FAMOUSUNCLEART

I arrived at my temporary home for the next couple of weeks, I was pleased by the approach, there are huge chestnut trees on Siargatan in Sodermalm (I still can pronounce them and most show the address to people who stare at me as if I am stupid...no argument there.)

With the help of the driver, we unloaded by luggage which was a big as a baby SUV to the door of 17.It wasn't easy since are three doors marked 17, one for the garage, and one for the basement. I pressed the code number, heard a buzzing sound and I pushed and leaned against the oaken door...nothing happened. I looked to see if I had the wrong code, I didn't and again I tried...It opened slowly because it weighed as heavily as a Frankenstein Movie (directed by Mel Brooks)

I faced a stairway of about 10 plus steps, I bounced my luggage up those steps, finally got to the landing. I saw a circular stairway leading upwards. Kirsten, my house hostess had emailed me that the apartment house was renovated recently, but never mentioned whether she hand a lift or not. They live on the fourth floor. I sighed, cursed myself for not asking, and saw my salvation. It was wired open box--similar to those in Paris but this was a small as a phone booth. I didnt care.

I met with Claes and Kirsten. They were getting ready to leave, I was seriously jet lagged. It was not the right situation to comprehend details warnings and what to do and what not to do. Three days later, I still haven`t figured how the trash is recycled. So, I put all my trash and take it outside and deposit it in a street trash basket.

The place is an excellent one, as you enter there is a large living room, extensive library which is in Swedish, the lighting consists of floor lamps, very Ikea-like, a comfortable reading chair, a vcr and a TV (alas both don't work... ) There is a small bedroom off the living room. No window shades..more about that later.

The kitchen is ideal for me, an old microwave, an electric stove, aluminum sink and, a dishwasher which makes my day. An apartment size refrigerator and freezer combined. Oh, I forgot, a toaster which must date back to the twenties. I went through eight slices of bread before I got used to it...when the bread is toasted, the toaster slides them out and the bread scurries across the tablecloth like burnt rabbits.

The master bedroom is very large and it is mine. It has shades. It doesn't get dark until..well, it really doesn't get dark, dark. And l go to sleep, at night the sun or something pretending to the sun streams into the room. I'm sound asleep and my body says to me, "hey, get up, the sun is shining." I do. It is shining but it is 3 A.M. Finally, after three days of this, it dawns (pun intended) on me that I had to pull down the shades down.

To add to my woes, I have no TV to "veg" out and get ready for the sand man..so I suffer.

indytravel

Don't you love the first few days of jetlag mixed with never ending Scandinavian sunshine?

Two years ago I sorta got used to having only 4 hours of twilight each evening. I would shudder every time I thought about what they have to tolerate in the winter to make up for it.

Nice to hear from you again Uncle Art!

Hershey

Uncle Art,

Please keep us up-to-date each day. You're a marvelous story teller [..."the toaster slides them out and the bread scurries across the tablecloth like burnt rabbits...] Hilarious!

SandyBrit

I loved your story about the trash. I think your honest style of writing is what I so much enjoy. You tell it exactly like it is.

Looking very forward to your next posting. Thank you so much.

Sandy

SiobhanP

Art, I know how you feel about the summer sun...it's better in Ireland (At least it sets for a few hours) but every day for the past 2 weeks I wake up at 5 am wide awake. I havent't had my 8 hours in a few weeks....must buy blackout curtains! Tell us more about sweden!!

FAMOUSUNCLEART

Some of you have asked about the light summer night sky or the Midnight Sun.It is aptly named. It is ten in the evening. I am looking out my kitchen window and it looks as it might around eight or eighty thirty at night back home. It's eerie and disables me, disortients me. At night, after one am my bedroom lightens up it awakens me. Unlike at home, when the sun coming up dawn does not awake.If it does, I can go back to sleep. For some odd reason, I can't do that here. I don't why, but I can't.

If you've seen Al Pacino in Insomnia, you'll get a sense of how the midnight sun can affect you. It hasn't completly crippled me as it did him. I still can do my trips, visit museums. I really don't that sleep deprived, that is, as I did about five days ago.

