renaissance. It has two statues near it that are well-known.

In front is the 1404 statue of Roland, known as Roland der Riese (Roland the Giant). It shows a knight holding the sword of justice. The figure is 10 meters/33 feet high, explaining its name. At Middlebury, as a pronunciation exercise, we had memorized (with my translation):

The other statue is more fun. On the side of the Rathaus, in the back, is a charming statue of the Bremer Stadtmusikanten. This is the Grimm fairytale of the Bremen Town Musicians, which ends up with the animals standing on each other’s backs. The statue, perhaps half-size, shows the donkey on the bottom, supporting the dog, who supports the cat, who supports the rooster on top. Of course, of the two, this was the statue surrounded by people taking pictures, putting kids up on the pedestal next to the donkey. The theme carries on through Bremen. Outside one shop was a full-size plush-doll replica, and small plush-doll replicas were for for sale everywhere.

Leading south from the Marktplatz a short distance to the Weser is the Böttcherstrasse. Between 1923 and 1933 an industrialist paid to have the 2-3 blocks of this street remodelled into an “art street”. There had been some historic brick houses on the street, and they were included in the remodeling. The street is all-brick, typical of the whole northern part of Europe. It is particularly interesting to see the beautiful brick work, not only in historic styles, but also in the Jugendstil (Art Nouveau) and Art Deco brick styles that this street is in. At the end of the street is the Weser River, where the old fishing port has been remodelled into a river promenade. It was a pleasant couple of hours back in Bremen.

Hamburg   After these excursions, I finally revisited Hamburg. It’s Germany’s second city in size, which is particularly appropriate that its rail connections to Berlin should have been improved so well. I did another urban walk for hours. The Alster is a long lake to the northeast of downtown, which well in the past was divided by a wasp-waist of road and rail corssings into two connected parts. The further one out is the larger Aussenalster (Outer Alster), which covers about ¾ of the lake’s surface. On a beautiful day it was covered with sailboats, and had great views from the parkland around it. Closer in in the Binnenalster (Inner Alster), which has the prestigious street of Jungfernstieg bordering its southern end. Nearby is the huge Rathaus dating from the late 1800’s, and the Rathausmarkt before it. I walked along the river promenade, where signs told about the many emigrants that had lodged temporatily in this area waiting for their ship to leave for America. My Russian grandfather could have been among them.

Hamburg’s skyline is known for its towers, those of five historic churches, plus the Rathaus. You can see them from the Alster, and from the Elbe. The best-known of them is the Sankt-Michaelis-Kirche, known affectionately as Michel, and, because of its tall steeple, Der lange Michel (Tall Mike). The steeple dates to 1786 and is 132 meters/yards tall. I have a picture of this steeple on the wall at home. The church was open late, and I could re-admire its Baroque interior.

I ended the evening walking most of the length of the Reeperbahn (REE- rhymes with cafE) in Sankt Pauli, or at least, the distance between the U-Bahn station “Sankt Pauli” and the S-Bahn station “Reeperbahn”. I’d referred to this street, which name means “ropewalk”, referring to the long area needed to make ropes, when I was talking about Double Dutch rope skipping in New York (Reflection 2005 Series 18). Sankt Pauli, and particularly the Reeperbahn, is world-known for its nightlife, having developed as the street that sailors would come to when in port. Nevertheless, although I’m sure it can be whatever you want it to be, on the surface most of it is really quite tame. There are more curious tourists than anyone else, most people just sitting in sidewalk cafés. McDonald’s, Burger King, and Kentucky Fried Chicken are represented on the Reeperbahn, just to give you an idea of what it’s like.

The long, narrow islands in the Elbe long ago developed into the Speicherstadt “Warehouse City”. After the wartime destruction, these buildings have been rebuilt, in brick of course, into offices and living complexes as well. I found out that the Queen Mary 2 was to leave the next day from the still under-construction HafenCity (Harbor City) cruiseport complex adjoining the Speicherstadt in the river.

QM2   I have seen a number of sailaways in my time, including several for the QM2. Aside from the times I’ve seen QM2 sailaways while I’ve been on the ship, I visited the Brooklyn terminal in April to see what it looked like. There were a good number of curious bystanders in the street, a dozen here, a dozen there, since the QM2 had never come to Brooklyn before. When the ship sailed, I had gone down to that park with a pier a few blocks away, and there were maybe 100 people waving the ship away. The city had also supplied three fireboats to spray a farewell in colors. That was the fussiest sailaway I’d ever seen before for any ship as far as people bidding farewell.

