We sailed all morning which made for a nice, relaxing time. We went through the Lock of Gabcikovo which is about the only lock we did during the day and it was a big lock. After we docked, we went on the included excursion.
Our tour there was the Bratislava’s Christmas Markets and an organ concert at the Gothic St. Martin’s Cathedral. The Cathedral is one of the largest and oldest churches in Bratislava, known especially for being the coronation church of the Kingdom of Hungary between 1563 and 1830. The concert was a woman playing the organ who was very good playing several pieces and Christmas carols. Her husband sang the Christmas carols accompanied by his wife on the organ. It was a good concert and we really enjoyed it. We also enjoyed the church because it was warm inside! It was cold outside.
There are lots of places for food. Apparently a lot of people use the market for supper. Lots and lots of people and lots and lots of places to buy great looking food. Too bad we were not hungry!! Some of the food looked great. We did have gluhwein, of course. Mike had some great hot chocolate also. There was mostly food in markets and not a lot of stalls selling Christmas things. I wonder if this might have been that this is the first year the Christmas Markets have been open since COVID first shut them down. I would think I lots of places that had them in the past just didn’t have the supplies to have a nice market or maybe they were unsure if they would be open this year. Last year they shut them down late in the year and there was some uncertainty if they would open this year.
In the roads of the town there are grooves in middle of stone. They were built this way and filled with rough rocks to keep horse hooves from slipping taking items to market.
After we got back to the ship, we did a tour of the ship’s bridge. The first mate did the discussion since the captain only speaks German. Sometimes there is only a 3-7 cm clearance under a bridge with the ship’s bridge down to the slit to see out of. There are 13 locks from Budapest to Passau and 167 locks from Passau to Amsterdam. The ship can go under a bridge with 7 cm clearance below the boat to bottom of river. The wheel house is down for 4 days going from Passau to Amsterdam for bridges
Viking includes at least one excursion in every port. Usually it is a tour of the city. The first one was a tour of the beautiful city of Budapest, the capital of Hungary. We started in the city of Pest and did a general tour of the city, seeing the most iconic places such as Heroes Square and the State Opera House. Then across the river to Buda with the Castle District, Fisherman’s Bastion, Matthias Church, and beautiful views of the famous Chain Bridge across the Danube. The tour guide was very knowledgable and made the tour fun.
After the tour and lunch, we walked to the closest Christmas Market. The Christmas Markets are the reason for the trip!! The market had lots of great things to eat as well as all things Christmas. Of course we had some Gluhwein. I collect the cups since each market had different cups. They have the name of the market as well as the year on them. And they are all unique.
The food on the Viking ship was excellent. There was a set menu available at each meal as well as different selections for each meal. There are several available places to eat. The main dining room (with floor to ceiling windows), the Aquavit Terrace (which is awesome when it is warm. It is on the back of the ship and has an area outside with seating) and the ship’s lounge for quick breakfasts of coffee and pastries White and red wine and beer are included with lunch and dinner. All Viking ships are set up the same so they all have these restaurants
We have so many traditions, especially for holidays and it’s fun to learn about traditions in other countries.
Philippines
The Saturday before Christmas Eve, in the city of San Fernando – the “Christmas Capital of the Philippines”, is a “Giant Lantern Festival”. The festival is a century old tradition which is a competition between each of the surrounding districts. The original lanterns were 2 feet tall and now are 20 feet tall. The lanterns are made from a variety of materials such as colored plastic, fiberglass and handmade paper. They consist of thousands of spinning lights that light up the night sky and symbolize the Star of Bethlehem and unwavering hope.
Sweden has used a Yule goat as a Christmas symbol since ancient pagan festivals. It is a symbol of generosity and plenty. The goat was also supposed to help deliver presents and is almost as popular in displays, decorations and on trees as reindeer are. Gävle, Sweden, in 1966, had the idea of making a giant straw goat. The goat is more than 42 feet high, 23 feet wide, weighs 3.6 tons and is built every year on December 1. It has been in the Guinness Book of World Records. Unfortunately Gave’s goat has been burned 35 times in the last 50 years. Do the people keep building the goat because they get lots of visitors each year to see if the goat survives or is it just they love their tradition?
