Monday, July 19, 2010

Enjoying Finnish hospitality!

Monday July 19, 2010
Well, we have been gone from home a full week now and so much has happened it is hard to know where to start. Of course, our flight over to Helsinki went very well and our baggage arrived at the same time we did, but we never expect this miracle to happen. Hanna and Tommi were waiting for us at the airport, and we were happy to get to their house to relax after traveling for about 20 hours (although the flight was only 14 hours). Jet lag was a problem, but a bigger problem was the length of daylight, so it did take us a good 5 days to get around to Helsinki time. Below Jerry, Tommi and Hanna wave from the top of a lookout tower in the town of Kotka, close to Helsinki.

On Wednesday we drove east to Kotka to stay at Hanna's parent's summer cottage on the Gulf of Finland. It is a really wonderful, rustic (electricity but no running water) cottage right on the water where we enjoyed late nights, good food, saunas and swimming in the warm 28 degree Celsius water. Hanna and Tommi have three very nice children. Below their eldest, Effie, is picking wild blueberries to make a tart which we enjoyed later with vanilla cream...... yum!
 

We are off to tour around Helsinki now, so I will continue this post later.

1 comment:

Pat Shaughnessy said...

Gosh Kathy, that all sounds so exciting! How nice of Tommi & Hanna to personally show you that part of the world. A real plus to meet their children too. You seem to be having a great time! Keep posting. No Charles yet.
Love, Mom