Travel Diary

Hours later cruising along the sea, my dad woke me as he was returning from taking sunrise photos. He advised getting a few shots myself, but I was still exhausted and also figured that the sunset photos I had taken the night before would be about the same (I mean they often are). I’d later discover that the sunrise opportunity actually allowed for much better pictures. Ah, well.

At around 6am, we finished zig-zagging through the small little islands (there are so many of them), disembarked and found ourselves in Turku, a medium sized port city in southwest Finland. It was very early in the morning, so there wouldn’t be much to do. Wouldn’t hurt to head over to the hotel. Though how to get there? No Uber would be available in a smaller Finnish town at this time. We inquired and found that the bus was the best way to go.

Taking the bus, we got dropped off near the hotel. Reception wasn’t open yet, so we sat around a small cafe and had some coffee. When the hotel opened, we stored our bags.

Well most of them.

Andy had forgotten his backpack at the train station, so our next trip was taking the bus right back to the ferry port. It’s fun to have a mission! From there, we found the ferry terminal and checked with lost and found. They had the bag and owner and bag were once again united.

We also got to experience some fine Finnish rain. Luckily (or sagely), I had my umbrella. An August in Finland doesn’t guarantee sunny skies.

Turku Castle would be our first visit, though it wasn’t open just yet, so we toured around the gardens for a spell. They were not too elaborate but the tranquility of the early morning was relaxing. Finally, it was almost time to open. We entered the courtyard and became one of the first groups of people to go inside for the day.

The castle was great. So, so much to explore. A lot of information about the history was noted and we spent a deal of time wandering around. Luckily, photography was allowed. There seemed to even be another museum (or several) inside the castle near the end of the main tour. Suffice it to say, there were far more exhibits to see than we had time for. One gets his money’s worth in that place. You could spend half a day there at least.

But we had other places to be.

Once outside, we returned up to the hotel and checked into the rooms. Then we headed up the street and to the Sibelius museum. Lots of information was presented about this famous composer that I had actually never heard of. One fascinating aspect of the museum was an old collection of different types of pianos and organs. There were many instruments I’d never seen before. But the history of the man himself was the main focus and there was a great deal surrounding his life and contributions to music. I listened to one of the sound samplings and it was very moving. Outside of the photographical aspects of travel, one of my highest treasures is experiencing music from different parts of the word--all starting with a string quintet playing Vivaldi in Venice back in 2000.

We strolled into a nice pub although they didn’t have much food, so it was just a stop for drinks--drinks being beers. We grabbed seats at the bar and ordered a round or two.

Then it was more walking around. I spotted a candy store so I quickly darted inside. The choices were seemingly endless, yet it was a sweetness overdose as I couldn’t decide on anything due to too many choices. Plus, there was then a line building as I was so indecisive. I darted back out again.

We crashed early as the day has been completely wringed out.