Why does the constant light affect one's body. I don't know. What am I? Some kind of doctor. Yes. I should know since I am a doctor!

Let me explain, when I visited the Court Theatre at Dommingholm I ate at a restaurant on the grounds. I asked the waiter what the specials were. He said "We have Spainish Meatballs with rice." it sounded fine but what I got were morsels of lamb, tasty but not meatballs.
I teased the waiter, who wasn't Swedish, dark skinned and he spoke English with an Caribbean accent. We chatted. The restaurant wasn't crowded since a rainstorm kept
people away.

He asked me what I do? I usually don't say I am an actor since it leads to "Oh, what films have I seen you in?" I said simply, hoping to close the subject " I'm retired."
He said "Oh, you are a doctor, aren't you?"

I asked what made him think so.

He pointed to my three pens sitting nerdy-like in my jacket breast pocket and said in effect that I have pens promoting drugs and he deduces that only a doctor would have have them.. He didn't say it exactly in those words but he was delighted he had figured it out.. I didnt have the heart to tell him that everytime I visit one of my many doctors, I ended up with a pen of theirs, mostly good sturdy pens. I couldn't shame him. I nodded knowningly, got the check signed it with a Pulmicort pen and beat a hasty exit. Suppose someone were choking and he expected me to perform the Heimlich manouver. The was delighted since he felt like Sherlock Holmes and I realize the next time I am asked, I say I am a retired CPA.

DixieChick

You are cracking me up, "Doctor" Art! Can't wait to here the next installment.

indytravel

Bring it on "Dr. Art"

I love the way you go with the flow. I've let myself be stuck many a time by people who wanted to believe what they wanted.

margo_oz

great descriptions, Uncle Art - please carry on!

FAMOUSUNCLEART

I've often said that the best way to first see a city is by the sightseeing tours--both bus and boat. The bus tours offer the best choice since, in most cities, you can get on and off the bus at spots you like. Boat tours aren't nearly as good because you are always looking up at places and usually you cannot get on and off. I don't count canal rides in this since they are usually not as informative but still lots of fun.

We took a boat tour of Stockholm on a bright sunny day which are getting rarer as the week progresses. The boat had a recorded narration in four different languages. Usually,I don't like recorded tour narration (specially in Museums) since they always sound a bit stuffy.

This boat narration was different, upbeat, and little--no a great deal tongue-in cheek. For example, Stockholm has 14 islands in the city and boat travel to and from was important in the 1800's and the local boat travel was dominated by the Rowing Madams. Yes, I said Madams, a rough a crew as you'd ever see on a pirates ship, me boy. They cursed a blue streak and were a match for any man.

However, another group of women thought they gave a wrong impression, so they to break into the Rowing Madams monopoly. A rowing war broke out. If you went with the gentler females you could end up in the middle of a battle, a tough fracas between the two groups of women and you in the middle. It actually ended up that the Rowing Madams won but the modern times, and bridges threw them out of business around 1850.

I found out the part of Stockholm where our apartment is was once a place for "down and outers" low class working people who lived in shacks, hovels and it was the paupers burial ground. That explains all the ghosts late at night howling outside my window asking for alms.

Stockholm was known as a city of drunkards and there were many attempts to clean it up. One gentleman bought up and island, and when he did,he put in his will that not a tavern would be permitted on the island. Liquor sales are now regulated and very expensive. It explains why when Swedes got to Denmark, they return laded with liquor.

Another island was a prison for years and when it got time to vacate it, the prisoners didn't want to do it since the prison was very nice and easy to escape from. One of the well known prisoners (to the Swedes) who was a lady who in the words of the narrator had "plenty of suitors" wink! wink!, and involved in the murder of my boy, Gustave III. He was stabbed in the Royal Opera House which had built and she was supposed to have had a hand in it. She didn't serve hard time since she had a spacious cell, and maids, cooks and butlers. She was released with the help of "one of her male suitors"

The narration points out that in 1960 the inner cities or older buildings were torn down and in their place were building we see today, to our eyes, they look like those in Eastern Berlin, square and dead looking.

