Category: Stuff We Did–our stories

Part 7 of our Adventure has us riding through Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic

You can watch some of the highlights of our trip HERE

Krakow, Poland

After researching about where to go in Poland we realized that Krakow was where we would find the “true” culture as Warsaw was rebuilt due to getting almost completely demolished during WWII. But we still wanted to say that we had visited, so we took a quick drive through Warsaw and then headed straight to Krakow.

Krakow is one of the oldest cities in Poland and it was fortunate enough to avoid getting destroyed in WWII. The Germans did occupy Krakow, but for the most part they left the monuments and beautiful buildings alone.

Walking through Krakow square, and visiting yet more cathedrals made me fall in love with the splendor of the past and the romance of the slow, simple life.

I am thankful to be born (and living) in the late 20th century, but the cadence of life–even just 100 years ago–does hold it’s appeal, especially when visiting a place that seems to blend the modern lifestyle along with the old seamlessly.

There were gorgeous carriages pulled by magnificent horses, conventional and impressionist artists, musicians of all kinds, break dancers, new modern hostels and old guesthouses, cafes and restaurants that would have served coffee or glass of cold beer to a generation or two older than us.

Krakow is also one of the cheapest cities in Europe so, if you can, stay awhile and enjoy it to the full. We wish we stayed a few more days. ***Most of our activities and meals cost less than in Bangkok!!

Another highlight in Poland was visiting the Weiliczka Salt Mines. It was amazing and something you shouldn’t miss out on if visiting Poland.

The mine opened in the 13th century and just recently stopped being active in 2007 which makes it one of the oldest and long lasting mines in the world and it was absolutely fascinating. While being guided through a fraction of the 287 kilometers of pure salt corridors we got to see hundreds of years of history being carved into the salt.

Everything besides the mining tools were made from salt. We visited several chapels, a couple of large cathedrals, massive rooms, endless tunnels, stables and variety of decorations, sculptures and furniture completely made of salt.

Slovakia

We sort of over-scheduled ourselves and we had to drive through Slovakia rather quickly. We only stayed 1 night, but the camping spot we found was beautiful.

The country is gorgeous, and the roads are perfect for those on a motorbike. Straight roads are really boring when on a motorbike, so we truly enjoyed driving through the Slovakian country side which had rolling mountains and winding roads that were just winding enough to keep it interesting but not too steep or too challenging.

Our short experience was enjoyable.

Prague, Czech Republic

The land of craft beer, castles and yes…more cathedrals…

I was amazed by the wealth of the different styles of architecture . Abstract, Minimalist, Gothic, Renaissance and Baroque stand side by side.

We spent most of our time in Prague. The Charles bridge was something to remember and strolling down that bridge will take you on an unforgettable journey.

The bizarre, yet somehow beautiful statues will probably tell a new story to each and everyone who passes by. I assume that most of the statues have a religious meaning, but most were just too bizarre to understand and I was happy to just stroll by and make up my own understanding of them.

 

 

It was time to leave Scandinavia…

We were looking forward to experiencing a bit of the “exotic” part of Europe…well at least in comparison to the countries we had just visited. Check out our video below:

Estonia

Our ferry from Helsinki, Finland took us to Talinn, Estonia in less than 4 hours. Sometimes I forget how small Europe compared to Asia.

4 hours is easily what you can spend in traffic going from one end of Bangkok to the other 😛

After disembarking from the ferry, we had a little drive through the old town of Talinn, it was beautiful but because the weather was a bit unpredictable we decided to push through and keep on driving and spend the night in a town closer to our next destination, Latvia.

In retrospect, I think we should have stayed the night in Talinn as that was the place we saw the most happening. The other cities we passed through were very quiet, and hardly anyone spoke any English.

We had booked the night at this out of the way campsite with Hobbit styled cottages in a little town called Padise. It was a toss up between camping in our tent or staying in the cottage. Staying in the cottage ended up being the correct choice as it rained all night and the temperature dropped quite low.

We had a delicious BBQ and a luxury salad before the rain started in earnest and a good night’s sleep in our king sized bed in our Hobbit-House.

After leaving the Hobbit-House we drove directly to Riga, Lativa. Ok, that might sound like a long way, but actually it was only around 300km and easily accomplished within 4 hours of driving.

