Picturing Turku or You Mean You're Open In October!!!

Today we were off taking a day trip to the old capital of Finland, Turku. For centuries Finland was a province of Sweden and Turku was its capital. When the Russians conquered Finland from the Swedes they moved the capital to a less Swedish influenced city, Helsinki.

THE thing in Turku is its castle. The origins date back to the 13th century as a wooden structure, it was continuously added to and developed throughout the Middle Ages and on into the Renaissance period.

Here we see the structure with both its Medieval and Renaissance sections.

It was completely derelict until a group of locals after WWII undertook to have it completely rebuilt and restored under the guidance of a father/daughter architect and interior design team. It is one of the best castle museums I've been to...and I've been to a lot!

Of course as we approached we noticed...

CONSTRUCTION, our nemisis.

Would we be turned away yet again?

No! It was open!

Yay Turku!

Here is a set of shots from the inner courtyard and walls of the castle

 

The museum had a neat set of models which showed how the construction took place over the centuries.

This model showed how the groined arches were built

And how they look in fact

In the interior were all kinds of exhibits and artwork

Some of the artwork had you thinking you were actually being watched

Ever wonder how things looked to the dragon as St. George was taking him (or her) down?

There were a number of extremely well restored wall paintings (hard to find these from the Middle Ages)

And tapestries

Wife holding up the royal chapel built in the 18th century

Then it was on into town for the second big thing in Turku it's Cathedral. Built originally as a Catholic church in the Gothic style it is now Luthern. It looked really spectacular against the Fall colors

Interiors

Another shot of the determined photographer

And our Sign of the Day

No Flash Photography of People's Palms?

Never In October or Down And Out In The Alund

The Alund is the southern coast of Finland. Historically it was associated with the Swedes going back to the days of the Vikings and even today, Swedish is the predominate language here. And it is an area noted for being a home of vacationers and tourists...In the Season...the Season NOT being after the start of October.

We left Helsinki in the morning, took a cab and an airport bus to the airport to pick up a rental car. All that went smooth. It was a two and a half hour drive from Helsinki Airport to where we were looking to do our touring, the Turku Archipelago, a chain of islands with supposedly all kinds of interesting things to see.

We had researched a number of places to go to but only made it to two. Partially because it took longer for us to get there and partially because it took forever to find a place to eat lunch because so many things were closed.

Our targets of opportunity

The Sadness of 'Out-of-Season'

 

 

And yet there was a 15th century church with all kinds of interesting visual aspects

Beautiful fall colors

And interesting buildings

Tomorrow we go to the old historic capital of Turku so we'll see if our luck turns

 

The Way Of The Tram or Trial By Ice

You know we de-I Clan, we loves our trams. Cities with tram lines seem to us to be the easiest to navigate via public transit. Metro lines, you are underground, don't see anything, always have to negotiate the station when you arrive to figure out where the heck you are. Buses, they're always a million of them. They have many more stops. They take more twists and turns and are easier to get confused as far as direction. But trams, there are usually fewer of them, there are fewer stations, most trans systems clearly announce the stations on visual signage, and you see more of the city while you are going.

In Helsinki they have a specific 'tour by tram' itinerary' making use of two of the tram lines. Wife and I thought this would be a great way to see more of the city and get lots of photo ops. The only problem was it was freaking cold! The high today was only 46 Fahrenheit/8 Celsius and it was colder than that most of the day. Plus it was windy. So it was not pleasant. But Wife and I are nothing if not persistent tourists and we did our best.

Back at the Tuomiokirkko

 

 

A study of the Camera Yoda as she sizes up a picture

A statue of Czar Alexander II

As the Finns hate the Russians, I'm not quite sure why this is still here

This building's name means 'North' or it is the 'north' side of it I guess

I doubt if this guy was the model for the faces but he could have been

The World of Tramming 

The Temppeliaukio Church

Built right into rock

And on to the Opera

A building we were not that impressed with

Another 'must see' is the tower at the Olympic Stadium and Sports Museum.

We spent almost an hour trying to find and get to this in the frigid, windy cold only to find.

COMPLETELY CLOSED DUE TO MASSIVE CONSTRUCTION

This picture hardly shows the amount of wandering we did trying to get around the construction.

Near the historic Hakaniemi Market

A statue entitled 'Maternal Love'

The oldest operating cafe in Helsinki

The Roman Catholic Cathedral (significantly smaller than the others)

And last but not least another installment of Signage of the World

Don't Spit or Spray Saliva While Shouting!

Tomorrow we leave Helsinki and head for the Southern Finnish Coast!