The city in order to support the poor, allotted a long stretch on one of its islands to the poor people for small plots so they could grow vegetables. They dot the coast line and they look like our community garden and many other plots we've seen in other countries.

A good, fun filled tour on a bright day. To top it off, we walked into along a row of chestnut trees lined with boccie courts to a world series of boccie teams, lots of cheering, good Swedish food and, of course, beer because Stockholm is a city of boozers!!

FAMOUSUNCLEART

Whenever you travel to a new place, people will tell you that "You must see...." The two we've heard of were Vassa and The Open Air Museum. Hey, they were right.

The Vassa Museum is large, made of wood and has two large masts jutting into the sky, it looks like a ship which isn't going anywhere. In my profound ignorance, I thought it was a museum about many ships. I was wrong. It is about one boat, an ill fated boat called Vassa.

It was a warship built by King Gusttavus II Adolphus in 1625 for the Thirty Years War and it took him three years to do it. I often wondered by it took 30 years for the war and now I know--every ship, every gun, and every overseas moment took time, lots of time.

Gus II Adophus had built a monster craft, the hull constructed from a thousand oak trees--not just any oak trees, but those which fit the shape of where it was needed, it had 64 huge canons, and guilded figures and painted sculpture. The cannons were to kill and the figures to scare and ridicule the enemy. There was one, ornate and grotesque sculpture of a Catholic Prelate, the Swedes were Lutheran.

Vassa, which stands for wheat or a wreath of wheat--Vassa met a tragic and unnecessary end.
It laid at the bottom of the Baltic sea for centuries and was raised only recently in the 50's (this past century) and this museum was constructed just for it.

When I walked into the museum, I said "Oh My God!" . The ship loomed over me like the Colossus of Rhodes . It was awesome in its size alone. The length of it is 69 metres, the width is 12 metres, and the height is 53 metres. You'll have to do the math. Regardless in metres or feet, it is huge.

A film showing how difficult to raise the boat and the years, about thirty years it took to clean all detritus, keep the wood from rotting, and you can imagine the rest. I will not pile on facts, but you must, if you are in Stockholm, you must come to see it.

One detail I learned is where the word "head" navy talk for toilet came from. The sailors had small pitchers for latrine and the style was called beak heads. Whew, aren't you glad I told you.

Oh I didn't tell you how it sunk. Heroically, In the 30 years war in a decisive battle? No! At her launching, a strong wind hit the sails, she righted herself and as she approached near where I am sharing a home, she keeled over and sunk to the bottom and laid there for almost five centuries. Her voyage was 1,300 metres. Why did she sink, ? The ballast in the hold wasn't heavy enough to cover the weight above decks. I still don?t know if Sweden won the thirty years war!

I was wrong about Vassa containing a lot of boats, and when I went to Skansen, the Open Air Museum which has old homes in it, I thought it was like Disneyland with modern replicas of olden homes. It wasn't.

It was founded in 1891 and I couldn?t find out who founded it but it is large some 300,000 square metres, and it would take a full day to cover all the grounds. All the old buildings are original but there is some modern reconstructed where major pieces are lost, At an old farm house which was built in the mid 1400?s we learned that the museum prevented the extinction of a breed of pigs who since their ears were far back in their heads, didn?t suffer from frostbite since the ears didn?t get wet when they ate.. complex sentence but you get the idea.

There were buildings of printing presses, bakeries, tailors, etc. And at each the work was done with the tools of the time and not any modern tools. I was struck about the concept at a home, a woman dressed in costume was simply carving a small doll out of a wooden block. She wasn?t doing it as a gimmick, she was concentrating and I got the sense she was carving because she enjoyed it.