Austria has a tradition at their St. Nicholas festivities on December 6. St. Nicholas rewards the well behaved with gifts. He is joined at the festivals by an evil accomplice, Krampus. Krampus is an anti-St. Nicholas who comes to warn and punish naughty children. He is a devil figure, often in chains, dressed in fur with a scary devil mast with horns and a long red tongue. He carries a wooden stick or switches to threaten children who misbehave. Sometimes he appears with a sack or basket strapped to his back to cart off evil children for eating or transporting to Hell. The US has introduce Krampus in post cards, holiday cards and several movies.
Japan doesn’t celebrate Christmas in a big way but they do have a traditional meal. Or traditional since 1974, when Kentucky Fried Chicken did a very successful advertising campaign which featured Kentucky Fried Chicken for Christmas dinner. It is so popular that people order their dinners months in advance or wait in line for hours, just have have their fried chicken dinner for Christmas.
Iceland celebrates for 13 days before Christmas. Each night children leave their shoes by the window. One of the 13 troll like “Yule Lad” characters comes during the night, leaving good boys and girls a small gift or candy. Naughty children get rotten potatoes in their shoes. The 13 Yule lads are troll like and each have their own speciality. Sheep-Cote Clod harasses sheep; Gully Gawk hides in gullies waiting for an opportunity to sneak in the cow sed and steal milk; Stubby is unusually short and steals pans to eat the food left in them; Spoon-Licker steals wooden spoons to lick and is extremely thin; Pot-Licker steals leftovers from pots; Bowl-Licker hides under beds and waits for someone to put down a bowl which he steals; Door-Slammer likes to slam doors, especially during the nigh; Skyr-Gobbler loves skyr (similar to yogurt); Sausage-Swiper hides in the rafters and steals sausages that are being smokes; Window-Peeper is a voyeur who looks through windows in search of things to steal; Doorway-Sniffer has an abnormally large nose and acute sense of smell which he uses to find laufabrauo (leaf bread – a traditional Icelandic Christmas bread made very thin, decorated and fried); Meat-Hook use a hook to step meat; Candle-Stealer follows children to steal their candles; Gryla, the mother of the Yule lads whom Icelandic mothers would scare their children from misbehaving by telling them Gryla would abduct them; Leppaluoi is the husband of Gryla, not evil but lazy. These 13 trolls are known for the mischief their name suggests.
Denmark homes are decorated with superstitious characters called “nisser”. “Nissers” are believed to provide protection from evil and misfortune if treated well. They are however, known to be short tempered when insulted or offended. They usually play tricks, steal things or even injure livestock if offended. Their name means “a household spirit” or goblin in Norwegian. They are generally described as being short, having a long white beard and wearing a cone or knit cap. They look similar to garden gnomes.
On Christmas Eve, Danish families place their Christmas tree in the middle of the room and dance around it singing carols.
The Irish leave a tall red candle in a front window on December 24, a welcoming symbol of warmth and shelter for Mary and Joseph. Traditional Christmas fare in Ireland often includes homemade roast goose or turkey, vegetables, cranberries, and potatoes. And they serve Christmas Pudding, or Plum Pudding. One superstition of the pudding is that it should be made with 13 ingredients to represent Jesus and His Disciples and that every member of the family should take turns stirring the pudding with a wooden spam from east to west, in honor of the Wise Men.
Boxing Day, celebrated on December 26, is an important day when they traditionally have football games and horse racing. Another tradition for the Christmas season in Ireland that I like – in some towns, Women’s Christmas is January 6 (also known as the Feast of the Epiphany). The women are given the day off and men do the housework and cooking.
