Kevin Runs Europe: Day 42 - 51 – June 26

12.0 miles biking (approx.)

4.9 miles running

0.5 miles swimming

I’m sure you thought I had given up on this blog. No, I still have a few more posts to finish out the trip, and this is the big one. I basically considered the arrival of my family and the departure of Curtis to mark the end of our trip and the beginning of a family vacation, so I’m just going to summarize the remaining “family vacation” days…

My parents and sister Kristin landed in the early afternoon of June 26th, rested for a bit after we got to our hotel in the Lesser Town, and then we took off for the Old Town to start a “Beer Tour.” We have our priorities! The tour is organized by a company (Sandeman’s) that does tours across Europe – many of them for free. This one wasn’t free, but was well worth the price, as you get to sample 3-4 of the best beers in the Czech Republic and indeed the world (because Czech beer is second best in the world, after Belgian beer – though that could be a matter of opinion) and the tour is highly informative and interesting if you want to learn about Czech beer.

Looking into the Lesser Town from the end of Charles Bridge

So many people...

Statue on Charles Bridge

The next day, we did the Sandeman’s free tour of Prague with a guide who was extremely – maybe scarily – enthusiastic, but a very good guide, nonetheless. Curtis left for the airport to go home, but returned back to our hotel that evening because when he got to the counter, they told him “you don’t have a ticket” (The booking company messed up big time, but it’s all been sorted out now). He was able to get a flight home the next morning, though.

Rudolfinum - a concert hall

Mom and Dad

View from Prague Castle

As Curtis headed home, we took the train to Leipzig, Germany, where my German “brother” Otto met us at the train station. Otto was an exchange student who stayed with us for a year when I was a junior in high school. We stayed with Otto’s family for a couple nights and we had a lot of fun barbecuing, watching the World Cup matches, seeing some of the sights in Leipzig, and going for a bike ride around the lake and through the parks near Otto’s house.

Casbudener See - lake near Otto's house

Memorial to the Battle of the Nations (or Battle of Leipzig) - A battle involving over 600,000 soldiers, in which Napoleon suffered a huge defeat.

Thomaskirche - where Bach was choirmaster

Leipzig University campus

American Bison in Germany!

Bike ride

Kristin and a statue

Otto by the house his great-grandfather built in 1909

We then headed to Berlin, where mom, dad, and I had all been four years prior when we visited Otto’s family for the first time. Sadly Berlin wasn’t quite how I remembered it. It seems the whole city is a construction site at the moment, as they’re building a metro line right down the middle of Berlin’s city center. They’re also reconstructing some of the major landmark buildings destroyed by bombs in World War II, such as the City Palace. I suppose you can’t be upset with the fact that they’re improving the city, even if it does severely detract from the pleasant atmosphere you remember. And still, being in Berlin during the World Cup, especially on a night when Germany was playing in the World Cup (against Algeria), was an experience to remember. Kristin and I decided to visit the fan zone by the Brandenburg Gate, which, by the time we got there, was stretched half a mile down the road from the Gate, and was filled with Germans of all ages and levels of fanaticism and drunkenness.

Original section of the Berlin Wall preserved as a memorial

Pieces of the Berlin Wall

World Cup fan zone at the Brandenburg during the day. Kristin and I came back many hours later to watch the game at night.

Pork Knuckle. Yum.

Me, Kristin, and Mom

World Cup fan zone at night

Typical German Fußball fan

Ferris wheel in the fan zone

Kristin

Grand Synagogue

Berlin Cathedral

Alexanderplatz - Neptune Fountain and the Fernsehturm (TV Tower)

Holocaust Memorial

"The Fountain of Youth" - painting at the Gemäldegalerie

Lukas Cranach's Last Judgment

In the Tiergarten

Statue in the Tiergarten

Walking up the steps of the Reichstag (German Parliament Building)

On the roof of the Reichstag - the building was mostly burned down in 1933 and blamed on the Communists (probably framed) which was the pivotal event in allowing the Nazis to take control. In World War II, the building was further destroyed and wasn't reconstructed until the 60s. Being the 60s, they did an awful job since, like most of the world, they forgot what architecture is. Thus, the interior was again reconstructed and the glass dome was added in the 1990s according to the plans of famous architect Sir Norman Foster.

View from the roof of the Reichstag - the whole city is a construction site.

One of the corner towers on top of the Reichstag

Inside the glass dome - they have an exhibition on the buildings history around the glass in the middle.

If there wasn't so much reflection on the glass, you'd see down into the German Parliament Chamber below it.

Leaky roof

The frieze reads - "[To] The German People"

Front of the Reichstag

A path in a cemetery near our hotel

After two nights in Berlin, my dad flew home (can’t leave the farm unattended for too long) and my mom, sister, and I continued to Helsinki, Finland. There, we met up with Hellevi, my mom’s Finnish friend who was an exchange student at Albion High School forty years ago. I spent my birthday (July 3^rd) in Helsinki, consuming marvelous Finnish food (like moose sausage, smoked reindeer, and bear sausage) and enjoying the sights of Helsinki with my mom and sister and with Hellevi as our guide.

Senate Square in Helsinki

Senate Square and Helsinki Cathedral (Lutheran)

Uspenski Cathedral (Russian Orthodox)

Uspenski Cathedral

Panorama inside Uspenski Cathedral

Harbor

Harbor, marketplace, and city hall (blue building)

An island on the way out to Suomenlinna

On Suomenlinna - It's a group of islands that houses a massive fortress built by the Swedes and expanded by the Russians and it's now a UNESCO World Heritage Site!

Kristin with a cannon and a Canon

Not sure if he knows what he's doing

In the depths of the fortress

Lovely young lady walking by a fountain with a lovely young lady statue on top. Lovely.

Finnish National Theatre

We celebrated the Fourth of July in Tallinn, Estonia, which is just a two-hour ferry ride from Helsinki. There, we met up with Triin, a friend who I met while studying in Austria two years ago. Triin showed us the Old Town of Tallinn, which is really impressive and has been beautifully restored since the end of Soviet occupation in 1991.

Kristin, Hellevi, Mom, and I on top of Linnahall - a Soviet era concert hall constructed when Tallinn hosted the sailing events of the 1980 Moscow Olympics - It's abandoned now and they're still figuring out what to do with it. In the meantime, it's a magnet for loitering teenagers and curious tourists

Linnahall

Walls of Tallinn's Old Town and St. Olaf's Church

Streets of Tallinn

Town Hall Square

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral

Estonia's pink Parliament Building

City wall

View over the Old Town

A city gate

Fairy-tale medieval towers contrasted with Soviet hell-scape tower in the background

Mom, Hellevi, Triin, and Kristin walkin' down the street

Town Hall Square

Little castle in the woods just outside the city

On the ferry back to Helsinki

Tallinn from the ferry

Tallinn Skyline

Our last day in Finland and my last full day in Europe was spent relaxing at Hellevi’s family’s summer cabin on a lake in the forests northwest of Helsinki. I took the rowboat out on the lake with my mom, and I went for a short five mile run along the dirt roads through the forest (I’ve got a little scar-tissue buildup on my Achilles tendon but it doesn’t hurt at all). We also had a magnificent feast of grilled moose sausages, salmon, fresh strawberries (nothing beats Finnish strawberries), a Finnish cake that I unfortunately cannot remember the name of, and many other edible delights. After that, we alternated between swimming and sitting in the sauna (basically the national pastime in Finland). It was great getting to know Hellevi’s family and it made for a marvelously relaxing end to a marvelously non-relaxing trip.