"Home" is nowhere near on the agenda yet. The moment we left our car behind and rode off on our loaded bikes, euphoria took over. Freedom! Holiday! Onwards to the Åland Islands!
Today, after a few days of cycling along the northern side of the islands, we arrived in Turku on Finland's west coast. We're staying two nights here before heading back along the southern route tomorrow, cycling the St Olav Waterway.
But let's rewind to the day we were supposed to set off for the Åland Islands, which turned out not to be the day we actually left…
It took some puzzling out where to leave the car and catch the boat. There were several options, but only one turned out to be a good spot to leave the car safely for an extended period: Kapellskär. We didn't dare book a ferry yet, as Remy was still feeling a bit fragile and coughing terribly. And I was coming down with a cold…
The next morning, though, we both felt fine. We had plenty of time, since the ferry wasn't due to leave until 10:45. I went to the booking website, and to our surprise the boat turned out to be fully booked. We hadn't seen that coming! There's always room for cyclists, we thought. So, one more day at the campsite it was. And we already had something to fill it with: a trip to Finsta.
The day before, driving to Kapellskär, we'd passed through Finsta. Along the roadside I spotted signs with a ghost on them, like the one in this photo [photo]. Remy thought it looked like the Grim Reaper. A little further on, another one, but this time I looked more closely. "St Birgitta," it read. Of course! The birthplace of St Birgitta of Sweden. I really should have known that. As someone who writes about Nordic pilgrim routes, you're supposed to know everything, and remember everything. As it happens, this particular writer is rather good at forgetting, especially about things she probably won't be writing about again. Except, apparently, right now.
Two years ago, Ria and I walked the St Birgitta Way in Sweden (see On Two Wheels dismounts). St Birgitta of Sweden (1303–1373) is one of the great saints of the Middle Ages, and since we happened to be nearby, we went to her home village of Finsta. The whole village revolves around her: there's a prayer grotto, a spring, a walking trail, and a church with the Birgitta Stone and an exhibition on her life. The place to be for anyone with an interest in her. The weather is glorious, and we take a lovely walk along the St Birgitta Path, then admire, with great interest, the shoes in the church said to be the ones she wore to walk to Santiago de Compostela and Rome.
The next day we finally got to do what we'd been looking forward to for so long: cycling! We took the ferry out of Sweden and arrived a few hours later on the Åland Islands. On board, we discovered we'd crossed not just a geographical border, but a time zone too, suddenly it was an hour later.
The Åland Islands, also known as the Åland archipelago, once belonged to Sweden, later to Russia, and have been Finnish since 1921. Åland is the largest island. It's our first time in Finland, but the transition doesn't feel like much of a leap, on the islands, people speak Swedish. Did you know the border here is rather remarkable? It runs through Märket Reef, an uninhabited rocky islet of just 3.3 hectares that's part of the Åland archipelago. Originally the border was a straight line, but when Åland became Finnish, it turned out the Finnish lighthouse (built by the Russians) stood on Swedish territory. To correct this, the border was redrawn around the lighthouse complex. "Why didn't the Finns just hand the lighthouse over to the Swedes?" Remy asked me. As I said, I don't know everything. What I did read is that, back in '85, an equally sized piece of Finnish territory was given to Sweden as compensation, which explains the odd shape of the border on the map below. There are 11 border markers on the island; number 7 marks the westernmost point of mainland Finland.
A few days later…
"Welcome to the Åland Islands, welcome to Jurmo!" says the friendly barman / supermarket-cashier / hostel-warden at the café (vandrarhem being Swedish for youth hostel). He's all three at once, and who knows what else besides. "Where are you from?" He knows the Netherlands from the football. "Rotterdam, The Hague, Amsterdam…" "Katwijk?" we ask. Oh yes, he knows Katwijk too! (Katwijk is next to Valkenburg, where we live) We're on the tiny island of Jurmo, the last of the Åland islands on our route, and are allowed to pitch our tent in the hostel garden, a beautiful old schoolhouse where time seems to have stood still. A man arrives on a bike. "Hang on, let me just mow the grass first!" A moment later he's sitting on a lawnmower.
By now we've had a few wonderful days of cycling behind us. The Ålanders are friendly and hospitable. Without fail we're asked where we're from, followed by a "welcome to the Åland Islands!" The landscape, too, is gentle and very cyclist-friendly. There are countless cycle paths and the roads roll along lightly. And the weather is firmly on our side, it couldn't really be otherwise, given the roadside signs everywhere warning us about "sun" ("Zon" in Dutch). We cover relatively few kilometres, as the ferries between the islands run at times that don't always suit us. That's a bit of a puzzle too, which ferry goes where, and when? But we work it out and arrive at the Finnish archipelago. Now it finally feels like we're really in Finland!
The Dutch word 'Zon', means sun... That's why we see everywhere 'warnings' for sun...
As a child, I'd probably have been quite delighted with Finland. As a three-year-old, so the story goes, I put a dot over every letter of my name. I'd noticed that in the newspaper, plenty of words had at least one letter with a dot above it, some even two, and not a single letter of my name had one. That wouldn't do. I even went and corrected the newspaper with a ballpoint pen. In Finland we see plenty of names and words with little dots, and lots of vowels strung together too. The words look strange to us, but luckily this region is bilingual, as the guide at the Olav Church in Jomala on Åland told us (yes, an Olav Church!). So we see many signs in both Finnish and Swedish, which helps us make sense of things.
What do we think of Finland? We're not quite sure yet. Our first morning on the Finnish mainland was rather overcast, and we spent the day cycling along busy roads, mostly into a stiff headwind. The Finns seem a bit reserved, but can we really say that after just two days? We'll give it a bit more time and stay an extra day in the city of Turku. Tomorrow we begin the journey back, via the St Olav Waterway.
The boat from Sweden arrived at Långnäs, where we immediately spotted signs for the St Olav Waterway. We’ve already cycled a short stretch towards the end point and picked up a stamp at Jomala Church.
Mariehamn, the capital city of Åland:
And everywhere red wind mills:
We found a little cabin in the middle of the woods and had a lovely night’s sleep there
At Bomarsund, a former fortress, Remy removes a tick from my foot.
The medical infirmary on one of the ferries
The Finish mainland:
The picturesque old town of Naantali:
