Weekend 7: Turku - the previous capital of Finland

Last weekend a friend and I went to visit Turku, the previous capital of Finland. The two-hour train ride from Helsinki passed uneventfully, at least once we realized that seating is assigned on trains so we couldn't just plop down wherever we wanted (as, in fact, we originally did). Fast, clean, efficient...a little expensive, but otherwise a very easy travel experience.

First impression of Turku: cities with rivers running through them are nice.





Also, big cathedrals on the waterfront are a big plus.


One oddity about cathedrals in Finland: they all appear to have ornate model boats hanging from the ceiling as part of some tradition I don't yet understand. Here's one.


I guess if I were paying more attention I would probably know more about the boat story. As a really poor student of history, I also wasn't paying enough attention to remember this guy's name, though I do remember that he created the written Finnish language. Any guesses as to his name...anyone?


Another highlight of the trip was a visit to the Handicrafts Museum -- actually more like a Handicrafts Village with ~30 huts where people continue to produce crafts as they did in the ~1800's.


We got there right before closing so there weren't a lot of handicraft-makers still about, but we managed to see an original paper-printer and the room where the violin-maker works. The crafts produced here are actually used or sold throughout Turku (and possibly beyond), no doubt carrying a significant premium for the additional amount of hand-labored work that went into them.



Finally, we walked about ~30 minutes down the river to check out Turku Castle.




The castle primarily consisted of mostly-empty rooms, sometimes with a small display of furniture or old knick-knacks from the appropriate time period. They did make some efforts to jazz up some of the displays -- not quite sure what the short witchy-woman in the frayed dress is doing here by this desk, but I'm sure whatever it is, it is historically accurate.



And the strange "hanging boat" tradition continued in the castle church as well.


One of my favorite "knick-knacks" was this small statue of a knight totally kicking the ass of this one poor dragon. Take that, dragon! And that! Yeah, that'll teach you to mess with Turku!