Travelog for: Mister Snow

On the evening brought us Pegger boyfriend to the train station to Northeim. There we waited for the train to Hanover, where we would meet the others.



On the train - a metronome - Pegger told us something about the next train journey.

Here you see a card:


And here the travelplan:


The plan and card starts in Hamburg, because the first friend of pegger (Mondfalke) starts the journey there.

Hannover!!!!

Hanover or Hannover, on the river Leine, is the capital of the federal state of Lower Saxony and was once by personal union the family seat of the Hanoverian Kings of Great Britain, in their dignities as the dukes of Brunswick-Lüneburg (which title was later called the Elector of Hanover at the end of the historical period known as Early Modern Europe).
After the Napoleonic Wars ended, the Electorate was enlarged and made into the capital of the Kingdom of Hanover.

With a population of 522,944 the city is a major center of northern Germany, known for hosting annual commercial expositions such as the Hanover Fair and the CeBIT.
Every year Hanover hosts the Schützenfest Hannover, the world's largest Marksmen's Fun Fair, and the Oktoberfest Hannover, which is the second largest Oktoberfest in the world.
In 2000, Hanover hosted the world fair Expo 2000.
The Hanover fairground, due to numerous extensions, especially for the Expo 2000, is the largest in the world. Hanover also has regional importance because of its universities and medical school, its international airport, and its large zoo.
The city is also a major crossing point of railway lines and highways, connecting European main lines in east-west-direction (Berlin - Ruhr area) and north-south-direction (Hamburg - Munich et al.).




Here we waited to enter first the arrival of two other friends, and to the night train from Hamburg. This was even on time, others only on other track. Typical German railway.
And typically we had from then a delay, as we stood over an hour just inside the station of Hanover. Since we could not sleep, we walked through the train and met two or three men with whom we talked.
They thought we were crazy, of course, that we take this trip from Germany to Slovenia to watch skiflying there. Of course, they also found it crazy that we pressed our thumbs for Kazakh jumpers.

During the night - with not much sleep- we go by train from Hanover to Munich. There we arrive in the morning and have breakfast at Mc Donalds.

Some facts about Munich:

Munich is the capital city of Bavaria, Germany. It is located on the River Isar north of the Bavarian Alps. Munich is the third largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Hamburg. There are approximately 1.35 million people living within city limits, while the Munich Metropolitan Area (including the urban areas of Augsburg, Ingolstadt, Rosenheim and Landshut) is home to over 5 million people.

The city's motto is "München mag Dich" (Munich Loves You). Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" (Cosmopolitan city with a heart). Its native name, München, is derived from the Old German word Mönche, meaning "Monks". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat of arms. Black and gold—the colours of the Holy Roman Empire—have been the city's official colours since the time of Ludwig the Bavarian.

The city is an inspiring mix of historic buildings and impressive architecture, since Munich reconstructed the ruins of their historic buildings but also created new landmarks of architecture.

Yeah we arrive the next country!!!

Austria!!!

Here you see the railstation from Bischofshofen.


From there you can see in the distance the skijumpinghills. The final competition of the traditional Four Hills Tournament in ski jumping is held annually at the Paul-Ausserleitner-Schanze in Bischofshofen around 6 January.


Bischofshofen is located in the Salzach valley in the Alps, in the District of Pongau, in Salzburgerland, Austria.
The city is an important railway hub and lies at the Tauernautobahn, a highway route through the Alps.

Our next and last train stop was Jesenice in Slovenia. From there we drive with a bus to Kransja Gora, where we will stay the next days to have a lot of party and watching Skiflying in Planica :-)

Here some facts about Jesenice:

Jesenice is a town and a municipality in Slovenia, on the Slovene side of the Karavanke mountain range, bordering Austria to the north. It is known as the home of Slovenia's largest steel company, Acroni, and the hockey club it sponsors, Acroni Jesenice. The town name derives from the ash tree (Slovene: jêsen), which once grew in abundance locally. The history of Jesenice is tightly knit with that of its ironworks and metallurgy industries, which have until recently been the driving force of the town's development in practically all areas.

Here the trainstation:


and an old train:

Kranjska Gora is a town and a municipality on the Sava Dolinka river in the Upper Carniola region of north-west Slovenia, close to the Austrian and Italian borders.

Kranjska Gora is mostly famous as a winter sports town, being situated in the Julian Alps. It annually hosts an event in the Alpine skiing World Cup series, also known as the Vitranc Cup for the slalom and giant slalom events. The well-known ski jumping hill Planica is located in the nearby Tamar valley.

One of the hotels...

Here some impression from the skiflying hills!!! It was a great atmosphere there and everybody cheers for every jumper. It was so fantastic...

Here you see the jumpinghill. It´s the biggest one in world.


