MIR Corporation is offering two unusual August 2014 tours that take travelers to Europe’s least frequented and most undiscovered countries. These locales have received very little publicity as travel destinations, and I thought you might be interested in covering something out-of-the-ordinary. We have great photography for both tours.
Journey to Europe’s Unknown - Belarus, Ukraine and Moldova are three of the least-frequented countries in Europe. Time slowed drastically here after the devastation of World War II, but these beautiful countries are emerging from the shadows. On this 16-day trip guests visit with artists in Minsk and Kiev, and share a meal with a Chisinau family; explore Milesti Mici Winery’s “Golden Collection,” noted by the Guinness Book of World Records & Cave Monastery in Orhei Vechi, excavated in the 13th century and inhabited until the 18th century. http://www.mircorp.com/trip/belarus-ukraine-moldova/
Baltic Overland Adventure - This overland journey roves the countryside and urban centers of four distinct nations: the three independent Baltic countries – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania – and Kaliningrad, an exclave of Russia. They form a mosaic of countries ruled in early years by the traders of the Hanseatic League and later occupied by the Soviet Union at the end of the Second World War. The Baltic countries were the first to re-establish independence from the USSR. Visit Tallinn, Estonia’s capital, with winding cobbled streets, red roofs and turreted fortress wall all on the UNESCO World Heritage List. See Curonian Spit, a strange and beautiful landscape of corrugated dunes, little villages and forests. Explore 14th century Trakai Castle, the Brick Gothic residence of the Lithuanian Grand Dukes. And more. http://www.mircorp.com/trip/kaliningrad-the-baltics/