Then I came to Hamburg.

I had heard the stories about how people in Hamburg and in Germany in general love the ship, including that magazine article I recently mentioned saying that when the QM2 visited Hamburg last year there were so many boats in the Elbe you could have walked across the river without getting your feet wet. That was of course an exaggeration. But not by much.

I’ve already said that in Wedel they had set their Hafenfest to coincide with the QM2 weekend. Since the QM2 was calling in Hamburg twice this year, for my trip on July 16 and again on August 25, in the streets of Hamburg were notices saying in English that those two dates were each “Queen Mary 2 Day”, with the additional statement that “Wir begrüssen die Königin der Meere” (“We greet the Queen of the Seas”).

I had my urban transit pass from the hotel and I knew how to get to HafenCity by U-Bahn, which, along the harbor promenade, rose out of the ground to become a Hochbahn, an elevated line. The Baumwall station, like many, was equipped for the handicapped, so there was a lift down to street level for me and my one bag on wheels. In retrospect, I suppose I might have been one of the very few passengers, if not the only one, to arrive for the QM2 by U-Bahn, then on foot.

It was maybe a 20-minute walk to the ship, but I noticed immediately that there was a column of people walking about 4-5 abreast, towards the ship, and they weren’t passengers. There was sort of a fairgrounds set up in the park area near the ship, with tents selling food and QM2 souvenirs. This sailaway was going to be a big party.

I checked in about 4 PM, unpacked, had dinner, and went up top for the sailaway at 9 PM. It was still light, since the sun wouldn’t set at this time of the year until about 10:30, and even then the sky would remain a medium blue for quite some time afterwards.

The first thing we did was a very, very slow turnaround maneuver that took a good ¾ hour. We had still been facing upstream, and the QM2 is so maneuverable that it can turn itself in a circle without any tugboats, but after turning 180°, we were in the right direction and ready to move.

Where shall I start? The air: I counted six hot-air balloons up above, and over time, three helicopters flew over. The water: Although you couldn’t walk across the Elbe from boat to boat, you could understand that exaggeration, because as we were about to leave, I counted easily 60-70 boats in the water. They were anything from speedboats and small craft of that nature, up to yachts and regular sightseeing boats with lots of passengers. There had been a tent in the impromptu “fairgrounds’” offering boat rides to accompany the QM2 downstream, and those boats were among the flotilla. One of the sightseeing boats was an honest-to-goodness, thought less than perfect, replica of a Mississippi riverboat from Mark Twain’s time, including a faux paddlewheel in the back that sometimes turned, and sometimes didn’t. The vessel said on it:

which I thought was a cute juxtaposition of names.

The flotilla had been blocking our way, but as we started up, all the boats gathered to our right side, which is the city side of the river, and kept along for a couple of hours. As we were moving along, one of the passenger boats played Sinatra doing “New York, New York”. Another one played “Muss i denn”, a German folksong taught in beginning German classes which I always thought was rather simplistic, but since the gist of the lyrics is that “I’m leaving town, and you’re staying, but I’ll be back to see you”, it became touchingly appropriate.

That’s the air and water; now for the land. As we left the “fairgrounds” area near the pier there must have been easily a thousand people with their kids crowded up to the fence, waving. As we moved along within the city, a new group that had gathered at the next location would wave. Some very lucky people were in the U-Bahn trains moving on the Hochbahn along the esplanade, since they wouldn’t have been expecting the absolutely perfect birds-eye view of the QM2 sailaway they got. Since the trains come about every three minutes in each direction, and since the ship wasn’t moving too fast, several trainloads of people got that great view.

But the land view quickly grew as interesting as the flotilla. Picture the following three layers, as partial darkness quickly started to arrive. The lower layer is the cobalt blue river, with the boats’ lights giving some illumination. The upper layer is the darkening, but still light sky. But the middle layer is a black silhouette, first of city buildings, then gradually of suburban houses and trees. Within this black strip are houses with people on lit balconies, waving; people in restaurants waving; people in parked cars with their headlights shining to the river and honking their horns; an odd rocket or two being shot upwards; and this went on and on.

But the most impressive thing in this black silhouetted strip between water and sky was the twinkling. It looked less like stars in the sky than a multitude of faux stars in a stage set, twinkling more than real stars would. The thousands of twinkling lights went on, and on, and on, as we sailed downstream, and I finally realized what it was I was seeing. They were the flashes of thousands of cameras taking our picture.

By 11 PM, as much fun as the sailaway was, I was getting tired, and I was glad when we finally reached the lights of the ship greeting area of Wedel, which traditionally symbolizes the end of Hamburg, although we wouldn’t actually leave the Elbe estuary and drop off the pilot until 4 AM. It was too dark by that time to see if at Wedel they dipped the Hamburg flag as I heard they do, and I couldn’t hear any national anthems, but loud and clear was the announcement, first in German, then in English, that Hamburg wished us a good journey. Well, I would say that it certainly did. I have never seen anything like it.

We had one full day on the North Sea, with very good weather, off the German, Dutch, and Belgian coast, none of which were close enough to be seen. By evening the land grew out toward us from both sides, and at about 11 PM we passed through the Strait of Dover, that point where millenia ago the water buildup south of the glacier over the North Sea burst through the landbridge, forever separating Britain from the continent, and further defining through erosion the English Channel south of this strait. You could barely see toward Calais on the French side, but even at this late hour, you could still see the remnants of a sunset over Dover on the English side. You couldn’t make out the White Cliffs, but a thin red strip of the dying sun lay over the twinkling lights of the town.

I haven’t seen the White Cliffs for many years, since the long-ago days of crossing the Channel by ferry from France, but I should see them close up in Dover next May. I’ve already put a trip together, and have just done an onboard booking of a one-way ticket Southampton-New York on the Mary for June 4.

After a stop in Southampton we proceeded with 2618 passengers to New York. Although there are always announcements made on these crossings in German, French, and sometimes Japanese, this crossing is unusual in that there is such a large German-speaking contingent, about half of the passengers. Not only is Oxford University giving its standard lectures in English, they also have a docent from Oxford giving lectures in German. Many Germans speak English to a greater or lesser degree, yet it’s fun for me at a mixed dinner table to occasionally help out with comprehension one way or another.

The lectures are disappointing. One docent from Oxford lectures on modern art, which does not interest me. The other is a history lecturer, discussing World War II. I went to his lecture on the bombing of London and of Hamburg, which consisted mostly of quotes of the survivors from both sides. Now he is going on and on with lectures of the Battle of Britain. Not only is it a rather heavy topic for an ocean voyage and and involves a bit more than I want to know about the subject, but I do think it’s a bit inappropriate considering the nature of the passenger makeup this trip and considering the wonderful sailaway Hamburg gave us.

For the first time ever, there are German lectures by a German docent at Oxford. I walked out halfway through the first, and sat through the second, even though the literary and esthetic topics are dry as dust. It’s so dry, the lecturer keeps sipping water, and they should provide some for the audience as well. The third one was a bit better.

Our dinner table for eight has some interesting passengers. There is a German couple from Duisburg who speak quite good English, but I’ve been helping out when necessary. There are two other people who are regular frequent travelers. Staff Captain Hamish Sunter (second in command) has hosted our table twice, and Chief Engineer David Montieth and his wife Julia have hosted it once. This is part of the ongoing Cunard “culture”. By culture I mean those people, passengers, officers and crew, that you see again and again and you begin to regard as “family”. I brought the German couple up to date as to how a table works that is hosted by an officer.

Another part of the culture is the people you know. The day I got on board I came across Amanda Reid, who used to be Hostess, but has now been promoted to Assistant Cruise Director, and we had a long chat. When I re-booked for next year at the Cruise Office, I was glad to see that Anna Martin was on this trip, and we had our little chat. She got me a good price for next year, which even surprised her. As a single passenger, I have to pay 175% of a cabin price, yet the total that came up on the computer was about 62% of what she expected to see. She also put me down for a potential free upgrade for next year, so we’ll see what happens.

Mike and Chris are on board. They are both teachers from the New Orleans area who travel round trip by ship every year to visit her family in France. We met them on our very first QE2 trip eastbound in 2000 when we were all at the engineer’s table together, have kept in touch, and occasionally bump into each other. Essentially, they are the ones who got us started with round-trip ocean crossings, just like we used to do years ago, although with Beverly gone, I have been going one-way sometimes. Mike spotted me in the hall right after they got on in Southampton and we caught up on things, including just how badly they were affected by the flooding (not too terribly bad). I reminded Mike of why I had thought of him when I got on board in Hamburg. In 2004, after Beverly and I had taken the QM2 to Europe, went from Prague to Brussels, then reboarded in Southampton, it was Mike and Amanda Reid who happened to be standing on the ship as we got on. The chat we had then was the last non-hospital social gathering Beverly ever attended, since she went into the ship’s hospital shortly after we had that chat.