Latvia

Driving in Estonia and Lativa felt like we were driving in Thailand. After the uber organized and safety conscious Scandinavia we had to adjust to a “crazier” sort of driving rather quickly. It was a night and day difference, but Stefan took it all in stride and made the best of it. At least it was easy to stay alert, there was no telling when someone would blatantly ignore the double solid lines or a truck would overtake another truck etc.

And oh, the WIND!…Estonia and Latvia border the Baltic sea and have a ridiculous amount of strong wind. We were almost blown off the road a couple of times. Well, not really, but it felt like it, and our necks were quite sore after a few hundred kilometers of fighting the wind to stay upright.

Arriving in Riga was a pleasant relief. It wasn’t a very long ride, but it felt longer simply because of the strong wind and the crazy driving.

Riga has so much character! There were so many things to do for very reasonable prices. We spent the day walking the cobble-stone roads and going in and out of the various museums that costs a fraction of the prices we experienced in Northern Europe.

Cathedrals were free to enter and there were endless choices of cafes and dinning spots.

For dinner we treated ourselves to an authentic Medieval dinner in the Rozengrals Restaurant, a building that dates back to the 1200’s. The staff were dressed in medieval costumes, the tables and chairs were made of solid wood just like in the olden days and the medieval music and ambiance was incredibly on-point. You can take a look at the place here…it really was worth it.

The entire restaurant was candle lit (including the WC’s, though they did have proper modern toilets) and all in all it was a memorable meal complete with home-brewed non-pasteurized honey beer.

If you are headed to Riga, you must try this place out. We were lucky that we stumbled upon it during our walk around town. But it is recommended to make a reservation as it usually is full during all the prime times. We ate and drank our full (please do note that they serve half litres of beer as per norm) for less than 35euros!

We also were finally able to go Salsa Dancing in Riga, after many failed attempts (we were in the city during the wrong nights etc. so no salsa dancing was happening) we found a cute Cuban club called the Cuban Café just a couple of blocks away from our hotel.

The dance floor was tiny but the music was good and the dancing was lively! If you want a lively place for dancing and cheap cocktails and beers do visit this bar.

Another highlight in Riga was the RetroFoto salon we visited. Again, for only 35euros we were able to get a complete photo op with costumes, professional pose cues, props, photo shop editing when needed etc.

They were so professional that we were in and out in less than an hour. They do need a week or so to completely finish the digital enhancements of the photo, but for us that was no problem as we didn’t plan on printing out our photo.

We chose a Baroque theme and were quite pleased with our souvenir…what do you think?

While traveling there is always a bit of scary excitement—we lost our passports and legal papers!!

Because of the open borders, we hardly have to pull them out. So we only noticed that we didn’t have them with us when we were ready to leave Latvia. We had a bit of a panic, but we figured we could have only left them in our last hotel. Fortunately, we hadn’t driven very far, and in 30mins, we were back in possession of our precious documents. Lesson learned: always check that you have your important documents whenever leaving a hotel!!

Lithuania

It was a beautiful day when driving from Latvia to Lithuania.

We had a pit stop at the Hill of Crosses, an eerie yet beautiful place with history just bursting at the seams. Every cross tells a story of love and devotion to God or a loved one who has passed on.

It started out as a symbolic burial site for the rebels of the 1831 and 1836 rebellion against the Russian occupation. Some of the rebel’s bodies were not found and thus symbolic burial sites with crosses began appearing on the hill.

It is now possible to place your own cross on the hill so long as it does not disturb the crosses, and statues already on the hill so the hill continues to grow.

The beautiful sunny day turned into a rainy and stormy night so we decided to leave Lithuania for sunnier weather as being wet and cold while riding a motorbike is a rider’s worst nightmare.

 

Friendly Finland

We weren’t able to stay long in Finland…

And we learned the hard way that Mid-Summer Night Season is not the best time for visiting…unless you want to join in the fun an debauchery that comes with it!

The young (and the young at heart) are busy staying up all night singing, dancing, drinking and attending massive music festivals!

This means that almost everything is CLOSED! It’s like Christmas in Europe or Songkran in Thailand–even the grocery stores and mall closed earlier than usual!

