Tag Archives: Walking

Jul24

A walk in the driving rain

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Thursday, 27-June-2024


I was sitting in a cafe, relaxing and trying to decide what my exact plans for the day would be, when the sky opened up above me.

Thankfully I was already indoors, because if I hadn’t been… well, I saw how quickly the people outside got completely soaked through. Granted, I didn’t have anything on me that couldn’t get soaked and be okay, but… that doesn’t mean that it’s pleasant to have to wring out a satchel full of water.

I relaxed and appreciated the rain, as I appreciated my coffee and my pastry. Chocolate Mousse, if I remember correctly – clearly the lunch of champions, and in hindsight an excellent choice to combat the downpour.




After about half an hour, the rain let up and I took my chance. I’d paid the bill a bit ago, and had just been sipping my water and reading, so I was able to take advantage of a quick let up in the storm to fast-walk the few hundred meters back to my apartment. I’d debated and considered, and my goal for the afternoon was the North Face Store, about three kilometers from where I was staying… My duffel bag had torn again (my second bag to give up the ghost), and so I’d decided that overkill was the best option and that I’d be buying one of North Face’s expedition duffels for my third attempt.

What better way to get an expedition duffel bag, than to embark upon a (light) expedition to get to it? I laced up my boots, locked on my rain gear, and headed out into the… dang it the rain had stopped.




That’s fine, of course. I simply took off the jacket and kept walking – soon enough Prague obliged my preparedness and started back up with the rain, and so the jacket went back on, and I continued through the intermittent deluges and breaks of sun.

I passed the Dancing House, a beautiful building by Frank Gehry (in collaboration with Vlado Milunić), saw a rather spellbinding juggler (but didn’t get a photo), and appreciated the city in the rain, and in between the rain. It was lovely, quiet, and a perfectly meditative excursion.



As an interesting side note – I took the opportunity of walking in the rain to photograph another art installation by David Černý, called “Embryo”. It’s a less-popular one of his works, supposedly, and I can understand why… while all of his works that I saw were subtly creepy, this one was actively creepy. An embryo growing in a downspout on a theater, with a faint pulsing heartbeat light inside.

Definitely neat, and definitely added to the plethora of art to be found in Prague… but definitely disconcerting at the same time.




Links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dancing_House
https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/david-cernys-embryo

Jul3

Walking the Walls – The old town of Tallinn

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Various days, between Friday 07-June-2024 through Sunday, 09-June-2024

During my early adventures around Tallinn, I noticed something about the Old Town of the city… it was ringed by walls. Now, in retrospect that shouldn’t be a surprise – European Cities were generally fortified at some point in the past, which inherently means walls. I hadn’t really seen any walled cities on this trip so far, though – Iceland and Greenland didn’t have city walls, and Oslo / Stockholm / Helsinki didn’t appear to have them either. Perhaps because they were all water-based cities, and didn’t have such a risk of land-based invasion?

Either way, Tallinn did have city walls. City walls which made for an excellent hiking target.


I woke up, got some coffee and food inside me, and headed out to circumnavigate the old town of Tallinn.

(Now, keep in mind that most of this happened on Sunday the 9th… but my adventures and wanderings on previous days did take me around and through the Old Town. I’ve included those pictures here, just to keep everything simple)


The wall around Tallinn isn’t continuous, I quickly learned, and is instead sort of like a dashed line – some sections have fallen to time, and some sections are effectively just houses now. While it wasn’t a clean and easy trail, it was definitely a fun way to wander around the city. I passed shops, found gardens, and saw quite a few towers and ramparts along the way.

I didn’t dive into any of the museums surrounding the town – and there were quite a few. Each tower seemed to have its own gallery, and while they would have been a welcome respite from the rain… galleries and museums weren’t my goal for the day. I wanted to walk – to be outdoors, and to have some time for my mind to rest and parse through some of the adventures I’ve had… basically, time for both my mind and body to wander.

I accomplished that goal perfectly, I have to say. For an active rest day, the Walls of Tallinn were a great companion.

Jun20

A brief introduction to the Djurgården

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A brief introduction to the Djurgården

Monday, 27-May-2024


One of the big spots on my list of places to visit in Stockholm was the legendarily-huge park, the Djurgården. I’d heard stories of it before, from family and friends, and was looking forward to taking a good long walk in the woods. I’d been rocking the city life since Reykjavik, and some clean air and animal sounds were sounding pretty great to me.

After leaving the Vasa Museum, I knew it was a bit too late to kick off a true exploration of the gardens… but I am a pretty big fan of recon missions… and the Vasa Museum is right next to one of the entrances…

I checked my map, grabbed a quick snack, and headed in.



Stepping into Djurgården proper, or at least the nature section since technically the Vasa Museum is within the bounds, wasn’t much different from stepping into any city park – There were beautifully flowering plants, people picnicking, and some folks playing various lawn games. It was pretty, but nothing especially unique… at first.

As I continued walking, the garden became more and more wild. Where most city parks will maintain that base level of “tamed nature”, the Djurgården became less tame. I passed one last restaurant, and found myself in a forest of oak trees and wild underbrush. I could almost, just barely, hear some city noises… but I was essentially insulated, hearing mainly the wind in the trees and the birds chattering to each other.


I’ll admit that I didn’t wander for too long – I hadn’t had too much to eat previously, and the day was quite warm. I got some good exposure and exploration in, came up with a good plan on where to go when I came back, and started to slowly forge my way back to civilization.




Ohh! One quick extra – Something that I’ve noticed in both Oslo and Stockholm. Vegetarian Roombas! AKA automated lawnmower robots! They’re cute, but also just a little bit scary.