There were four allotment shacks which contained a table, a few chairs and a stove. These shacks were made for the people who attended the vegetable plots allotted by the state so poor people could have food. The school house had the similar lots for the teacher, who was low paid-even then, could have her own vegetables. And, of course, used them to teach her students. Oh yeah!

indytravel

FamousUncleArt. Glad to hear from you again. Hopefully you've adjusted to the midnight sun.

I thought the Vasa was incredible too. The low lighting to help the preservation efforts gave it a spooky, eerie feel. I kept expect ghosts of pirates and sailors to swarm the decks.

By any chance are you going to the popular music museum? My biggest disappoint was the museum was closed for the 4 days I was there due to the first day of summer holiday. I really, really wanted to see the ABBA exhibit.

The first day of summer is this Monday June 21st. When I asked a hotel clerk about the holiday she said, "It's just another excuse for Swedes to get drunk." So perch a flower wreath on your head and join the festivities.

Speaking of alcohol you might try the Ice Bar in the Nordic hotel. It's near the main train station. You get to drink vodka cocktails from tumblers made from ice, while wearing a silver parka.

http://www.nordichotels.se/doc.open....amp;StructID=2

yeadonite

Indy you come up with the best ideas! I will try and drag him to the bar it looks like a blast! I am having a great time listening to ABBA on the radio. I dont know if the Musikmuseet is on the schedule. Tomorrow we might do Sigtuna.

FAMOUSUNCLEART

The village of Vaxholm was written up as ?The Gateway to the archipelago? in a Turistbyrå pamphlet. Turistbyrå stands for Tourist Bureau. It was replete with photos of comely couples at a beaches basking in the sun and the caption ?the waters are always inviting.? The final touch was there was a ?bustling mixture of people, motor yachts, sailing boats-both and ancient ,of course the much loved steamships?.



Sounded perfect, and we went to the docks, and got on a steamship called Storskår. It was ancient and lovely. There was a long line of non-tourists embarking, they made bee lines to the best spaces. The ferry users would put a backpack on the seat next to them so nobody could sit there . It reminded me of New York. Connie and I found seats in the rear of and the botttom of the boat.



The Storskår started with a rumble and a lurch and we were on our way to the gateway to the archipelagoes.. The aft room was pleasant although crowded, the windows low on the ship were slightly covered with a red scalloped fabric. I could see that the lighting fixtures were originally designed for gas flames and then adapted for electric light.



The ship was built with a deep red mahogany wood with a bright luster. It looked as if it would fit an Agatha Christie mystery and I could imagine Hercule Poirot wandering the ship. There was a dining room which had four or five tables and immediately they were crowded and some passengers came down to our level laden with plates of herring and Carlings Beer.



Our level, the bottom of Storskår, offered us a view of the water, since we were a foot or two above the water line, we saw mostly the waves splashing right under our window. We wanted a broader view and we went up to the second level and went out on the gangway and it gave us the best view of the islands.



The Storskar was not a cruise boat alone but more a cruise/ferry boat since we made three stops to drop off people and provisions for the summer residents. Their homes were not crowded and the homes grandly built and brightly painted were designed for a summer?s pleasure and they fit the bill.



The islands were heavily covered with forest, and the trees were much like birch trees but the foliage was at the top of the tall straight trees, seventeen or eighteen feet high, and the homes peeked like playful colourful winks through the austere forest.. There was little or no activity to see, no swimmers, and although many of the homes were on the lake?s edge, I did not see many piers.



The people on the islands could signal the ship to stop by raising a disc on the main pier. When skipper was about to stop, he would blast the horn three times and pull up to the dock. When the Storskar left, it left in reverse, and chugged which vibrated the old ship like a ?fasten your seat belt turbulence? until it was ready to sail forward.



The ship was built in 1908 and was, of course, operating on a regular schedule, albeit the trip was slightly longer than the return ship, a modern monster called the Cinderella which didn?t have the class that Sgtorskar. It has been operating for nearly a century and the ride on it captured the past with elegance.



