Helsinki and Ekenäs Archipelago National Park

Thursday, June 2, 2022

Helsinki, Finland

A word about saunas.  Using a sauna is an integral part of Finnish life, we are told.  In a country of 6 million people, there are 3 million saunas, and every residential unit, be it home or apartment or condo, has a sauna as part of it, and Finns use their saunas multiple times a week.  Babies as young as two weeks are taken into a somewhat cooler sauna than the 80-90 degree C. usual temperature.  Bathing suits are not used; public saunas are separated into men’s and women’s, but home saunas are commonly used as a family.  In a talk about why Finland is perennially noted to be the happiest country on earth, our guide gave the sauna some credit, but gave the social structure the greatest credit.  Paid maternity leave is a year, and at five months of age, the leave can switch from the mother to the father if the family wishes.  Taxes are very high, but services are very high, and the Finns love it.

Today’s activity was a day-long visit to the Fiskars Artisan Village, about an hour from Helsinki.  It is an entire town which originated at the Fiskars tool company, but which now is an enormous artisan village with any kind of artistic endeavor you can imagine.  Here is the original Fiskars Cutlery Mill, dating from 1888: 

The tools are sold here: 

We spent time with a wonderful glass blower: 

But the goldsmith had the most interest (and sales): 

We returned to the ship after lunch, and had a wonderful lecture on “Baltic Culture—Art and Architecture in the 17^th Century” by the historian who is along with us.  After dinner, the musicologist presented a video medley of ABBA’s greatest hits, and we both were surprised at how many we were able to hum along to.

Friday, June 3, 2020

Ekenäs Archipelago National Park

The Ekenäs Archipelago National Park is off of the coast of Finland and consists of many islands (and the water in between).  We sailed to it overnight, and in the morning, multiple options were offered on Jussarö Island; I took the photography walk with the two National Geographic photographers.  Joyce opted for a Zodiac tour of the island.  Astonishingly, only five of us signed up for the walk with the photographers (the other choices were a very vigorous hike and a less vigorous hike), and it was wonderful looking at things through the photographers’ eyes.  I got confirmation of a number of things I’m already doing, and many ideas of how to see things in ways I didn’t already know.  Here's a photo of developing pine cones which I would not have thought to take: 

We spent some time at this site, looking at many ways to photograph the cottage, the sea behind, the trees, the rocks, etc.

  Here’s one the photographers thought was good; I actually disagreed! 

We went back to the ship for lunch, and as we ate, we sailed to another island, Modermagan.  During the sail, after lunch, we had a wonderful lecture on the birds of the Baltic from one of the naturalists who is an ornithologist.  We then had a nature walk with the naturalists, and here I took pictures I liked even more than the ones I took in the morning.  Here’s a pond we passed: 

And here’s a different pond, with lily leaves and a newborn fuzzy duckling swimming:

 

They have poisonous snakes here, and we found this viper on our walk: 

It was really quite wonderful and the walk with the naturalists was great.  There are things right in front of your eyes which you don’t see unless you’re with someone who can tell you how to look.  We went back to the boat for dinner, and we’ll sail overnight to Stockholm, Sweden.  More then.