If we weren’t tired from driving and hoping from one ferry to the next, we might have wanted to join in the fun, but as it was, we were eager to find a quiet place to JUST SLEEP…

Our first stop was the Old City of Rauma. This almost 600 year old preserved town is beautiful and listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, but because of Mid-Summer everything was closed and it was ghost town…

We were able to explore the old streets and take a bit of footage, but we weren’t really able to get much info about the charming place.

Since we couldn’t really find anything open, we decided that it would be best to eat at the next restaurant we found open.

We found this cute pizzeria, and while we were enjoying the free salad bar (this was the kicker…as soon as Stefan saw they had a free salad bar we knew this was the place for us..:D) we met our first Friendly Finnish Folks!

This stood out to us because they actually initiated the conversation which didn’t happen in all the other places we had been through. Folks were friendly in Norway and Sweden, but we were usually the ones to start talking or asking questions.

In Finland it was so pleasant to have folks start talking to us. They told us that it was honestly the wrong time to visit Finland, because everyone was so busy celebrating the Mid-Summer Night that they had no time for tourists…

They also warned us that all the cheap lodging and camping spots might be taken by the Finnish young folks roaming around attending the different music festival.

I don’t know why we didn’t get wind of it before, but there was a HUGE music festival happening in Rauma and all the camping and hotels were booked!!

The friendly couple we were chatting with in the pizzeria offered us their back yard to camp in, in case we didn’t find anywhere to stay—so kind! 😀

Even though we were quite tired, since we couldn’t find anything in Rauma, we decided to push on towards Helsinki.

It was quite late so we stopped in another town called Turku, we again checked out the camping sites, but they were full (or the prices were double) because of Mid-summer so decided to see if we could find a wild camping spot…

Our first spot was already taken by some party revelers and there was no way we were going to get any sleep if we camped next to them…

The trick to finding a good wild camp spot (in our un-professional opinion) is to find a small road leading off the main road that leads to the conventional campsites. By following the smaller roads it usually leads you to a walking or cycling road that is not very frequented and THEN you can spot some level ground perfect for setting up a tent…

In this case we found a little path that turned off a jogging path into a small prairie and it was private enough that folks couldn’t see our tent while jogging or walking around.

The grass was up to my waist and we had to press it down to get some space for the tent, but this made it nice and soft so we considered ourselves lucky…

It was a beautiful night. The sun stayed bright all night but the temperature was cool. In the middle of the night we heard some noises and discovered that a family of small deer were nearby which made the whole “wild” camping experience more authentic.

You can see more footage of our Wild Camping  and our Finland Adventure HERE:

The next morning we slept in till around 10am and we had fun watching some folks noticing us packing camp while jogging or cycling. Their faces read: “Oh, those guys camped there!!”

Wild camping is legal in Finland as it is in Sweden and Norway…but got the impression that most folks don’t really do it.

When we mentioned to the friendly couple in the restaurant that if we couldn’t find a place, we would “wild camp” they didn’t really know what to say and promptly offered us their back yard to camp in…LOL!

I LOVE HELSINKI!

Helsinki is a beautiful city. The architecture and the Orthodox Christian cathedrals were something we had never seen before. We haven’t been to Russia yet, but we can see why folks say that some of the outstanding buildings and churches have a strong Russian influence.

Walking around Helsinki and taking a ferry to Suomenlinna Island Fort that was 15mins away from the mainland was like walking around in a new world and seeing a part of Europe we hadn’t seen before.

And again, folks went out of their way to talk to us so it was nice to talk about where they recommended we should visit and we didn’t feel so alone and foreign J

***Shame we didn’t take any pics with the friendly Finnish folks we were able to chat with…I guess we are still getting used to cataloging our experiences for our blog…

Helsinki was a contrasting experience of the OLD and the NEW…the old roads, the old churches, cathedrals and forts the old bars and hang outs…

And then we checked in THE MOST MODERN and fully automated apartment we have EVER been to.

We booked this fully set up apartment just outside of Helsinki because it was a really good deal and it look new and clean.

We didn’t realize that it was completely electronic and supervised by camera and codes.

We booked but we didn’t realize that we had to PAY ONLINE to receive our code to access the building…

So we wandered around for an hour (trying to find a grocery store open etc) waiting for our “code” or for someone to email us back.

