Hello all,

This weekend I did a little exploring. Saturday morning I woke up early and called my supervisor to see what I was doing this week. The equipment is still in the States, so it looks like I won't be leaving until Tuesday. I then caught a train to Porvoo. It was one of the old school ones, so it was pretty neat. The town is about 50 KM away, so it took about an hour to get there. Porvoo is the second oldest town in Finland and got its name from a ground fortress, which no longer exists. Everything in the town is made out of wood, so most things have burnt down, but there still is an "old town" area, which are mostly buldings from the 17th century. I explored the town on foot and I went to all the neat little shops, and checked out the hand crafts and paintings. I then did a walking tour of the town to make sure I would see everything, as I was only there for 4 hours. The streets are all cobblestone and I'm surprised I made it through the day without breaking an ankle. There were red orchre merchent sheds, a beautiful catherdal and lots of old wooden and stone houses. They are actually expanding the city a bit and the new houses that are being built on the west bank are built in wood, so that it would go with the old town area. At 4 pm I took the J.L. Runeberg steamship back to Helsinki. It was a 3 1/2 hour cruise. I was sitting on the top deck but was freezing my behind off, so I went and wandered around. I was in search of food, but found a nice spot on the rail in the sun so I stood there the last 3 hours. There was an accordian player right behind me. So I was looking and a guy went to give me the words, but they were in Sweedish, so I had no idea what they were singing. It still sounded nice:) Anyways, I think the guy was happy to practice his English because he talked to me the hole ride home and told me what the different views were of and everything. When we got off, we went to an American restaurant. It was the best food I had eaten. It was a western joint and I should have gotten the steak, but I got a ceasar salad and it tasted more mayonaisy then garlic or ceasary...after dinner I continued my quest for clean underpants. I walked all around to find a laundry mat and nothing :( So i was talking to my Finnish msn buddy and he said he could activate it for me if I don't get a cell phone this week:) hopefully I'll figure something out soon:)

Today, I went to the Post Museum and checked out their collection :) It was very interesting they had a lot of historical stuff there. However, it was not as nice as the one in Canada because the one in Canada has their stamps displayed better. Here they were like in a filing cabinet in the wall that you had to pull them out in order to look at them all:(

I then headed to the market and took a ferry to Suomenlinna. Suomenlinna is a 250-year-old series of fortifications and hence a major monement of military architecture:) It's included on UNESCO’s World Heritage List.

I walked around the island for a bit and saw the king's gate, the church, and the tomb of Augustin Ehrensvärd. I'll probably go back, as I wasn't there for long. I was getting tired and had to get groceries before the store closed at 8 pm. There was also lots of people there sunbathing, and picnicing. Oh, it would be such a nice spot for that :) I never thought of it. Instead of wasting a precious pair of underpants, I should have worn my bathing suit:) But I also discovered that speedos should be illegal :) They aren't very flattering on the best of bodies and leave nothing to the imagination.

I made it back home just in time (30 min. before the store closed). I got hot dogs:) At least that is what I think I bought. It makes sense because the weiners came in a 5 pack, but the buns came in a 4 pack. Why do they always do that??? I know at home its a 12 pack of weiners and an 8 pack of buns:) The buns were hard as rocks though. They must have been imported from somewhere...like Cuba because they were that stale. On the upside, I bought some ice cream...mmmmmm European ice cream. Its actually cheaper then the crap we get at home:)

Anyways, I should go to bed:)

XOXOXO
Krissy

Pictures:

1. Nostalgic train I took to Porvoo
2. View of Porvoo
3. Old town hall or the Porvoo historical museum
4. Cobblestone street (which I survived without injuries)
5. Old Cathedral. The inside was gorgeous. The wood was painted to look like green marble and it sure fooled me:)
6. Merchant storage houses
7. J.L Runeberg steamboat type boat that I took home. This picture was actually taken when It came to port at 2 pm. The guy I met is actually in the picture. He's the one in the yellow shirt sitting at the bow (Is this what you call this?).
8. The new part of Porvoo that is being built on the west side of the bank.
9. An old wooden house. They were very thrifty back in the day. This house used half of the churches wall for its left side of the house:)
10. Some building.....I forget what this one is...I'll find out:)
11. Trisha will like this one. They couldn't afford to put windows in every where, so they made "fake" ones to keep the "symmetry" of the building. I also noticed that on some buildings they still had mirrors...I forget the name of the thing...but anyways, it's so they can watch a "soap opera." They didn't have a TV, so it was used to keep them informed of the happenings of the street. This would be interesting to have in Emily's condo area..with all the weird things I hear going on there :)
12. Pharmcist's sundial. This was brought into the town by an architect, but no one could afford it. One night the Pharmacist sat down with the architect and said he would buy it for the town. The next day he had no knowledge of agreeing to it, so some merchants came up with some money to buy it for the town, but they wanted to call it the "Pharmacist's Sundial" so he would never forget that he had agreed to buy it:)
13. Suomenlinna-The sea fortress
14. Another view of Suomenlinna
15. The tomb of Augustin Ehrensvärd
16. Another view of the fortification
17. Another view of the fortification
18. Another view of the fortification
19. The King's Gate