Nan&Peter's 2015 Cruise: 2. Aug 18: Gdansk and more

Aug 17-19: Sailing to, being in, and leaving Gdansk

After a nice walk in the morning in Copenhagen, far fewer people on the streets, returned to the hotel, packed up, and headed for the pier and boarding the Silver Whisper. I sat in our suite, gazing out the window to our veranda, looking over at...Sweden! Quite a sensation, looking from one country to another like that.

Unexpectedly rough seas during the evening as we sailed to Gdansk. I had a hard time standing up! The crew had been taken totally by surprise – the weather was atypical of the Baltic in August.

Aug 18, our 30^th anniversary day:

Took a shuttle into the old town section of Gdansk, which was utterly charming. The town was 95% destroyed by the Soviets in 1945 as they drove out the German forces. It's been rebuilt completely since then, and is 4.5 feet higher than it was, having been rebuilt on the ruins of the old city. Buildings and statuary recreated largely from old photographs.

All the streets we walked were lined on both sides with people selling amber jewelry. According to Wikipedia, “Amber processing is also an important part of the local economy, as the majority of the world's amber deposits lie along the Baltic coast.” Gdansk is over 1000 years old!

On our return to the ship, after what was a lovely, lovely afternoon strolling on cobblestones (can be quite tiring, if quaint), we discovered that a small cake reading “Happy Anniversary”, electric candles, and festive baloons had been placed in our suite (see pictures). After drinks and dinner, I came up and got the cake and took it back down to the dining room for our dessert. Thank you, Silver Whisper, for acknowledging us and our special day.!

At 10:30, en route to Klaipedia, Lithuania – seas were so calm there was hardly a sense of motion – a most welcome change from the night before!

This is a cruise ship from a different company :-)

Looking from a bridge (see next photo)

On bridge looking at the gateway to Gdansk Old Town

These buildings were rebuilt using old photographs to capture the original designs. Note the statuary atop the white building in the center - extraordinary!