I’m finally caught up with recording our awesome northern European vacation in this blog, but there are still some thoughts and events I want to remember when I look back on these entries.  (Any regular readers?  Maybe you want to scroll backwards to read the formerly missing entries.)  To any grammar nerds reading my posts, I think I’ve corrected all (most?) of the mistakes I made.  If you found one, go back to see if I caught it.  If it bothers you, let me know and I’ll fix it.  After all, I’m a grammar nerd too.  And maybe a little bit of a perfectionist.  Maybe.

Every time I went to the laundry on the ship (two or three times, but three trips each time–load washer, load dryer, empty dryer), there was at least one man ironing.  I never knew so many men ironed their own clothes.  Ted does, because I hate ironing and, many years ago, he got tired of waiting for me to get around to it.

In downtown London, at least one car in five must be a Prius; in Denmark, Teslas were easy to find on the streets.

It was odd to see kids wearing Mickey Mouse ears in Paris until we remembered there’s a Disneyland in Paris.

On our coach trip in Britain, our tour guide told us that by the time we went home, we’d all qualify for a degree in operating plumbing systems.  She was right!  I had no idea there were so many creative ways to turn on a faucet or to direct the bathtub faucet water to the shower head.

It’s not unusual for men and women to share restrooms (toilets or toilettes) in Europe.  This isn’t as personal as it sounds.  Most restrooms have stall-size “rooms” with walls to the ceiling and the floor, so privacy is complete.  There is usually a male or female icon on the door (I assume the difference is the urinal) and you choose the appropriate one.  Then you wash your hands in a general area with multiple sinks.  In practice, it’s fine, but it felt a little weird for both Ted and me to go into the same area together.  It is also not unusual to have to pay anywhere from 20-70 cents/pence/whatever to use a public toilet.  In England, it cost 20 pence.  Our tour guide described it as “20p to pee.”  We always kept change in our jacket pockets.

Good news:  While we were away, we missed six weeks of election phone calls, six weeks of election advertising, and both political conventions!  Yea!

I’ve never worn a jacket for so many consecutive hours!  We wore at least one jacket nearly every day (only four exceptions) and we had them on all day and all evening because we were outside all the time.  At home, when we put on a jacket, we go somewhere, we come home, and we take it off.  Maybe we put it on again later to go somewhere else, but we don’t wear it all day.

I’ve never set an alarm clock for so many early risings in a row.  We had only one day to sleep late–when we were at sea all day between Talinn and Gdansk.  I have always planned at least one day a week to sleep late and/or a day with fewer activities to give myself a break.  We were up early and busy all day every day.  The good part:  We had no trouble falling asleep at night!

In Britain, we never had a wash cloth in our hotel rooms, but the bath towels were huge!  A bathroom safety fact:  Europe does not allow electrical outlets in bathrooms except for electric shavers which have special prongs to fit the outlet.  I always had to dry my hair in the bedroom.

In Stockholm, two young women crossed against the light in front of our bus.  Our tour guide remarked sotto voce, “You are breaking the law and we have the right to kill you, but you are young and beautiful, so you may cross.”  In a face-off between our bus and a van (the bus won), our Berlin tour guide noted that “We are stronger than a van.”  The traffic lights in the cities turn yellow before they turn red and also before they turn green.  Drivers take green lights very seriously and horns will honk at anything that requires a delayed start or the use of a brake pedal.

A double bed in a European hotel means two twin beds pushed together.  The beds are usually made up separately, but sometimes have a shared blanket.

In Scotland, it’s appropriate to “address the haggis” before eating it.  Robert Burns, a Scottish poet, wrote Address to a Haggis.  The poem is read before the haggis is eaten at formal meals.

There are enough hedgerows in England to circle the equator two-and-a-half times.

Hay bales were wrapped in plastic everywhere we went.  Given the frequency of rain showers, my guess is the plastic keeps the bales from rotting.

In Iceland, there are earthquakes every day.  They are small and not usually noticeable, but the ground is always shaking.

The onion-shaped domes on the Russian palaces and churches are onion-shaped for the simple reason that onion shapes don’t collect snow.  The snow slides off, so its weight does not become a structural problem.

English was spoken nearly everywhere we went, but it wasn’t American English.  Sometimes it was easy to know the “translation”; other times, I had to see/hear it repeatedly to figure it out or ask a native.  Here are some words we heard frequently.

Pop in = drop in (pronounced “pope in”)

Way out (signage) = exit

Give way (highway sign) = yield

Bend (highway sign) = curve in the road

Circus = roundabout

Takeaway = carryout

No overtaking (highway sign) = no passing

Dual carriageway (highway sign) = divided highway

Ring road = beltway

Child minder = babysitter

Towel = sanitary napkin

Semi-skimmed milk = 2% milk

Zebra = a white-striped crosswalk (Russia)