The land of the midnight sun, saunas and berries (Finland)

5 litres of blueberries... Yum!

Walking into Helsinki is like stepping into a fairytail. On every corner there is a castle like building, with turrets as balconies and the city is surrounded by water. The people are georgously friendly. The general vibe of the city is long and lazy, it smells of an endless summer day. Helsinki is a great place to roll into for two souls who have just spent 3 days traveling.

The history of the city is that it was built after a war between Sweden and Russia. I dont know who won the war, but the compromise seems to be that the buildings are all Russian Tsar like and the sign posts are written in both Finish and Swedish!

One of the Tsar "castles"

Helsinki city

Washing day in Helsinki - These are shirts dangling from the art gallery

The markets are abuzz with vibrant colour and delicous food - everyone eating berries and peas! In 1 afternoon we have fallen in love with this city, where the strawberries are as big as peaches, the raspberries the size of strawberries and the people all blonde and tanned.

The secret to that georgous scandenavian tan becomes obvious - all everyone does here is sunbake. The parks and nature strip are dotted with people pulling up picnics and towels and bikinis and books - soaking up enough vitamin D to last all year. I curse my pasty white skin, I am the only one seeking out the shade and already have sunburn. 

For dinner Matt has reindeer with ligon berries and we settle into the hoidy-goidyness of it all getting a little tipsi from 1 beer (well I do!). I tried to pay for the meal with a baht that Mel gave me to spend on a mango when we get to Thailand, much to the entertainment of Matt and the waitress. We then walk back out into the sunshine and pop on our sunglasses at 11pm!

We next head to a little farm town called Myrskylä where we are staying with the lovely Morgensterns (a family I lived with in Germany 10yrs ago, the kids in our families have been houseswaping ever since!)

The summer cottage near the lake

If Helsinki was like a fairytale, then counrtyside Finland must resemble a page out of an Enid Blyton book - the woods are very Enchanted Forest like and the farm houses are yellow and red and blue.

The berry kabab (thredded onto a blade of grass) that finish children use to carry the wild berries

Berry pickin' in the woods

Our days on their organic strawberry farm are filled with swimming in one of the many clear lakes, moutain biking, hiking and berry picking and getting nourished by Varinas AMAZING organic food. So far we have had berries with every meal - ligon berry jam, blueberry juice, pie and sorbet, strawberry muesli, seabuckthorn jam YUUMMM! We pick blueberries from the forest floor, and munch on the tiny wild strawberries that we find. And .. there is herbal medicine growing ALL over the place! We have had calendula flowers in the blueberry sorbet, borage and dandelion in the salad! My herb nerd self is getting a little bit excited!!

  

The strawberry picking contraption

Twice a week we spend an hour in the sauna - the men go 1st and drink a beer and solve all the worlds problems. We use the branches from the birch trees to stimulate our lymphatics and then sit outside on the varander to cool off...completely nude!

We have 1 more week here, where the dinner table converstation is lively and colourful and spoken in three different languages, then off to Sweden!

XoX 
- Sboot and Mboot













                                                                                                            xox S-Boot