After not receiving the code, we went back to the apartment building and tried in vain to call the emergency number again and again…

Ah! It’s is still Mid-Summer holidays so I guess there wasn’t anybody answering the phones! What do we do???

We finally realized that we hadn’t actually finished the payment process, we had booked, but we didn’t finalized payment.

Our phones were dying and we had 2 euros left of internet credit and we were getting tired of being on the steps of our hotel!

It was the case of being so close…but so far…we could see the Promise Land but WE COULDN’T GET IT…lol!

Our payment finally went through (thanks to PayPal) as filling out our card details would have probably eaten up all our internet credit…

And wallah, we had OUR CODE!

Our code gave us access to everything! Free secure parking???

Tap in the code and the garage door would automatically open for you to drive in and automatically close after…

Tap in the code for front door…

Tap in the code for the elevator…

Tap in the code for the room…

Tap in the code for the kitchen…

Tap in the code for the laundry room…

We felt we were in a bit of Si-Fi movie.

We saw 2 other people the 2 days  we were in this apartment.

1 guy was another biker who had booked a room and showed us where the garage was…

The other was the cleaner lady who said exactly 1 word to us… “Hi”

We saw NO staff…

We saw NO other folks though we knew it was full as it was the last room available.

It was strange after living in Thailand when you get used to seeing “staff” everywhere!

Once we had our PRECIOUS CODE…we had a really comfortable stay…

But it was so weird not seeing a single person to ask any questions or get directions or get any help from.

We were joking, what if we FORGOT THE CODE– we would have been seriously screwed!!!

The apartment was also extremely efficient. No frills, everything was utilitarian without being ugly or institutional.

In the room they provided us with:

·       Complete set of dishes for 2 people

·       Dish towels

·       Dish washing utensils

·       Garbage bags and general cleaning supplies

·       Coffee machine

·       Microwave

·       Bath towel set

·       Hair Dryer

·       2 in 1 body soap and shampoo

·       Comfortable Bedding

In the “Common Areas” they provide us with:

Fully equipped kitchen with extra dishes and pots and pan

·       Washing Machine

·       Dryer

·       Working Desk Spaces

·       Brochures for things to do in town etc

·       Signs for everything from the Internet code to saving the environment etc…

You are expected to:

·       Wash and Dry your own dishes and put then back in their correct spaces

·       Clean and Dry the kitchen pots, pans and utensils used. They also provide you with a large array of cleaning cloths to make sure you wipe and dry the counters and sinks after use.

·       Empty your own garbage bins if they become full during your stay

·       Check out by 11am as your CODE would automatically be invalid

It was surprisingly easy to comply as everything is so clean and orderly when you check in that you want to leave your room is similar order.

My OCD tendencies loved it!

Stefan was a bit dismayed, I think he is still having withdrawal symptoms from not having a maid clean up everyday 😛

Ok, I think I ranted a bit too long about our apartment….

But I hoped you enjoyed reading about it nonetheless 😀

We capped off our Finland stay with an authentic Finnish meal and beer and we were ready to get on another ferry to Estonia!

Yes, Stefan got lost for over 6 hours…

But let’s start at the beginning…

I felt we were sneaking into Sweden when we rode in across the border…

After all the legal work, visas and immigration visits—(which we got so used to in Thailand)– the concept of open borders still seems bizarre to me.

Both Norway and Denmark have random passport checks, even though we were never checked, at least we saw some border officials and we were asked to show ID’s when boarding the ferries.

Crossing into Sweden stood out because basically one second we were in Norway and the next second we realized we had passed a sign saying “Welcome to Sweden.”

About 50km into Sweden we entered a National Park area and we still hadn’t seen a single person or proper town. It is a bit surreal driving well paved roads and seeing no civilization whatsoever…

We realized that we were pretty close to the Fulufjallet waterfall that we wanted to see so we decided to try to find it. After finding it, we were told it would take a 2-3km hike up to see it, it was around 7pm so we decided to take another shot at it the next day as and we still didn’t have a place to stay.

As mentioned there was hardly a soul in sight, so it took a while for us to find a campsite. We actually found one “proper” campsite but it had a terrible spot to put up tents so we decided to strike off on our own and “wild camp.”

This was easier said than done as the area we were in wasn’t it full spring or summer bloom. The ground was still very rocky and the trees were a bit grey and uninviting.