Connie and I agreed the boat trip to Vaxholml was the best part of the trip. In all fairness, it was a cold windy day which we hadn?t anticipated but there wasn?t excitement in Vaxholm that day. The waters were not, as advertised,?inviting.? The food at the famous restaurant was ordinary food, a salmon like dish for Connie and I had the herring. However, I found the herring at the food stand much better. The shops were pedestrian, and the homes were not very exciting. I expected to see beautifully designed beach homes much like those in the islands around New York. The homes here were boxy, some brightly painted but rather dull. There was one exception, a bright yellow mansion with a carefully trimmed garden and a sign reading Private Property No Trespassing. I, of course, passed the tres , went on and took a photo. I noticed the iron gates had a royal symbol on it. I was lucky that I wasn't arrested or worse shot. But that was the most exciting event on Vaxholm..which is pronounced Waxshom.. sound like Pat Nirito in The Karate Kid. Wax on! Wax off. I feel like I Wax offed Vaxholm



However, the ride out to the ?Gateway to the Archipelago? was worth the whole trip

More later.

indytravel

Thanks for the update Art. You're my kind of visitor. I'd much prefer the older, chugging Grand Dame of a boat to the modern boring one.

Your Hercule Poirot reference made me think of all those Agatha Christie novels I read. I figure if I wait 20 more years I can read them all again and not remember "whodunit".

FAMOUSUNCLEART

Sigtuna, a name of a village in Sweden but everybody who should know did not know how to get there or even to get to the city where a boat supposedly took you to Sigtuna. We had a brochure describing how to get there but we left it at home. Bad enough to forget something in your home but it can be a disaster to do it while on holiday. It was, ironically, the most perfect day, bright and not a sight or thought of a drop of rain, and, more irony, it was the first day we had gotten over our Midnight Sun-lag and we were up early and ready to see Sigtuna.

We got wrong or no helpful information from the staff at the Centraal Station, trekked through the lovely sun which now decided to get mean. We spotted a sign which we thought was were the boat to Sigtuna was supposed to leave, up three flights of stairs, on a street in the highway overhead and walking midst some weird characters who were either junkies or down and outers and we forgot to take our bottles of coke and water.

Finally, we spotted a kiosk which sold boat tickets but, you guessed it, they didn?t go to Sigtuna but had a lovely tour of a place where Viking ships were discovered. We said we?d like that and were told there is only one boat and it leaves at 9:30 tomorrow.

We trekked back to the Centraal Station, I went to one information desk and Connie to another, we both got information that there is no boat to Sigtuna (I vow I will never eat another can of tuna at this point) we must take a train and the next one is in ten minutes.
We hasten to the ticket counter and got our number 515. However, 454 or something like was on the board, we would never make the train in ten minutes. We decided that if we had to wait an hour, we would not go to Sigtuna.

Got to the window, a lovely woman told us that we had to go downstairs and catch a bus there which would take us to Sigtuna. Connie and l looked at each other nodded our heads?no way are we going downstairs to the bus.

We went to the Modern Museum, sat in the patio had a small lunch and enjoy watching all the boats going to Sigtuna or some lovely place.

We decided to visit the Ice Bar at the suggestion of indytravel. We got there at 3:30 in the afternoon and beat the Absolute In Crowd, We were given a heavy parka with a lined hood, and gloves and we into a locked door section and finally into the bar which was six degrees below zero. Everything was made of ice, even a cow (part of a city wide cow collection, painted different colors)

We slide up to the bar since an earlier drinker had spilled their drink. It was easy to do since our glasses were square with a hole about the size of a silver dollar. I asked for Absolute on the rocks and the bartender, a frosted young fellow, said ?This is Absolute in the rocks.? I am sure it was his standard joke but we laughed just to see our breath hover in the frozen air.
We took pictures of each other, the bartender took pictures of us and people peering through the solid ice window took pictures.

After a time, we were hysterical and the fact that we never got to Sigtuna didn?t matter because we made our own Sigtuna.

We?re off to Talinn in Estonia and then Helsinki in Finland..hopefully there will an on line service.

