I am currently on my way to join a trip organised by Redha Travel and Tours to three Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania) and Poland. Too bad we cannot cover Belarus due to the difficulty of obtaining visa. No embassy in Malaysia. You need to go to Indonesia to get one. You can get visa on arrival if you arrive via Minsk International Airport. Unfortunately that will make our tour itinerary a bit haywire. Our trip starts in Tallinn and ends in Warsaw. Minsk is closer to Vilnius.
This tour costs RM9.5k per person. Not a full board tour. No lunch provided only breakfast and dinner. My second trip with Redha and this is their first trip to the Baltic states.
This tour costs RM9.5k per person. Not a full board tour. No lunch provided only breakfast and dinner. My second trip with Redha and this is their first trip to the Baltic states.
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| Picture courtesy of Google Map |
Looking at the map I just realised that there is a region in between Lithuania and Poland. A quick google informed me that it is called Kaliningrad. It is both a city and a state in the Russian Federation. Before it was annexed by USSR after World War II, the area was part of a unified German state called East Prussia for 700 years. Its capital was the beautiful medieval city of Konigsberg. It was destroyed during World War II. Its current state of decay is all the more depressing given its rich past. Today, Kaliningrad is little more than a spreading mass of gray apartment blocks. A forgotten Russian "island" trapped in Europe.
I guess Kaliningrad is not ready to welcome a group of Malaysian travellers huh?
Since this is my first trip in 2018 and there is no longer any backlog posting of previous travels, I was thinking of changing my blog and instagram style.
Instead of photos I will try to do more videos with commentary. There will of course be a bit of photos to capture still objects like food, flowers, sunsets etc but I will try to keep it to the minimum. Will also try to group similar photos and videos together so there will be less individual posts to clutter the instagram account. I will also introduce the number of countries that I have visited so far in "My World Countdown". Wish me luck! I hope I have the strength and discipline to do it.
Our itinerary is as follows:
26 March 2018 Kuala Lumpur - Istanbul
27 March 2018 Istanbul - Tallinn
28 March 2018 Tallinn
29 March 2018 Tallinn - Parnu - Riga
30 March 2018 Riga - Sigulda - Riga
31 March 2018 Riga
1 April 2018 Riga - Vilnius
2 April 2018 Vilnius - Trakai - Vilnius
3 April 2018 Vilnius - Warsaw
4 April 2018 Warsaw
5 April 2018 Warsaw
6 April 2018 Warsaw - Istanbul
7 April 2018 Kuala Lumpur
I will upload the videos and photos as and when possible during the trip. You can find them here:
https://instagram.com/mkhasha.n.travels
Hashtags specific for this trip:
#mks2018Baltic #mks2018Turkey #mks2018Estonia #mks2018Latvia #mks2018Lithuania #mks2018Poland #mksIstanbul #mksTallinn #mksRiga #mksVilnius #mksTreblinka #mksWarsaw
My World Countdown:
Estonia#58 Latvia#59 Lithuania#60 Poland#61
My mom's would be #47-50
Njoy !!
POST MORTEM (updated on 15 October 2018)
I should have done this months ago but unfortunately I was not inspired enough to write. Now I have to dig into my memory to remember what I like and don't like about this trip :P
Likes:
- The timing of the trip which was early spring. Since both my mom and I love snow but hate winter, this was a perfect timing for us. We were blessed with a lot of snow still on the ground and gentle snow falling during the trip but minus the brutal cold temperature :)
- Since the itinerary was set by our group, we decided to take it easy so we stayed between 2 to 3 nights at each city. It was quite relaxing and we didn't have to wake up at ungodly hour either and ample time to eat leisurely breakfast :)
- Our local tour guide, Minda was very nice. His first time handling a Malaysian group. Our bus driver was good too, unfortunately I forgot his name. Sorry!
- Istanbul city tour with breakfast. Due to our long transit (8+ hours), we were entitled to a free city tour organised by Turkish Airlines.
- Visit to Hard Rock Cafe Warsaw and a factory outlet which are not in the original itinerary.
- Bad management of the group by our Malaysian tour leader. Case in point during the free Istanbul city tour. He lost half the group due to lack of research on the meeting point for the tour and no clear communication on how the group should proceed after we disembarked from the plane.
- Since this is my second trip with Redha, I noticed their lackadaisical attitude in adhering to the itinerary. My first trip with them, they cancelled the visit to two museums (no refund of our paid museum tickets however) so this time round we were a bit vigilant and managed to stop this unethical practice. They tried to cancel the trip to concentration camp at Treblinka, Poland due to not enough time to reach the hotel for prayer and a visit to a city palace in Warsaw to make time for more shopping.
- Trakai Castle was closed due to a holiday when went there. Very disappointing and very bad management of our ground operator.
- Same restaurant for dinner at each city. Lack of food variety. Surely there are more than one halal restaurant at each city? A bit lazy don't you think? Luckily the food was plentiful and quite tasty.
