Baltic Quotes

“One of the few entry points to the Baltic Sea, the Kattegat passage is a busy and treacherous waterway. The entire region is a maze of fractured islands, shallow waters and tricky cur-rents which test the skills of all mariners. A vital sea route, the strait is used by large container ships, oil tankers and cruise ships alike and provides a crucial link between the Baltic coun-tries and Europe and the rest of the world. Navigating is difficult even in calm weather and clear visibility is a rare occurrence in these higher latitudes. During severe winters, it’s not uncommon for sections of the Baltic Sea to freeze, with ice occasionally drifting out of the straits, carried by the surface currents.
The ship I was commandeering was on a back-and-forth ‘pendulum’ run, stopping at the ports of St Petersburg (Russia), Kotka (Finland), Gdańsk (Poland), Aarhus (Denmark) and Klaipėda (Lithuania) in the Baltic Sea, and Bremerhaven (Ger-many) and Rotterdam (Netherlands) in the North Sea. On this particular trip, the weather gods were in a benevolent mood and we were transiting under a faultless blue sky in one of the most picturesque regions of the world. The strait got narrower as we sailed closer to Zealand (Sjælland), the largest of the off-lying Danish islands. Up ahead, as we zigzagged through the laby-rinth of islands, the tall and majestic Great Belt Bridge sprang into view. The pylons lift the suspension bridge some sixty-five metres above sea level allowing it to accommodate the largest of the ocean cruise liners that frequently pass under its domi-nating expanse.”
― Jason Rebello, Red Earth Diaries: A Migrant Couple's Backpacking Adventure in Australia

“Ar tām idejām ir tā... Zini, kad viss sāk pastiprināti darboties? Kad esi ar alkoholu vai citām vielām noārdījis auru un tev lido iekšā visvisādi sūdi un arī labie. /Dambis/”
― Uldis Rudaks, Rokupācija

“Following the end of the Cold War, there was much discussion concerning the point of NATO. In the event, it was reinvented as a means of reducing Russia's reach on its western frontiers and seeking to isolate it. Its former East European client states were admitted to NATO, as were the Baltic states.”
― Martin Jacques

“The flavors and food of the Baltics, generally reasonably priced and rich with variety and imagination, can often rival Nordic cuisine (which influences it), yet it is not held in the same esteem. I can still taste the sea buckthorn cheesecake I ate in Klaipėda-- the whole berries set in jelly on top, their sharpness slicing through the full-fat cream cheese-- and the snow-white fillets of pike perch, caught in Pärnu Bay, baked with butter and capers. The exceptional farmstead dairy produce-- in particular, herby butters packed with the power of meadow grasses and flowers. Smoked sprats, cloudberry jam, and bread as nut-brown as the soil. And I think of the birch forests we drove past and how, at this time of year, Latvians would be out tapping the thin white trees to bottle the nutrients stored in their roots that each spring filter up through their trunks, carried by the rising sap, like magic.”
― Caroline Eden, Cold Kitchen: A Year of Culinary Travels

“Tiger-orange, and so dreamy and evocative of name, cloudberries had been on my mind for years. The first time I ever came across them on a menu, rather than in a field guide, was in a bistro on Estonia's Baltic Coast, in Pärnu, as a jam to accompany cake. As I was curious to try the preserve, the waiter agreed to bring me a spoonful, despite the cake being off the menu. Golden and precious as the amber torn from rocks at the bottom of the Baltic Sea, it gleamed.”
― Caroline Eden, Cold Kitchen: A Year of Culinary Travels