FAMOUSUNCLEART

Tallinn, Estonia

The first reaction I had to Regina Baltica was how big she was. I should have realized that she would be large since there were a string of cars waiting patiently to get into her hold.
She looked more than able to ferry us on the fourteen hour trip to Tallinn, Estonia. Originally, we had booked one suite , but after some soul-searching, I realized that the two of us in a small cabin for 14 hours would be a disaster so we changed our reservation to a single room for each.

The suite was, of course, very small, a cleverly combined toilet-shower , two rough towels, and a soap dispenser. The toilet paper could be used to sand down some of the wooden frames. There was an upper bed much like the one in Some Like It Hot. I opened to see if Jack Lemmon or Marilyn Monroe would pop up. They didn?t.. My Monroe-less bed was about the size and comfort of an army cot. I felt at home.

I grew up on Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies where they met and romanced on an ocean liner, and their suites were large enough for the Rockettes to dance in and, of course, there was a huge window and one could see the romantic moon shining on the ocean. But not here on Regina Baltica! No space. No window. Reality sinks in...just as long as Regina pull a Titantic..

Regina is used mainly to carry Swedes to Estonia so they can buy ,buy, buy! The prices were much cheaper and are no State Liquor stores. She has three decks, the first had a Duty Free shop, a cafeteria, and a reception desk to get English answers to stupid questions.

On the second there was a very French looking and always nearly empty restaurant, a buffet, much live those in Atlantic City. It had a lounge with a lounge act, a solo man with a guitar who could sing badly in five languages.

There was a casino on the third level.. I was delighted to hear that while we were boarding. However, it consisted of a black jack table, an American roulette table, and six or seven slot machines. I did not spend much time there.

There is a ?Nightclub? on the third level. It had a large dance floor, and an orchestra which played country and western and mid fifties Glenn Miller music. The old Swedes did very well as jitterbugs. I wanted to join them. I also wanted to join the younger Swedes in the disco they were a spiral staircase and some sixty years away.

We arrived in Tallinn on a slate grey, dark day which fitted the town since it had a look of a 50?s black and white news reel report of a Mayday parade in Russia. They built the colorless uninviting, buildings near the boat harbors..

Our hotel, the Reval Hotel Express, was a short walk from where Regina was docked. Although painted white and blue, it was, I suspected, built by the Russians. It was not your Holiday Inn. We got there around ten in the morning .Our room wasn?t ready and wouldn?t be ready until noon something I heard often during my working travel days. We decided to go into Tallinn.

At this point, I must say that I went overseas and returned in uncomfortable troopships and never got seasick. As I walked to the town, I wobbled and put it down to my adjusting to solid ground after the voyage. We sat in a side-walk cafe facing the wonderful town square.
I was feeling queasy but thought I would feel better after ate. I am sure it was not sea sickeness.
As we waited for our breakfast-lunch, I heard a loud noise, and saw a table in a near by restaurant tumble into the street with a clatter. It was followed by a bedrabbled young man of twenty or so who, I suspected was drunk. He fell with a concrete thud on the cobble-stone public square. A waitress stepped down, picked up the table. She ignored the supine man who appeared unconscious. The square was fairly crowded but nobody paid attention to him.. (Which I must say included us) In Manhattan it would have attracted a small but verbal crowd. He lay mostly unnoticed until about twenty minutes later when an ambulance came, picked him up and took him away.

I quickly finished eating, and since I didn?t feel well, I wanted to go back to our hotel and rest up. It still wasn?t noon, but Connie told the clerk that I was sick and we got the room. It was adequate, it did have a window with a view of a gas station.. The best feature was it had a working television and we thought of spending our two days watching CNN and BBC news. We resisted that temptation. Connie went into the old town of Tallinn, scouted it and we saw it together after we had returned from Helsinki (I?ll describe that trip and the trip back to Stockholm in a following email.).

If you are ever near Tallinn make a dedicated effort to see it before it becomes a major American tourist stop. See it before it becomes like Brugge which once was delightful but now is a commercial disaster.
Talinn is a wonderfully well preserved un spoiled old town.. We went there early on Midsummer?s Eve which is a holiday. Tallinn was relatively empty and we got to see these remarkable old buildings .A pharmacy was still in business in the same building since 1422.!

