Turku, Finland, and Helsinki, Day One

 Tuesday, May 31, 2022

Turku, Finland

 The boat’s internet has been down, so I have not been able to post to this blog, nor to get any news or emails.  However, we did learn today that the reason for the cancelled trip to Kotka is that Russian warships have entered the Gulf of Finland, and caution has led NG to keep to the western part of the Gulf.  So, we are in Turku, and on very short notice, the Lindblad/NG folks have arranged a day for us in this city.

 We are in an area called the Archipelago Sea, defined by the 179,584 islands (and we thought we had many in the Thousand Islands!).  The Archipelago Sea is the largest island group in the world!  Turku, on the coast among the islands, is Finland’s fifth largest city, and dates to the 13^th century.

 Our day began after breakfast with a trip to the University of Turku Botanic Garden on the island of Ruissalo.  We began with a stroll along the coast where a number of old homes from the richest families of the merchant class are facing the water. 

 

 Each house has a bathhouse and sauna on a small dock over the water.  After bathing and a sauna, you can jump right into the river (through a crust of ice if necessary); we were told it’s “good for the system.”  I cannot imagine that it’s good for the cardiovascular system, but……

 

The end of the walk took us to the botanical garden which was very nicely done.  Here’s a photo from the tropical greenhouse:

 

 There were groups of schoolchildren there:

 

 After the botanical garden we drove about 45 minutes into rural Finland to visit a winery!  Yes, that’s what they call it, and wine is what they call the product they make from various berries and fruits (there are no grapes grown in Finland).  We tasted the third product in this row, the still white currant wine, and the fourth, a sparkling strawberry wine.  The French won’t have any competition from these.

 

We had a late lunch at the winery and then returned to the boat.  I am amazed that we had a lovely day which clearly had been arranged with very short notice.  Lindblad/NG do a truly fine job.

Wednesday, June 1, 2022

Helsinki, Finland

 We sailed overnight and on awakening this morning were docked in Helsinki.  While Finland was part of Sweden, prior to 1808, Turku was its capital, but when Russia annexed Finland in that year, the Russians moved the capital to Helsinki so that it would be closer to St. Petersburg.  The capital remained in Helsinki after Finland achieved independence.

 We had morning options, and we chose to go to Nuuksio National Park, to forage for edible herbs, berries and mushrooms.  Note the name:  Nuuksio.  A word about Finnish (on which we had a short talk).  There are no diphthongs in Finnish; every letter is pronounced.  They have an abundance of vowels, some of which have dots, squiggles or tiny circles above or below them, so they have more vowel sounds that we’re used to.  In addition, they string vowels together, as in Nuuksio, and each one is pronounced.  Finnish shares roots with Hungarian and Estonian, and to my ear, is completely unpronounceable. 

 A core value in Finnish culture, we were told, is “the right to roam” and gather the wild products of the forests.  It’s considered “everyman’s right.”  We set out with a lovely guide, who knew the forest extremely well: 

 The forest is mixed evergreens and deciduous trees, with lots of birch.  We are very early in the season (they said spring is late this year, and the tulips are just blooming now), so there was not too much to glean which could be eaten now.  One of the most interesting things to see was Reindeer Lichen, a ground lichen which is very thick.  We were told the reindeer can smell the lichen through a meter of snow and dig it up:

 

At the top of our hike we had a great view of Long Lake: 

 Near the top of the mountain was a small shelter: 

 Our guide’s wife had built a fire inside and was grilling sausages over the fire on a rotating grill: 

 We had lunch at picnic tables, and used the heated facilities: 

 We then went back to the port, and left for the afternoon activity, a visit to the Sea Fortress Suomenlinna.  Located on four adjacent islands just off the coast, the fortress is reached by ferry from Market Square in Helsinki.  We were able to see one of the large interisland ferries which, amazingly, are free to use, even with your car: 

The fortress is an entire community which was built starting in 1748, and was used not only defensively, but also as a naval base during multiple wars in the late 18^th and early 19^th centuries, wars I never learned about in school!  During WW II, the fortress served as an artillery, anti-aircraft and submarine base.  The walls are appropriately impressive: 

There is an enormous dry dock there, too:

After our walking tour of the fortress, we took the ferry back to Helsinki.  At the port there is an enormous Ferris Wheel, which, we were told, is the only Ferris Wheel in the world with a sauna car (insulated, in black in the photo).  More about saunas later. 

We next toured a couple of the more prominent sights.  Here’s the Lutheran Cathedral:

 

In front of the cathedral is a monumental statue to Czar Alexander II, which, according to our guide, was left there after independence because Alexander was good to the Finns.  More research needed on that claim: 

Finally, despite the fact that there is only a very small Orthodox population here, there is a very impressive Russian Orthodox church:

A very busy day with more than 12,500 steps.  Tomorrow, we’ll go to the Fiskars Artisan Village.  More then.