Hezu

There appears to be also faster Express bus route 400 between these two cities, albeit the timetable is probably not that convienient for most cruise passangers since the departures from Tórshavn are weekdays at 6:25 and 16:15 and from Klaksvík only in the weekday mornings at 6:25 and 7:35.

Since the use of Olympus brand for camera equipment has been discontinued, the recently introduced replacement for Olympus TG-6 carries name OM Systems TG-7.

I own both Peak Design and Heipi travel tripods (bought both from their Kickstarter campaigns) and certainly PD tripod has its advantages (like low weight and compact packed size) and is not a bad tripod and it can keep light camera gear stable enough, the thinnest leg sections look somewhat less convincing. Heipi 3-in-1 tripod is then certainly sturdier, the mini tripod is useful addition (especially for low level shooting needs), changing the included ball head to something else is very easy and ice spikes are stored inside the tripod legs and included in the price, which is significantly lower than what PD travel tripod retails. And size and weight are still quite tolerarable.

Peak Design Travel Tripod is ok, but the legs are tad flimsy. My current favourite is Heipi 3-in-1 Travel Tripod, which is bit more sturdy and the construction with a mini tripod as the central column is quite innovative. It is available at https://heipivision.com/products/heipi-3-in-1-travel-tripod

It is Keflavík Airport that is quite long way from the Reykjavík city centre, but there is also Reykjavík Airport that is within the city and I don't think it takes 45 minutes to get there from the cruise port. That airport concentrates in domestic traffic (+ some flights to Greenland), but if I looked right on Google Maps, there is couple car hire places next to the Reykjavík Airport. Another few (including that Blue Car Rental mentioned above) seem to be located in harbour area of Reykjavík and although the cruise port is located elsewhere, the distances between two are tolerable.

Actually, I think in Germany there are still quite a few other establisments that do not accept card payments or if they do, it is only the local cards that most foreign tourists do not have.

These options provide the protection from the water (during boat rides and such), but like mobile phones GoPros and TG-6 have lenses with more or less short focal lengths and you may miss chances to capture shots for which you need a longer telephoto lens. Granted, hauling an ILC and a telephoto lens (+ possibly also alternative shorter lenses) could be somewhat taxing. One alternative option would be then a superzoom compact and in this category my favourite choice would be Sony RX10 IV, although some other cheaper alternatives might work too, although these have inferior autofocus capabilities compared to RX10 IV.

I have no first hand experience with Norwegian strawberries, but at least I have read that since Finnish strawberries grow during the time of year when daylight is plentiful in the northern latitudes that improves the taste.

Although currently the only possible date for using that routing is December 9th 2023...

I have never visited Galapagos islands myself, but if I ever would do so I certainly would like to take also other photographic equipment than just a mobile phone. The reason is simple: with an ILC and telephoto lens I could photograph also subjects (eg. fascinating endemic animals) that are further away as mobile phone cameras only have lenses with short focal lenghts. So, in your case, I would definately take the DSLR and that telephoto lens.

Although it is worth noting that Germany may not be as card payment friendly as the other locations on the usual Baltic itinenaries and several, especially smaller establishments may require cash payments (or local cards, that foreign tourists do not have).

Do I assume this has a little typo and you actually are taking Sony FE 1.4/14 GM and not the new Sigma 14 mm F1.4 monster?

Although I think there are some ferry routes that are more of cargo ships than fancy cruise ferries. For example, Finnlines ro-ro-ships on Helsinki - Travemünde route do take also other passengers than truck drivers, although the operation is first and foremost geared to get goods on wheels across the Baltic Sea from Germany to Finland or vice versa. And if one plans to make extended stays abroad, it is good idea to check what sort of visa policies there are, and this also includes visa-waiver programs, which may still dictate that you can only stay eg. up to 90 days within 180 days in certain country or area (like EU/Schengen area).

Actually, meatballs may not always be gluten free: many Nordic meatball recipes include bread crumbs and those obviously most often mean wheat (and thus gluten).

That museum is actually part of Estonian Maritime Museum and the reference to the seaplanes comes from the fact that the museum building was originally built as a hangar for seaplanes and the adjacent waters formed a seaplane harbour.