Christmas dinner in Poland typically has an extra setting at the table in case anyone shows up uninvited. Nothing can be eaten until the first star is seen in the sky (a reminder of the Wisemen who followed a star to visit Jesus). At the table are 12 dishes, meant to give you good luck for the next 12 months, or a symbol of Jesus’s 12 disciples. It is traditionally meat free (to remember the animals who took care of Baby Jesus in the manger). One of the must haves is “barszcz” which is a beetroot soup. Carp is often the main dish along with bios which is made of cabbage, bacon and dried plums. Most also have a popular dessert, a poppy seed roll made of sweet yeast bread, mixed dried fruit and nuts or a moist cake made with honey (like gingerbread) or gingerbreads.
In Poland people prepare their homes for Christmas by cleaning everything, including windows and carpets. Everything must be clean for Christmas Day!
Ukraine celebrates Christmas on January 7 because they use the old “Julian” calendar for their church festivals. They eat their main Christmas meal, called the Holy Supper, on January 6. As with Poland, you can”t begin the meal until the first star is seen in the sky. They also have 12 dishes with no meat. A similar meal is eaten.
Farmers might want to add this to their traditions. In Ukraine they have a dish made of cooked wheat mixed with honey and ground poppy seeds. Most families throw a spoonful of this mix at the ceiling – if it sticks, there will be a good harvest in the new year.
We were looking for something else to do and I stumbled upon the Palatki Heritage Site and it’s sister site, Honanki Heritage Site near the town of Sedona. These sites are preserved sites of the largest cliff dwellings of the Red Rock Country between 1150 and 1350 AD.
These sites are currently managed by the U.S. Forest Service and Reservations are required for the Palatki Site. We didn’t get to go see either site.They close at 3:00 which was about 15 minutes after we would have gotten to the Honanki Site. We were almost to it and the road (which hadn’t been great the whole time – dirt and gravel and potholes) took a downward slope with large rocks, not gravel and we didn’t want to take the car down it. So, we just looked at them from a distance. They were beautiful! We would have really liked to see them up close but even from a distance they were amazing!!
Then Mike had found a group of three tents and we could rent one, so we did. It was in the Arizona desert and would give great views of the stars at night since there was no light pollution. Great idea!!
The tents were teepee like tents with not much ventilation, double bed, flashlight and a book about where you could eat in town – 10 miles back, 2 camp chairs inside and a picnic table and hammock outside and a portajohn a little ways from the tent. The portajohn was very clean and I think recently put out. But … We made the best of it.
We bought a bottle of wine after supper in town and watched the beautiful sunset while sitting outside having our wine. Unfortunately, it was a cloudy night so the sunset was beautiful but no stars. The temperature in the tent when we went to bed at 11 PM was about 95 so sleep was slow coming. I got up about 2 AM and the sky had cleared so we went out to see the stars and take pictures. We probably won’t do that again unless there is running water and an air-conditioner.
Next up – the Petrified Forest National Park in Arizona. At the Ranger Station on the way in, they asked us not to feed the animals and especially the ravens. There were lots of ravens. We did have to wear masks in the buildings around the Petrified Forest.
It is a 346 square mile park and has some absolutely stunning opportunities for beautiful pictures. From the Painted Desert to the ancient homes of people 13,000 years ago to the zebra-striped mountains of the Tepees and the Blue Mesa in the badlands with the striped hills of blue, purple, pink and gray. At the Crystal Forest, you could walk right up to the petrified logs.
Petrified wood is very colorful because of impurities present during the fossilizing process. The trees lived in the Late Triassic Epoch, about 225 million ears ago, before the dinosaurs roamed the earth. That’s a long time ago!!
We saw lots of Petroglyphs made by the Puebloan people (petroglyphs were made by carving designs and pictures into a rock on the ground. These were very important to their society and religion).