The first ski jumping hill was constructed before 1930 at the slope of the Ponca mountain. In 1934, Stanko Bloudek constructed a larger hill, known as the Bloudek Giant. The first ski jump over 100 metres was achieved here in 1936 by the Austrian Sepp Bradl. This was, at the time, the biggest jumping hill in the world, sometimes called "the mother of all jumping hills".

In 1969, a new K-185 hill, Letalnica Bratov Gorišek, was constructed by Lado and Janez Gorišek. Since 1985, when Matti Nykänen flew 191 metres, new world records have always been set at Planica rather than any other ski jumping hill (e.g. Kulm in Austria, Harrachov in Czech Republic, Oberstdorf in Germany or Vikersundbakken in Norway).
In 1994, Toni Nieminen of Finland was the first ski jumper in history to jump over 200 metres. The current world record stands at 239 metres, set by Bjørn Einar Romøren of Norway in 2005.













The result of the individul competition from this day was, that Simon Ammann from Suisse won this day. Second was Gregor Schlierenzauer from Austria and Anders Jacobsen was thrid!!!

Hello again from Hamburg!
My last host was going to a Postcrossing-Meeting in Hamburg  (www.postcrossing.com) and we met my old host Jenny there. So I will spend some time in Hamburg again and I am really happy about it. I am also very curious what new things this city can show me!
But now first back to the Postcrossing-Meeting. Of course I took part and also some photos. These meetings consists usually of some sightsseeing und then some eating andf drinking with a lot of postcard-writing and even more postcard-signing!
As I had seen a lot of the sights in Hamburg already we didn't take photos everywhere but this time we climbed on the St. Michaelis-church and had a really great view around!



Here you can see the TV Tower in the distance.


Where you can see the three church-towers is the city center of Hamburg.

And here you can see the "Speicherstadt", a large district with lots of warehouses. It was founded on oak-piles and it is a heritage-site since 1991.


Oh, here you can see the football stadium of the FC St. Pauli and in front of it the "Heiligengeistfeld". Many things are held there, for example the public viewings for the football world championships 2006 and 2010 and the DOM. DOM is the fair which is three times a year. Jenny told me that we can perhaps go there!


A view over the harbour.

The old St. Nikolai-church.

The lake Alster in the city center in Hamburg.


After the St. Michaelis-church, also called Michel here, we went on to the harbour.

And from there further to the restaurant. I was very hungry by then and a bit cold as it was a very windy day!

And there were so many postcards, I couldn't believe it! I liked this one because it is different from the usual postcard! We had another TV with us called Panda_Lilo, you can see here on the photos.

These were the cards Jenny wrote for the meeting!

And here you can see all the beautiful pictures on the cards.

After the meeting we put all the cards together on a table and I can't say how all these cards could be signed in only one afternoon!


I hope I can tell you more soon!
Bye,
Mister Snow

Hello!
As I told you in my last entry we went to have a look at the DOM, a huge fair on the Heiligengeistfeld. But before we even got on the underground we saw this great evening sky.

Then we took the underground and left at the station Feldstrasse. From there we came directly at the DOM and we had to walk past the Millerntor stadium, the home of the FC St. Pauli.


On the DOM were lights everywhere and all was loud with music and people and scented in many different ways.

Here was the cart of a fortune teller but we didn't go inside.


Here was some autoscooter for small children. I think they had much fun!

And some really delicous looking sweets.

The small rollercoaster called "Rasende Maus".

Here is a chairoplane, I think it was the oldest looking thing there but just from the outside.

Right next to the Heiligengeistfeld is an old bunker from World War II.

Oh, this is the really big rollercoaster, I was much too afraid to use this!


Some attraction with an egypt style.


At last we took some photos with the ferris wheel.


Then we took the underground back home from the station St. Pauli.


Bye,
Mister Snow

Hello again!
Today we are going to make cookies! I am really excited about that, there was a really special form as you will see later!
First we collected all the ingredients we needed.

We had this scales and I just jumped on it. Ups, I had 68 g, perhaps I should not eat so many of the cookies later!


We put all the ingredients together and made cookie-dough, it looked really tasty!

The dough had to be in the freezer for a while, really cold inside here.

Here you can see the first ready cookies. They are shaped like tigerducks.

And more cookies! Can you see it? They are just shaped like me! Like snowmen!

Here is the form which is shaped like a snowman and the ones for Muumintroll and Little Myy. And of course the dough with the almost realy stars.


More cookies *yummie*

Here I am in front of the oven! It is really hot here, can I go back to the freezer?

Of course we wanted to make the cookies even more cool and so we added some icing!

We had different colours and made funny cookies!

Of course we tried some of the cookies and they tasted great!

Bye,
Mister Snow

Hello!
Mister Snow is greeting from a Winterwonderland! Snow is everywhere and that although my host told me, that in Hamburg there is hardly any snow except the last year. So we made a trip outside and of course we made some photos. We went to a park called "Planten und Blomen", it is near the trainstation Dammtor in Hamburg.

In the distance we could see the Finland-house.

And here is the TV tower again. It is directly next to Planten und Blomen.