But after wandering around the little back trails we found something not too far off civilization– right beside a stream going under a bridge.

Check out our video HERE:

The trees were greener and the grass was long so we figured it was about the most comfortable spot we’d find. And the little clear water stream was perfect!

We set up camp and immediately started to scour the area for dry twigs for a fire as there were massive mosquitos about.

LOL, we felt very inadequate for true wild survival because no matter what we did…we could NOT get the fire up and burning…

I gave up after an hour or so, but Stefan kept at it and it the end we got the fire going—but we had to vigorously fan it to keep it alive…we ended up setting up a little USB fan to try to keep it going but to very minimal success.

Since I had given up on my fire-making skills I decided to make a cooler system for our cold meats and cheese. The weather was quite a bit warmer (about 20 degrees) than in Norway (which was about 13-15 degrees) so I thought I needed to put them somewhere cooler.

The water in the stream was easily below 10 degrees, and perfect for keeping our food cooler. I tied my collapsible bucket to a tree, filled it up with rocks so that it would be below water level and so it wouldn’t float away with the current, and then placed my little cooler bag of cold meats and cheese in. I tied it all up to make sure some feral cat wouldn’t get in to it and was all in all quite pleased with my contraption.

It was mid-night by the time we decided to get some sleep. Time seems to just tick on by because the sun is still out so our brains just kept on telling us it was still early. We found out later on, that that night was the longest day of the year in Sweden—no wonder why it was so bright!

Ironically, around 2pm the temperature dropped to probably around 12 degrees, while shivering in our tent as I hadn’t put enough clothes on due to it being quite warm when we turned in for the night, I was thinking that my “cooler contraption” was probably unnecessary.

The next morning the sun was out again and when washing my face in the stream I realized that someone had visited our camp and managed to untie the cooler bag from my bucket in the water. It was a bit freaky knowing someone had visited our wild camp, but I was just thankful that nothing else more valuable was taken and I hope that our food went to someone more in need than us.

Funny thing though was that they left my Sea to Summit collapsible light weight bucket which easily cost 5x more than the food they took. I guess they needed the food but had no need for my expensive bucket…LOL!

So after realizing our “wild camping” skills were not as good as we thought we decided we were ready for some proper civilization.

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Meeting a Moose some boars and Lost for 6 Hours

We booked an adorable Airbnb cabin around 40km from Stockholm. Interesting thing was that it was a cabin with a bit of woods right behind it but it was actually part of a residential neighborhood.

There was the main house with all the modern amenities of a proper home (full kitchen, dish washer, washing machine, dryer, bathroom with bathtub, sauna etc) and then two cute cabins adjacent the main house as guest rooms. Everything was also built from pine wood so it really gave an outdoor-sy feel but actually we were in the middle of a residential town.

While staying at this cute cabin, we had another incident happen that stamped our “wild outdoors” careers as “EXTREMELY NOT LIKELY”…

Stefan got lost for 6 hours!

He went off for a run to the beach (about 20mins from the house) around 10.00am and didn’t rock up back to the house till around 4pm…

He didn’t bring a phone with him, so I had no way of contacting him. I was curious as to why he was taking such a long jog, but I assumed that he found a good place to sun tan by the beach, or something, so I wasn’t unduly worried about him. He also always claims that he never gets lost so I kept myself busy with the blog and the all the laundry.

Around 4pm, just when I was getting worried that he was lost, cold and hungry, he walked in and declared that he had been lost and wandering around in the woods for the last few hours. I had just started worrying when I realized he had left his wallet and jacket and that the temperature had dropped quite a bit, when we came back…

Apparently, he took a wrong turn when returning from the beach and ended up around 10km away. He realized he was really lost when he saw a full-grown moose and then a family of wild pigs (boars???) and had to go around them as they can get vicious when protecting their young.

After avoiding the wild pigs and getting nowhere closer to civilization after wandering around for 3 hours, he finally saw a house in the distance but he had no choice but to cross a few cold shallow rivers and mud bogs to get to it.

He started ringing all the doorbells he could find. The first few houses had no one at home, another house had a Thai maid that spoke hardly any English and when he started using the little bit of Thai he knew he realized she didn’t know where she was and couldn’t help him…

It was the 5^th house that had someone home and fortunately he was a kind soul and he offered to give Stefan a ride back.