We went to the Painted Desert Visitor Center for information.Then off to look at the Painted Desert from some of the overlooks. It is amazing and beautiful with lots of colors in striations. We saw the Painted Desert Inn. We also saw the Blue Mesa. Its is called Blue Mesa for a reason – beautiful blue coloring and gorgeous striations there too. We saw the Newspaper Rock area where you could see over 650 petroglyphs, some 2,000 years old!
We went to see the Jasper Forest with lots of petrified wood all in one place. Studies have shown that some of the petrified trees date back 211 to 218 million years! We went to the Agate Bridge which is a 110 foot petrified log spanning a gully. The ranger said it would eventually fall into the gully.
The Crystal Forest has a short trail (0.8 mile loop) where ancient 200 foot tall conifers existed and are now petrified and on the ground in pieces. These particular trees have a high concentration of crystals inside (small pockets where trees have become filled with deposits that eventually turned into quartz and amethyst crystals). From the trail you could view the beautiful petrified wood as well as a panoramic view of the Crystal Forest ad the Blue Mesa.
Leaving the Park, we saw the rusted 1932 Studebaker which is near the original Route 66 that cut through the park.
Then off to Albuquerque. This was one of our family stops but we made good use of our time there. We visited the National Museum of Nuclear Science and History. It is a great museum with lots of history and information about people from the atomic age, nuclear medicine, the history leading up to the creation and use of the atomic bomb in WWII. They have bomb casing of the Fat Man and Little Boy bombs, airplanes used, information about the Cold War, nuclear waste transportation and all things nuclear. It was very well done and had lots of great information.
There is a Critical Assembly room which is an exhibit based on the laboratory environment for the assembly of the atomic bomb during the Manhattan Project. A room exploring the Cold War and the political conflict existing after WWII along with lots of military weapons. Exhibits about sources of radiation that are around, there uranium comes from and how it affects us and the process of changing uranium into a usable form for nuclear power or weapons and how to dispose or recycle it.
There are displays of the Manhattan Project and the people involved, especially at Los Alamos and the journey that led them to the first explosion in 1945. The devastation at Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the after effects are covered. There are even displays about the history of nuclear medicine and how it contributed to the advancement of medical technology as well as green energy options. There are classrooms where children were learning science and a lab where you could play and learn the concepts of physics.
The next thing we did was go to Roswell, New Mexico.
After visiting Carlsbad Caverns, we drove on and went to Roswell, New Mexico. We are both science fiction fans and wanted to see Roswell and all the information about that reported UFO landing. The town was so much bigger than I expected! I thought we would be able to walk to see whatever we wanted. Nope, it is so large, there were two Tractor Supply stores, a Penny’s, Hobby Lobby, Target, etc. I never expected it to be a city.
Lots of businesses capitalize on the UFO landing that they are famous for, especially downtown. A doughnut place had a huge green alien holding the sign up, (most of the alien depictions looked the same, green alien that is common to UFOs) as did a gas station, lots of businesses had alien theme signs on the windows and store fronts. It was kind of fun. Like seasonal decorations but there all year. Of course, there were several UFO shops. We also went in the International UFO Museum. Very well done, informative and worth the visit. Very factual with international UFO information as well as a neat map which showed every reported sighting site. If you touched the site, it would tell you where it was, when it was and what was reported. The also had displays on some of the better UFO movies.
Most of the roads we were on (and we didn’t do interstates, all back roads so we could see the country) were in excellent shape, nice and wide divided 4 lane roads – even the back roads we were on. SC could use some tips from them! We kept seeing signs that said, “Rough Road”. We seldom knew where the rough road was. If they wanted to see rough roads, they should come to SC. And very little traffic on any of those roads. It was very pleasant to drive them.
The first touristy thing we did was to visit Carlsbad Caverns in Carlsbad, New Mexico. Mike had applied ahead of time for an entry time (based on where we stayed the night before and how long to get to the caverns). Reservations are required at this time. It didn’t take us very long to get our instructions and information to start our tour.