The old town is preserved because of an economic fluke. The Russians wanted to replace the old town with a Soviet-style city, but they never got around to it. After the war there was no money to modernize and the buildings remain relatively untouched.

There are many restaurants, shops and churches. We went into an Orthodox church and the incense smell evoked memories of going to the Greek Orthodox Church in Philadelphia and being frightened by the icons featuring how I would suffer in hell if I didn?t behave. There were women begging for money, the stood on the steps, holding out baskets, heads nodded as if they didn?t want us to look them in the eye. I had seen the same begging by women in front of Notre Dame but they were verbal pleading and crying. Here, silence and your own conscience. Although it occurs to me that the church should be taking care of the poor.

There is modern building going on in the town but when the building is completed, there are open parts revealing the ancient foundation. Walled cities always fascinate me, the ones which are preserved in Tallinn are excellent with its gates and towers (29 of them) Again, we?re struck with how they were built. The stones are not of equal size or shape, we get the sense that they were built in a hurry and used anything to repel the Vikings.

After a day- long tour of the town, we ate at a Russian style restaurant, and ancient the town was the restaurant was au courant, the food was haute cuisine. I had broccoli soup and warm trout on toast and Connie had a penne salad. They were served in modern Swedish plates, white big as a Frisbee and with a scoop design which made it look as if the food would slip into your un-napkinned lap. The restaurant was unisex when it came to WC. It was like Russian roulette, hopefully, there wasn?t someone o f the opposite sex sitting or standing.
Also, there was a gentleman, swarthy, smoking a cigar, high up on a stool writing on a laptop and mouthing what he was writing as he slowly typed. I wonder if he were doing an email journal.

Connie points out that in this ancient place there are many areas of Wi-Fi sets and, of course, everybody uses cell phones. The modern meets the ancient in many ways.

We got back to our hotel, sat on an outside table and watched young boys and girls playing a form of football. Connie wanted some chocolate milk and thought they might have some at the gas station which was a modern convenience store. They did not have chocolate milk, they had fire logs, charcoal, oil, engine detergent, sodas, ice cream, wine and at the check-out you could buy all the liquor you wanted before you drove off. No chocolate milk.

indytravel

Thanks for the update Art. Glad you started feeling better quickly.

I'm one of those who wears a patch in 1 foot swells when the trip is only an hour.

I'm looking forward to your impressions of Helsinki.

FAMOUSUNCLEART

We left Estonia by boat to Helsinki. Our boat was a catamaran, called the Tallink Autoexpress, a voyage of roughly and hour and a half. Fast! The interior looked like an airplane, padded comfortable chairs, and if you pushed the recline button, you didn?t smash the knee caps of the silvered hair sweet old lady behind you. Even when you flushed the toilet, it made that fierce schlooping sound.
About half-way through the trip, I dozed off and there must have been strong waves and it felt exactly like the turbulence on a plane. I broke out in a cold sweats when it happed four or five times. I tried to fasten my seat belt, but of course there wasn?t any. I felt like a complete idiot until I notice another passenger looked as frightened as I was. We landed safely..I mean we docked safely.

Euros are the currency in Finland, Connie had two hundred euros, and we found the number 15 bus to take us into the city. She handed 100€ to the driver. He said gruffly ?No change. No change.? We jumped out of the bus, ran into the wharf, got to a money exchange, broke the C note and raced back to the bus. He was waiting for us, we got on, paid our way and asked if the bus went to the centrum of Helsinki. He said ?No? We were crestfallen until he explained to us that we had to get the metro (underground) at a certain stop. He announced the stop to us. At first, I thought it was a bad beginning but it turned out well.

Our bus ticket was good to get us on the metro. Me, the veteran traveller, looked at a wall map and said we must go six or seven stops to ?Centrum?. An older man, not near my age, interrupted us and pointed out that the Railway Centrum, two stops away, was were we wanted to go. When we got off, he directed us to the proper exit for the railway station. Helsinki was looking much better.

