Saturday 20 August. Arrival in Helsinki

 We wake at 7 EST (Finnish time on board). Breakfast on our table 75 next to the very large Germans.  Still no sight of land.  

We approach the port through an archipelago of treed islands. We dock on time after 30 hours on the Baltic at a very large container port. No customs or passport control and after a speedy disembarkation we set off for Rastila camp site about 15 minutes away to the East of the city. 

We set up the van and then head off to the sauna on site. 85degC.  Then a dip in the Baltic ( very warm) and back into the sauna. 

Then we take the metro from near the site into central Helsinki. Confusingly stops have 2 names. We later discover that one is Finnish the other  Swedish. We pick up our Helsinki cards and then visit the vast Lutheran cathedral up some very steep steps which dominates this part of the city. The hop on bus takes us on a tour of the city. Then lunch at the market hall ( salmon and fennel soup) and then a boat trip.  We see the icebreaker ships that are used in the winter. Apparently the Baltic is relatively shallow and being an inland sea freezes easily as it is fed by fresh water that raises the freezing temperature. The architecture of the city is a mix of Russian, and French on a large scale and Art Nouveau  

Back to camp site. Number plates nearby are L, LV, FIN, D, SK, and UK (that’s us, only ones on the site!)