Carlsbad has self-guided tours as well as Ranger lead tours. The Ranger lead tours went deeper into the cavern but we opted not to do that. We decided to do the self-guided tours. There is also the option to walk down into the cavern or ride the elevation. We decided to walk down (but NOT back up). It is a 1.25 walk into the cavern.
It is 750 feet down (equivalent to walking up or down a 75-story building) and pretty steep. We walked down, some steps, some slopes. Most of the time there were handrails but occasionally you could venture off the path and get up close and personal with the sides of the cavern as well as the deep look into the lower areas. We didn’t do any of that. They actually ask you not to so as not to harm any of the structures as well as for safety.
We went all around the “Big Room” – 8.2 acres. The walk around this area is 1.25 mies. The Caverns are beautiful and well worth the visit! It was so much more than we expected! It wasn’t just a little walk around, it was massive in size and had a huge number of different formations. Most of the structures and rooms are named and you can usually tell why they had that name such as the Totem Pole, Temple of the Sun, Hall of Giants, The Whale’s Mouth, Iceberg Rock, etc.
Carlsbad Cavern is one of over 300 limestone caves in a fossil reef laid down by an inland sea 250 to 280 million years ago. The Cavern stays about 56 degrees F. It has been called one of the seven wonders of the world.
The “Big Room” measures 2,000 feet long and 1,100 feet wide at its greatest extent with amazing formations everywhere and you can walk around all of it! The ceiling arches 255 feet above the floor. It is the largest chamber in North America. The calcium deposits have built stalactites and stalagmites, some eventually joining as columns. Nature has decorated the caves with mineral features of draperies, thin straws, popcorn-shaped nodules and oddly curved helictites.
We didn’t, but you can watch 400,000 Brazilian free-tail bat bats leave the cavern on summer evenings. Reservations are required. The bat area can be seen as you walk down into the cavern. We heard from some people who had seen it that it was amazing!
The elevator ride back up is 62 seconds (at 9 mph). Much quicker than walking back up. We did see some dedicated people walking up as we were walking down.
WOW! What an adventure driving out west was! We have been wanting to do a road trip out there for several years. Mike has been to a lot of places out there but I have never done any sightseeing in the west before. I have been to several cities in California and Texas, but that was about all my seeing the sites consisted of.
Think about it, most people including us want to go to exotic foreign places with beautiful scenery and beaches and mountains without ever considering the cornucopia of places to visit right here at home. From sea to shining sea, there are awesome parks, towns, cities and attractions for every taste, So for us as travel advisors, and just for ourselves, this was a journey of exploration of the wonders in the West of the United States.
We decided late last year that if we didn’t plan it and do it, we never would, so we started by setting a date. We wanted to go at the end of the summer this year. We thought maybe several weeks would allow us to do everything we wanted to do. That ended up growing to 5.5 weeks.
Mike did all the planning. I had input in lots of the sites but he has been to some and knew what we should see better than I did. He spent weeks checking out different sites and planning a possible route to see the things we wanted. Then he started planning the exact route. We also had to consider how long we wanted to spend at each site. Then look for any other sites near the top things that we might enjoy looking at. He did extensive planning and it went perfectly!! Every hotel was planned ahead and reservations made (we did leave plenty of leeway to stop for things we found along the way), all the parks reservations were made (some are required, some are not) and he planned the route for every day – mileage, time in route, and what time we might leave and arrive.
We visited friends and family all the way out to California, not just sites. We started on a southern route first. On the way out, we went through Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Nevada and California. We wanted to see as many National Parks in Utah, Arizona, Wyoming and California as possible, as well as as many things near the parks as we could. Of course, several caverns and trains since they are always on Mike’s list of things to do.
So join us on our adventure of 40 days and 40 nights over just shy of 10.000 miles as we explore just a very few of the things to do and see in the western part of our great nation. The hope is that inspiration will follow, and you will take to the road or the skies to make a journey of discovery as well.
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