We heard there was a excellent sight-seeing bus, at the station. Since we had only about seven hours, we decided to do that and then opt on what features we wanted to see. There was one obstacle?there were no sight-seeing bus at the station. Usually, they are usually at most railway stations. We asked some people with no luck.

When I want information, I have found that best source is in a hotel . We saw a Holiday in and a young woman not only told us where to get the bus stop?it was in front of the Kiasma, the Modern Museum of Art?she also gave us a map.

We just missed a bus, went into the Museum, used the WC which was free and did not make that schuppling sound., We knew we'd be on the bus for some time so we had a light snack of sandwiches, mine was goat?s milk cheese, Connie?s was mozzerella and tomato.

As we ate, we could see the sight seeing bus stop and worried that we might miss it, we took half of our uneaten sandwiches with us. A bus rolled up shortly after we got there and we got on. The driver told us that the round-trip was20€ per person, Connie made a face and complained to me that she thought that was a bit too high. (There was no sign giving the rate) The driver asked us more than once if we wanted a round-trip, that is, that we were planning to stay on the bus and not get off and on again. We said that is exactly what we wanted. He sidled up to us and offered the ride for 20€ for both of us. Of course, he could not give us a ticket and after we said we would, he muttered in his best conspiracy English ?No tell anybody about this.?

The tour was a good one, it gave us an oversight of what we wanted to see and some facts we did not know..for example 80 % of all ice breaker ships were made in Finland, a summer ritual was women come down to the beach to wash their rugs and one half of Finland was above the Artic Circle.. We did not want to roam through the ?Exciting Flea Market? since it looked like people selling there old clothes at a charity function.

We went to the Temppliaukion Kirkko, or the Rock Church. It doesn?t have a rock band but the church was blasted out of solid rock in about 1969 and has a 14 mile long copper ribbon above the congregation. It doesn?t look like a church, it almost, to me, looked like a bomb shelter and is on street level. They didn?t want you to ?climb up to God? but He is on our level.

There was a ceremony with a Japanese choir and I found the church a very comfortable one. The cooper dome is supposed to make one think of eternity and on sunny days it should remind one of God?s love. The church is illuminated by natural light. No matter what your religion is or, if you are an agnostic, it is a peaceful and comforting place to be.

The Lutheran Cathedral was at the top of a hill, and my legs were giving out on me, Connie made the trek up to see it. The Lutheran population, however, is a very small one, and reflects the diversity of Finland which was dominated by the Swedes, then the Russians. I felt the Russian influence the most?especially in the buildings which had the look of St.Petersburg without, thank God, the cold.

The Market Square was thriving on the clear and getting warmer every minute day. We strolled through the produce market, commenting how high the prices were. It explained why the Finns went to Tallinn.

We also strolled past the three blacksmiths statue. There are the three about to and almost striking the anvil. It reminded me of a Sid Ceaser sketch where blacksmiths in a clock tower hit each other when the clock broke down. The locals say ?If a virgin walks by, they?ll actually strike the anvil.? We waited and waited. They didn?t. We left.

Connie was more at home at Stockmann?s , Finland?s Macy's..no, not Macy, some Fifth Avenue Store. I sat next to another geezoid waiting for the shoppers to finish. We sat in front of the pastry section, the sweet smell of those crispy fruit-filled mounds of delight was almost too much for us,till his wife came and dragged him away. Connie bought two strawberry pastries and on the plane...oops, on the boat back to Tallinn, she said they it was the worst-tasting pastry she?s ever had. Later, she reluctantly confessed she was lying in the hopes that i would not want the remaining pastry. I ate it. It was superb.

indytravel

Connie is a woman of my own kind. I'll lie for good food too.

I'm glad you liked Helsinki. I think it has some great architecture. I also read that sometimes a movie will want a "Russian" looking place without the hassle of Russia so they'll use the big plaza in front of the Lutheran cathedral.