Participants
leave their home town and fly to Amsterdam with possibly (if departed
earlier) a stay at the IBIS hotel, near Central Station Amsterdam
before continue their flight to Vilnius.
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Vilnius - upon
arrival you will be picked up from the airport or in case of delays or
reroutings by cab to the Holiday Inn. All participants are
expected to check in today and those who arrive early we will provide
with info to start exploring the city on their own. Or use this day to
rest and acclimatize.
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Holiday
Inn Vilnius
. |
Vilnius
guided city tour in the morning. You will see
spectacular architectural and cultural masterpieces. The late Baroque
churches are particularly outstanding. Napoleon once wished to carry
over the Gothic St Anne's church to Paris. Fortunately he did not.
UNESCO declared the OLD Town a part of the World heritage.
Group lunch at noon.
In the afternoon we'll go to the Jewish
State Museum, divided over two buildings.
One comprises Jewish cultural items,
photographs, books and more, dedicated to the Jewish presence in
Vilnius. The other museum focuses on Jewish life in pre-war Vilnius and
its destruction during the Holocaust.
In the evening you will be free to explore Vilnius by night.
| The
Vilnius Jewish
State Museum:
|
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At 8:30 am we make an excursion by bus through the neighborhood
of Vilnius, followed by a group lunch at 12.30. The rest of
the day will be for shopping or excursions of your choice, like an in
depth visit to the Romanov Church or the Gestapo museum, where you will
understand why Lithuania wanted to join free Europe.
| 
Ruins of
the Vilnius Synagogue Courtyard. |
Holiday
Inn Vilnius
At 7 pm you are all expected back in the
hotel for the group dinner. |
Riga
-
Reval Hotel Latvija
 | Visit to the RIGA
museum of Occupation and the Jewish Museum are scheduled.
After the Museum visits a group lunch.
Did you know that our decorated
Christmas tree tradition started in Riga, in the year 1510?
|  | The Riga museum of
occupation we visit shows the absurd war history of
Latvia.
First Russia invaded Latvia in 1940.
A year later, July 1941, people thought they became liberated, when the
German soldiers marched into Riga.
< The memorial at the
Salispils concentration camp. |
Ruins
of Old Shul Synagogue. |
RIGA
Today's [individual]
activities will be filled in by your choice of the many plans we
supply.
In 1940-1941 leading Jews were arrested and perished in
Stalin's Gulag. The NKVD deported 14,000 inhabitants of Latvia on June
14th 1941 including about 5000 Jews, half of them from Riga.
More than 70,000 Latvian Jews were murdered during the Holocaust.
After the war only a few survivors returned. Some Jews from the USSR
settled in Riga.
|
Group
dinner in the evening.
Riga - Reval Hotel Latvia
 |
Radisson TALLINN
 | TALLINN
In the morning a guided walk through the
medieval
town center.
Group lunch at the hotel, after that optional activities, we will
advise you about. |
Defense
Towers |
Radisson TALLINN
 | TALLINN
A day you may spend with activities we selected or with those
of your choice.
At 7 pm everybody is expected back to
enjoy a group dinner, followed by a meeting.
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 |
Russia,
St Petersburg is our target today, we leave by bus at 8 am
for a drive along the coast. En route we have a group lunch and upon
arrival a guided city tour by bus. St. Petersburg,
founded in 1703 by Tsar Peter the Great, is Russia's most European City
and is known as the "Venice of the North".
After check in at the Radisson hotel the
evening will be for leisure.
| Royal
Hotel
|
St
Catherina | St
Petersburg Your own interests can be explored today,
with the help of our suggestions. In the evening
after early group dinner we hope to offer you an evening with opera
ballet at the Mariinsky Theatre |
Radisson SAS Royal Hotel
 |
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In 2005 we added: We do
regret an early wake-up, because we have to leave the hotel at 6.15 am
in order to meet flight TE 460, departing at 7.30am and arriving in Amsterdam
at 9.05 am.
| Back home (if
with Northwest Airlines)
 |
The videos shown on the bus partly pertain
to the Holocaust sites, which we will watch before visit them. For the
other part they contain information regarding the cities we are
approaching. One video concerns the life of Miep Gies, Anne Frank's
helper.
Pictures are merely a way to give an impression of what we will
actually see on the trip. Hotels in particular always give pictures of
their most beautiful rooms. |
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