Blog de Samuel: Bons baisers de Russie !

Hello from Kingisepp, Russia.

After a long day already... i'll get back to it in a moment !

So i left you last monday in Tallinn, and on tuersday I had the good idea to leave in the morning under a grey sky, and go along the Northern coast of Estonia, to the national park they have up there.
Along the way, just like with a magical spirit, the sun arrived, the wind even was in the back...
So I went to a few small harbours and villages, and sand beaches, and forests and swans. I had some geological explanation of the "cliffs" there are. Actuelly the sand dunes have been moved up of around 10 meters into the land, creating hills... quite small ones.

I camped in an official camp site on tuersday evening, thinking that in a national park it could be more respectful. It was 50 EEK, around 3.3 E, and sauna was included !

On wednersday i continued my trip and went to a touristic pub in Altja, where i met some French retired people, all in a big bus,and they were surprised to be understood ;)
I went to and old castel along the coast, used by Pirates, the Toolse linnuse varemed. Just awesome in the beautiful afternoon.

In the late evening I met Maris in Rakvere, as it was agreed before as she had had a long day driving her children and mother to different places in the day.

We had a walk around the castel, took some pictures with our cameras, talked about ducks as well as Russians in Narva and Estonia, and came back for iber arouns 11.

On Thursday morning I took the road to the lake in the south, Peipsi jarv, and Rannapungeria town. I had a short visit of the sandyeaches of Kauksi, and ordered my first cakes in a shop where the official language was Russian...

In the evening i went on the hill of lisaku, saw that i could have some showers of rain o me, but managed to avoid them ! I could visit the Kuramae Klooster then, and look for a camp site. I then decidd to go to an official place, to have a warm shower, but no sauna, for 40 EEK thi time.

Next morning, yesterday Friday, i went to Narva, the Russian Estonian city, the city the mire Est of the European Union.

On the way i had few rain showers, but could also see great landkapes, cliffs again, empty beaches (because of rain and 13 celcius degrees), but magnificent ones.

Arriving i Narva Heidi let me go to her place and i could take a warm shower, put my clothes to dry, and wait for her to finish her work... before her holidays.

In the evening we went for a walk in the center, saw the castel and the Lenin statue, hd a Paulaner beer and some icecream, and went back home to finish our preparations for the rest o our trips. I could contact my host in Kingisepp, Heidi could check her bus shedule in Russia etc...

This morning we woke up at 3:20, to leave the flat at 4, then be at the borer at 4:05. The iea was tobe on the other side at 6 so that Heidi could have a bus there at 7 Russian time (there is one hour extra here, so now i am 2 hours in advance compared to France), and get her plane to Oman in St Petersburg at 2 pm.
But the queue was so long that Heidi decided to act as the tourists hse said, and go in ront of everybody! The word was easy for me : do as if you don't undersant !! So easy for me. But not or her who speeks Russian.

So we did it, we entered the Estonian Checkpoint and even inside, went in front ofthe smaller queue. We passed quite easyly.
On the bridge between the countries, we took the time for a picture then entered the Russian checkpoint. We needed to fill a form, like in the planes, and then go in front of the police woman.
After a few checkings, we passed the chekpoint. Then there was the 'something to declare' or not gates, we took the nothing to declare one and of course my bike rung, but the guys said to go without checking and... so here was Rsssia !

At 5:55 Russian time we were on th way to the bus station, where Heidi learned that the bus she expected to take did not work this very day, so she had to go to Kingisepp and change for another bus there, to St Petersburg. But as we were a bit earlyer than the plans, this was ok.
So I left her there and started my bike trip to the same Kingisepp city. 22 km of quite bad road, with a beautiful shining sun.