i've been having a few issues with internet access since arriving in helsinki on friday but at last, i think i have it sussed out. i am, of course, taking the opportunity to download music rather than update the blog immediately so will make a somewhat hasty blog posting for the 2 people out there who are still reading.i took the overnight ferry from stockholm thursday 7.13 and arrived early friday morning. i was somewhat thwarted in my attempts to find a cash machine that would accept a foreign card and wound up having to troll around the cobbled streets of helsinki trying to get some euros so i could get the bleedin' tram. at last, i got on and made it to my hostel - yes, hostel - and had a brief kip before heading to the beach to catch a few rays.
saturday morning, i went off to breakfast and met a charming scottish
brother & sister, gareth and sal. gareth now lives in australia and is here for a climate conference and sale came from glasgow to meet him. the three of us spent saturday wandering through helsinki and doing a little shopping. when i was in norway, i searched high and low for the perfect norwegian sweater only to find it at long last in helsinki. it was hideously expensive of course, but if i'm not worth it then who, pray tell, is?? sunday, we went to a design expo just outside of helsinki in a town called esboo or espo or something. it's a little unclear frankly. the expo, however, was really great. it was a modern development kind of similar to newport village in port moody where sammy lives, except it seemed that there were several developers 
involved and although the individual complexes were all the same, they had different designers doing the interiors. they also had all kinds of different products and stuff like at the home show. it was a really interesting concept. i have to say that my absolute favourite was the super 70's shag palace complete with broken glass moat surrounding. that'll go over well with the safety warden!since then, i've been prowling thru the town checking out the ample design offerings. today, i also went to suommenlinna (or however you spell it) which is the fortress built on the islands in the harbour. the fortress was built when finland was controlled by sweden with money
from then-ally france, only to be annexed by russia a couple of hundred years later after 6 days of siege culminating in a surprising surrender by the finns when the russians had all but given up. go figure. anyway, the islands are now on the unesco world heritage list and rightly so.off to estonia tomorrow where i'm booked into a 4-star spa hotel :)
2 comments:
Alright - all caught up now, phew... been really busy since I turned 50!!! (You and Me, busy that is not both 50.)
Spent last weekend in Parksville - the cottage is better than we could ever have expected. And also busy redoing the apartment where "former tennant" occupied, a big job. Great to read what youv'e been up to and the pics are great. How are friends who are expecting, and who are the only 2 readers remaining???!!!! Oh Beware Jaegger (sp) Cheers, talk soon...Shan
Two people reading?! I'm jealous. Ithought I was a member of very exclusive club! The perfect Norwegian sweater? Would that be a turtle neck by any chance? In black? Speak soon.
Rich x
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