Country Life Experience in Finland.

Country Life Experience in Finland

It is Friday and we are in Helsinki the Capital of Finland. It is a fine but crisp day about 8°and we are going on a 4hr tour, firstly around the city of Helsinki and then we are venturing into the countryside to visit and have morning tea in a typical Finnish home.

This morning the Eurodam had to manoeuvre its way through dozens of small islands on its way to the port. Helsinki has thousands of small, pretty islands of rock and most are covered in a forest of trees. There are quaint little houses dotted through the trees on some of the larger islands, and there are lots of small light houses and channel markers.

 

 

This morning we sailed past many small well forested islands.



Helsinki is a very pretty city with many Neo-classical style buildings that date back to the mid 1800’s. It has a population of 590,000 people living in it and it is surrounded by lots of water with many bays, harbours and ports. We have a very enjoyable bus ride around the city and our tour guide points out all the major sites. She also explains that most Finnish people who live and work in Helsinki also have a summer or holiday house situated not far away but it has to be on the water. The Finns love the water and most own their own boat.

We stop to take photos at the Lutheran Cathedral, which is the unofficial symbol of the city and situated at the top of the Senate Square. There is also a large monument in the centre of the square.

 

The Lutheran Cathedral and Square.

 

We then head out of the city to the typical Finnish farming community of Sipoo. The countryside is a mixture of heavily forested areas of pine, spruce and silver birch trees and very green open fields with pretty lakes. It is dotted with pretty reddish brown farm houses but there are no animals in the paddocks they are all still in the barns for winter.



 

The Old Church of St. Sigrid's.

We stop to visit St. Sigfrid’s the oldest church in the community which dates back to the 15^th century. It is an impressive old stone church with cobblestone floor and minimal decoration. .Going to church in this building must have been extremely cold especially in winter when there was snow everywhere, it was freezing in the church today and the sun was shining.

 

The New Church which was built in the 19th Century.

 

After traveling through the forest we arrive at Harriet’s countryside home beside a beautiful lake. Harriet makes us feel very welcome and we have a wonderful time looking inside her home at her treasured collections as well as her outside sauna and garden. We have refreshments which consists of coffee, apple cake, seasonal berry pastries with special butter and egg mix and home-made ice-cream. All where delicious. We then have a walk down to the lake. Everyone really enjoys their visit and seeing and hearing about how the Finnish people live and their customs.

The Finnish Country we visited on our tour.

 

 

Inside Harriet's Home.

 

Bread hanging from the ceiling.

 

The Lake at Harriet's Home.

Our sail away from Helsinki that afternoon was very picturesque. Cruising the flat Baltic Sea has been great. To top it off at about 10.30pm we had the warm beautiful sun streaming into our cabin and we experienced the most fantastic sunset of bright pinks, oranges and purples reflected on a perfectly flat ocean. It was a fabulous end to a terrific day.