My experience aboard MS Nordstjernen is already some years ago, but I think at least then there was no complimentary clothing (might been there was some available for buying, although I had a decent selection in my luggage). On landings there was portable steps on shore, so you could walk into the land with dry foot. However, at least on some stops before you boarded the boats they required you to step into desificant liquid to ensure your footwear does not bring any harmful seeds into the vulnerable artic nature, so it would be a good idea to have waterproof footwear. I had then light hiking boots with Goretex. In general, it is certainly a very good idea to have a waterproof outer layer as those boat rides can be somewhat wet.

On the other hand, although RX10 IV is certainly not a pocket camera, it is still far more compact than the traditional ILC + long telephoto lens combo, that doesn't even cover the wide angle part of RX10 IV's lens.

Helsinki is still fairly warm within Finland, the sea stays warm quite long and that moderates temperatures, although that goes also the other way around and in the spring the cold sea water cools down also air temperatures near the coastline. On some cold spells the temperatures can drop into the region of -20 °C, although this varies yearly and it doesn't always became that cold. But if the temperatures stay firmly below the freezing point for extended periods then the sea water starts to freeze and form ice, first in the bays and then also elsewhere in the coastline. If the cold spell lasts long enough, the ice will be indeed thick enough that you can go walking, skating or skiing on it. The sea ice in Southern Finland rarely gets very thick, but ice on inland lakes often will become sufficiently thick that one may drive motor vehicles on ice. Also, ice breakers will keep the sea lanes open, so rarely you can go too far into sea ice from the coast, thus for example the South Harbour around the Market Square in Helsinki is these days never in condition that you could walk on ice. And of course, the climate change means that there may not be as long cold periods as earlier, for example this winter in Helsinki there tended to be some colder spells followed by some very warm weather that melted snow and ice and then again little colder weather and so on. This meant open sea waters for pretty much whole winter.

That is German Navy's Braunschweig-class corvette Ludwigshafen am Rhein and it has exhaust pipes near the waterline. And the military aircraft activity might be related to currently ongoing large NATO air exercise or alternatively related to the fact that Russian airplanes (including military) that fly between Kaliningrad and elsewhere in Russia have to fly over Baltic Sea international waters as they cannot fly over other countries. And fairly frequently NATO (and Swedish) fighter planes make identification flights to check those Russian military planes that fly with transponders off.

Swimming water temperatures in Helsinki region are already on rise and warmest waters are already above 20 °C. ...although if I guess correctly that sauna was Löyly and since the nearest water temperature metering point on the website linked above is Eiranranta and that sadly means that particular area might have one of the cooler waters, 15 °C just now. And assuming your cruise ship docks at Hernesaari, it is really easy to find Löyly, just head to Hernesaarenranta road on the eastern side of this headland and move towards north east and it is about only building on the eastern side of that road, so hard to miss.

Oulu is not north enough for proper midnight sun, but there is no proper darkness either: for today (Friday, June 9th) in Oulu, sunrise is at 02:35 and sunset at 00:03. My guesses for reasons to start an excursion very early morning are that either the excursion includes a long drive further away from the coast or the excursion involves going to listen the night active song birds singing in the early morning, one potential location for birding in Oulu area would be Liminganlahti.

The snake in Rachel's photo is a grass snake (Natrix natrix) and that is non-venomous, so no need to worry about. Davey's picture then shows common European adder (Vipera berus), which is the only poisonous snake in this part of the world, although adder bites are rarely fatal, but may still need medical attention. And generally these snakes do not attack human unless provoked, say eg. you step on one. And these photos do show the best identification details of these two species: grass snake's yellow spots on the neck and adder's zigzag pattern.

It is worth a mention that Hamburg does have also other long distance railway stations, so if your accomodation is closer to those, you probably should book your journey starting from there rather than the central station.

Actually, "hiisi" is the singular base form of the word, in Finnish when you inflect words that can trigger vowel harmony and consonant gradation and in case of this word inflection triggers some changes and thus the plural (in nominative case) becomes "hiidet". I guess certain features of Finnish language may not be that simple for those who are more accustomed in English (or should I say Indo-European languages in general) and first time encounter this Finno-Ugric language.

Because those are not Canadian geese, but barnacle geese.