Meanwhile, at home, I was completely oblivious to all this drama and when I did start worrying he was back. This was a good thing, I guess, as the story could have gotten completely out of control if he was lost for longer and I had started calling the police etc….

Poor Stefan, he was all shook up when he got back and has a new respect for the wild outdoors.

I will not let him go running around without a phone on…no matter what he says about his “inner compass” or “directional intuition” ….

Arrrrrgh! It’s a shame how hopeless we are without our electronic gadgets…

And also, too bad he didn’t bring the GoPro as it would have been cool to see the moose and wild pigs 😛

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Day out with friends in Stockholm

Besides our wild wanderings in Sweden, we had a lovely day with friends in Stockholm.

The highlight for me was meeting up with Mia, a friend of mine from my Taiwan days…

We had a lovely lunch in a restaurant right outside of Old Town Stockholm.

It’s always great to re-connect with old friends—it had been 7 years since we last met—but it felt like it was just yesterday that we were hanging out on the beaches of Danshui.

True friends stay friends regardless of time or distance. We could still connect despite our lives having completely changed.

We were single, young and carefree 7 years ago, but now she has a beautiful daughter named Juliet and I am married and have “retired”…LOL!

Mia, if you are reading this…Thanks again for spending the day with us and for showing us around. We had a great time and look forward to seeing you again!

After 3 days of staying in one place it was time to move on.

Instead of taking the direct ferry from Stockholm to Helsinki we decided to take the “long way round” and headed up north to the Aland islands.

Three ferry connections later and one night stay at Mariehamn (Gro Udden Camping) we drove into Finland.

Farewell Sweden, you have been an experience never to be forgotten! 😀

Yesterday we climbed into my parents truck with 2 suitcases each, some carry on baggage and…OUR CAT! Yup, we were about to let Nikita take her first flight. And it would be an almost 24 hour affair, but she made it–or more like–we made it 🙂

We’re proud to say that she did really well. She DOES NOT like cars but as soon as we got to the airport she was an angel. She meowed a bit, but she didn’t scratch and try to escape the carrier while we were checking in, buying her ticket (yes, she has to have a “ticket” which cost only about 100 euros, as she flew in cabin with us) eating breakfast, shopping around to finish our last few baht etc. I guess we were expecting the worst so we were pleasantly surprised.

Once we boarded the plane, she was a bit restless, but fortunately those sitting next to us were very accommodating and her meowing and fighting the carrier was only during the first 15 mins and perhaps a bit mid-flight because by then she had been the carrier for about 8 hours.

We felt a bit bad for her as she’s not allow any food or water in case she gets motion sickness, but that’s apparently the only way to travel with cats in the cabin.

If you’re planning to travel with cat in cabin on an airplane here are the tips that worked for us:

1.  Get your cat used to the carrier–we bought her carrier about 5 months before the flight so she had time to get her used to it.
2. Get your cat used to riding in a car/vehicle–we ride on motorbikes so she doesn’t mind motorbikes at all. But because we didn’t get her used to riding in a car, as soon as she gets in one, she becomes a little hellion. I don’t know if it’s because cats easily become claustrophobic or because she was motion sick, but she seriously did some damage to the carrier trying to escape.
3. Feliway spray is a life saver–it works! We accidentally forgot to spray and bring it along when we took her to the vet for her last de-worming and tick and flea treatment and she was crazy the whole trip there and back. But when we sprayed her carrier on the way to the airport she was almost 80% calmer!
4. Don’t feed your cat 8 hours before the flight–yes, this seems cruel, but we did this and she didn’t get sick, puke, or anything, so this suggestion works. They also say don’t give water, but I felt too bad for her so I let her have some water before the flight.
5. You need a leash–most cats don’t like being on a leash but you will need one as there are a couple security checks where you will have to take the cat out of the carrier and carry through the x-ray etc. Without a lease you might find yourself chasing your cat around the airport…cats are darn fast when they want to be!
6. Bring a blanket–it get’s cold on almost any airplane so be sure you have something to cover the carrier to help keep your cat warm and it will also help “mute” any meows…

So that was our Jet-setter Kitty adventure. Hope our tips help you if you are planning to travel with your cat in the cabin of an airplane 😉