Back from Holiday Again (part 3)

Now we're heading off to Savonlinna and with the aid of a sat-nav, this time we know how far we have to travel! The route according to Google, via the town of Joensuu is here. The reason for the detour is two-fold: first we never go back the same way as we came and secondly, with most of the day to spare, we wanted to find something to visit on the way. A botanical garden in the far north sounded interesting. There we found a tropical house and a desert house. I don;t think I would like their heating bill for the winter, but flying around freely inside were a number of large butterflies.

We found our hotel in the centre of Savonlinna without problem and went for a walk before finding somewhere for dinner.

Looking over the town across the lake. Our hotel is the blue and pink building at the end of the bridge with a view across the lake. A bonus as I'd only booked the most basic room, but a smile and a friendly chat with the receptionist frequently results in the keys for a room upgrade.

A restaurant just around the corner provided a typically Nordic meal of fried fish, washed down with the local beer at (gulp!) £6 for a 33cl bottle. Next morning, we walked around the lake to Olavinlinna Castle, originally built by the Swedes to keep out the Russians, then as the border moved back and forth prior to Finland becoming a sovereign country, it switched between Swedish and Russian control before becoming redundant as a military asset and ending up as a cultural centre, most famous for an Opera Festival annually and occasional jazz festivals. There's a few images of the castle below:





 

Then, wandering around afterwards, we came across a selection of historic boats that form part of a cultural museum. Much later in the day, we discovered that we were supposed to have purchased a ticket to visit the boats. One is an express service passenger ship that came to an unfortunate end in 1898 when it was rammed and sank and the other is a steam powered timber barge

Salama, which means "Lightning" in English was built to carry up to 60 passengers on lake services until accidentally rammed and sunk

The stern of Salama which  was raised in 1971 from where it had been sunk and has now been restored

"Mikko" is a timber carrying steam powered lake freighter dating from 1914. Its main purpose was the carriage of lumber for construction and of firewood around the lakes

"Savonlinna" is another of the museum's collection, but was moored in the town on the day of our visit and surprisingly is newer than Salama despite appearances. Its main task was as passenger transport to Savonlinna, particularly bring guests to the spas in the area,

 After two days, we moved on again for two nights at Espoo, a modern suburban development to the west of Helsinki built around an historic settlement dating back to the Middle Ages. The area is a curious mix of modern concrete suburbia and typical Nordic countryside with trees, water and huge outcrops of granite. There are few hotels in the area and we managed to find one that is actually a massive, impersonal conference centre that is of a style that makes the former Tricorn building in Portsmouth appear to have a beauty of its own! It was just for two nights.

The journey to Espoo and what we did next will be told in the next instalment.