Ah, is it not beautiful snow?


We walked around and took some photos.


This day we had also a fantastic blue sky!



We also came to a playground and there was also snow everywhere. Perfect to take some photos!




There was also this wooden horse, we took a ride in the sun.

Then we went on to other places in the park, usually you can see a lot of water here but it was all ice covered with snow today.




After this last photo of the TV tower we went home to get a bit warm again.

Bye,
Mister Snow

Hi Mom,

A nice postman rang my new host's doorbell this morning and gave her the envelope where I was. My host opened the envelope and let me out of there. She said that the other toys were still sleeping, but I would see them later. I had breakfast with my host Kirsi and her black cat Lauri.

I had a nice and interesting day here in Helsinki, Finland. I think I'll enjoy my visit here. Photos and more updates later, I just wanted you to know that I arrived here safely and everything is OK.

Bye for now, Mister Snow

Hi Mom,

Here I am again

I thought you would like to see some photos of my visit here. At first I wanted to see some snow. (Picture 1-3) Spring is coming and snow is melting away soon, but here' still lots of it.

We went to the city by a tram. My host Kirsi told me that it is the fastest way to travel here. There's a tram stop right in front of my host's front door so it's really easy to use tram too. (Picture 4) We went to a small café for a latte and ice cream. I met all my new friends there too and it was a welcoming party for me and Gwennie at the same. I met Manu the Rubber Duck, Gwennie (a cute unicorn from USA), Blinchick from Russia, Bernd the Bread from Germany and Kerttu a little Finnish moose. (Picture 5) They are all very nice and we had fun there chatting and getting to know each others a little better. I tasted the latte and I think Finnish coffee is strong and tasty - I might get addicted to it soon. (Picture 6) The chocolate ice cream was cold and delicious - I like ice cream. (Picture 7)

One day we we went to a huge mall by a bus. There's also a bus stop right at my host's front door. My host's boyfriend has a car, but they don't use it often, because it so easy to travel by public transportation here. My host bought tickets to a concert and we had to wait at the ticket service for some time, because the lady, who sells tickets, was on her lounch break. Well, we found a great red couch and sat there. (Picture 8) We came back home by bus (Picture 9) and after our trip we all took a nap. Oh, btw, I got to push the button in the elevator when we were back at my host's building. We live on the 8th floor here. (Picture 10)

On Friday evening we went to a concert. It was great and I liked to hear Finnish music. Unfortunately it was not allowed to take any pictures there, but the evening was awesome and we all enjoyed the concert. On Saturday we went to the city by a tram again. (Pictures 11 and 12) Kirsi wanted to show us some Moomin characters, because we had all heard so much about them. Kirsi has a big book of Moomins and the others have already read it w lot - I can read it later too. We met a few nice Moomins in a department store. They were very friendly and we talked with them for a while. (Pictures 13 and 14) There was a wonderful view to the main street of Helsinki from the window and you can see the Parliament House, the tower of the National Museum and the Contemporary Museum called Kiasma behind us. The view looked almost like a postcard.

Kirsi showed me also the most important building of Helsinki and it was right next to the department store - the main post office. (Picture 15) Well, Kirsi is addicted to Postcrossing and postcards so perhaps that got something to do with the post office too... Kerttu loves trains so we went to see them at the railway station. (Picture 16 and 17) It's kind of funny that a little moose girl can love trains so much - she hasn't ever even travelled by a train yet...

Well, that's all by now, more later.

Hugs, yours Mister Snow <3

Hello Mom,

Yes, I'm still here in Helsinki and everything is fine. As you know my host Kirsi had some problems with her health and even bigger problems with her computer so we haven't been able to update my travelog in a long time. Well, now all the problems are solved and we can tell you all about my adventures of Helsinki.

Hmmm, where should I start? So much has happened since I wrote here last time so maybe I let the pictures speak for themselves. A little explanation at first. I've seen the beautiful Lutheran Cathedral of Helsinki, been in many cafés, attended in many Postcrossing meetings, travelled by bus and got many new friends. And yes, of course I've seen lots of snow too... Here you can see some pictures

Hi again Mom,

We had a great Easter here. We were hunting eggs and we found lots of chocolate eggs. (Picture 1-4) Finnish chocolate is really delicious

A week from Easter it was the MayDay, the First of May or Vappu as they call it here in Finland. It's a big celebration for students and most of the people. It's almost like a Finnish carneval. We had a peaceful Vappu at home. We ate some doughnuts and had balloons. It was a nice day and it also means that now spring is here. (Picture 5)

In the sunny days we like to sit out in the balcony and have some latte or ice latte. It's just nice to sunbathe sitting in a chair with friends (Pictures 6 and 7)

We have also watched some movies when it has been rainy or too cold to go out. We always had pop corn too (Picture 8) Finnish ice cream is very tasty and we've eaten that together many times when we've celebrated something. (Pictures 9-11)