I keep on getting reverberations from the Coronia trip we took around South America in the winter of 2004. At the captain’s reception last night, the new hostess, who asks for your name to present you to the captain, said quickly in passing she remembered me from the Caronia, where she was hostess. I looked Anja up today at the Purser’s Office, and also Tanya was there, who was the German hostess on the Caronia. I updated them on the fact that Beverly never outlasted that year, and we caught up on events. I reminded Anja that, although I was never on a team that won at the daily team trivia she was in charge of on the Caronia, I told Tanya that my team won either once or twice on the German team trivia on the Caronia. This is more of what I mean by the Cunard culture.

On board I did read “Roseanna” by Maj Sjöwall and Per Wahlöö. It involves a body found in a lock on the Göta Canal, and how the mystery is solved. Action takes place in Motala, Göteborg, and Stockholm, where the Reisen Hotel is mentioned specifically. All three boats are referred to, Juno, Wilhelm Tham, and Diana, and the Diana is the one involved in the action, including a reference to the petite size of the cabins.

I’ve caught up on a number of recent films on board that I had been meaning to see. One instance is worth mentioning. Everyone had been telling me that I had to see “March of the Penguins”, and stories and jokes have been told about it on television. The day I left Hamburg I noted it was being shown on board, but the first time I wasn’t on board yet, the second time I was unpacking, and the third time was during the sailaway that no one wanted to miss. What to do? Would it be played again? When I spoke to Anja, the Hostess that I’d known on the Caronia, she said she’d see what she could do. She called and said it would be shown three times the day before we reach New York. Out of curiosity, I asked if it had been planned that way, and she said no, but she’d arranged it anyway. It’s nice to have connections.

At 4 AM we passed Ambrose Light (they tell me), which is the entrance to New York harbor and the traditional end to the Atlantic Crossing. We went up Ambrose Channel, an underwater trench, through Lower New York Bay and into the Narrows. I did get up to do some early sightseeing right from my balcony, since I wanted to see just how the Brooklyn arrival would look. I saw us pass at 4:45 under the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, and thought of my passing three times this summer by ship under the Great Belt Bridge in Denmark. The QM2 clears the Verrazano with only four meters/yards to spare between the top of her funnel and the bottom of the bridge roadway, but sparks never do fly. As it gradually got a bit lighter, by 5:00 we had a Staten Island ferry nearby, and it looked so much smaller. At 5:10 we saw the Statue of Liberty straight on, about a mile away, which is exactly how it was meant to be seen, while entering the harbor. After all, she’s supposed to be showing you the way (“I lift my lamp beside the Golden Door”). It was illuminated, including the torch, and, although the sun wasn’t up yet, it was getting quite light. The view was best from the middle of Upper New York Bay; you could see the skyscrapers of Jersey City, then the Hudson (if you knew it was there, otherwise it just looked like the edge of the bay), and then the lower Manhattan skyscrapers. As we turned toward Brooklyn, even the Empire State Building in Midtown peeked through the downtown skyscrapers. South of Red Hook we did a 180° turn, much faster than in Hamburg, maybe because we had more room, then backed into Buttermilk Channel between Red Hook and Governor’s Island. From my cabin I had had the good view coming in, but after we turned I was just looking at the terminal, but when I went to breakfast, the view from Brooklyn was almost as good as from the middle of the bay. The Statue was right across the bay, except that the water view was interrupted by the greenery of Governor’s Island. We also had a view straight up the East River at the Brooklyn and Manhattan Bridges. Another large liner arrived at this point and went straight up the Hudson, just beyond the trees of Governor’s Island. We had docked at 6, at about sunrise, at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, a first for me. I used self-help, which means if you can get your own luggage off the ship by yourself (piece o’ cake), you can get off before all the long lines of other people will be getting off in the following one to three hours, and go through customs. The new terminal is efficient, as is the taxi and limo pickup area. All in all, although arriving in Brooklyn is distant from Midtown Manhattan for passengers and workers, it’s an attractive arrival.