Stockholm and Helsinki

Here we are in the main plaza in Helsinki. This is the Senate Square with it's most prominent building being the Lutheran Cathedral. Another sunny day in Scandinavia.

Finland is a very proud but closed country. It has very limited immigration preferring to maintain it's nationality. It's had a interesting relationship with Russia in the past it has been under Russian control and during WW II fought Russia to maintain it's independance when Russia had agreed with Germany that Finland would be theirs. So there still are a lot of Russian humor as well as jokes about other Scandinavian countries. For example an ongoing debate with Sweden on which country has more lakes. All in good fun much like the Danes blame the Swedes for things that go wrong.

For our time in Finland we decided to try to get outside of the major city and go to the countryside. We chose the town of Porvoo. It is the second oldest town in Finland and was very picturesque. The artilary piece has an interesting story. Given the rather distasteful relationship with it's neighbor Russia this gun was used in WW II. In a park now it was pointed to the east until a few years ago when the government recieved an official letter from the Russia government questioning the intenions of Finland with a gun pointed at them. After a good laugh the Finish government turned the gun to point North and so informed the Russian government.











One of the more beautiful locations in Helsinki is the Rock Church. Lutheran of course it was carved out of solid granite and is the location of many services.









This is the approach to Stockholm on the ship. It is called the Archipelago made up of some 24,000 islands in the approach to Stockholm. It makes for one of the most beautiful areas of the Baltic Sea. You can tell but there are very strict controls on cruise ships in this area.














Here Linda and I head through some of the old city dwellings. If you look close at the device on the window it was used by many residents of the apartments to check up and down to see who was on the street. It also works to increase the amount of light going into the room or so we were told.

Ok! By the time we are getting to Stockholm we are getting about to overload. None the less Stockholm is a beautiful city with lots of history. Here is the many river leading out of the city and the Gamla Stan area of the old town part of Stockholm.