Naantali, Rauma and Turku

The next day, the plan was to head off and explore Southwestern Finland. We started off by visiting Naantali, one of the oldest towns of Finland. It dates all the way back to 1443, when King Christoffer of Sweden signed the charter which gave trading rights to the convent chuch, which still dominates Naantali's skyline. Naanali is also one of the most popular summer tourist destinations in Finland, note least because of the presence of an amusement park dedicated to the Moomins (use google if you don't know what the moomins are ;-).

We started our visit of Naantali, logically, by checking out the church. it's a pretty impressive building (both on the inside and outside) - especially considering it's one of the oldest buildings in Finland (looks like they knew how to build back in those days...), nicely located in a lush park, a few hundred meters from the town centre. The views from the surrounding park are pretty nice too, we could see Kultaranta, for example, from there (Kultaranta is the Finnish presidents summer residence).

From the church, we walked into the guest harbour, where we stopped for a coffee. From there, we made our way over to the old town, which is actually more impressive than I remembered. Wooden houses galore, the old part of Naantali even trumps Tammisaari we visited earlier. They could oblige photographers lke me by covering a couple of streets with cobblestones, though ;-). For lunch, we decided to go for another Finnish institution - Hesburger! The original Finnish burger joint. Be afraid, be very afraid, McDonald's and Burger King.... That rye bread burger they serve up at "Hese" beats a Big Mac any day of the week!

Naantali ticket off the list, we carried on to Rauma, which was is a couple of hours drive from Naantali. Not a very scenic drive either (we did drive though Laitila, though, where I'd spent last weekend!), but anyway, Rauma is for sure worth it.

Rauma is my favourite wooden building town in Finland. Tammisaari is nice, Naantali is perhaps nicer, but Rauma trumps them both, hands down, if you ask me. Street after street (cobble stoned ones, yippee, great for photos!) lined up with beautiful wooden houses. And of course there's a nice medieval church, too.

We spent a good couple of hours walking around the picturesque streets (thankfully, the sun decided to make an appearance too!) of Rauma. We also tried the local speciality, the Vanilla "munkki" (google if you don't know what that is - Finnish culinary speciality ;-), yummie... This visit clearly affirmed by opinion about Rauma's beauty (UNESCO agrees with that opinion, old Rauma is one of 7 UNESCO world heritage sites in Finland).

We got back in the evening, in time for the planned BBQ. We'd purchased plenty of Finnish sausages for the occasion. Another culinary "delight" that Julie and Aurelien simply had to try - no visit to Finland can be considered complete without a taste of Makkara. (Actually, please don't tell anybody, but even though I'm fond of Finnish sausages, I grudgingly have to admit to preferring French ones!)

Then the sauna followed, naturally. Aurelien impressed me with his capacity to stand the heat of a Finnish sauna. He was a bit less impressive in the swimming pool though (c'mon, the temperature was almost 15 degrees, that's positively tropical!).

The next day, we decided to visit Turku, from where we were catching our bus back to Helsinki. The weather looked menacing, but thankfully the rain we were fearing never materielized! We dropped of dad's car at Berit's place, and then headed off to explore. We started by a walk by the Aura river, checking out the recently revamped riverside (which is now lined with trendy cafes and restaurants - they've done a pretty good job, it must be said!).

We crossed the river and naturally had to visit the cathdedral. It is probably the most famous "old building" in Finland, dating all the way back to 1300 (well, the current building has of course changed much over the centuries, including being nearly rebuilt after the great fire of 1827). Turku cathedral is also the seat of the Archbishop of Finland (and the place where "Christmas peace" is announced each Christmas).

The area around the cathedral, which houses many buildings of Turku university, is a pretty nice place to walk around too.

The plan was to eat at our favourite Turku restaurant, Mami. So we made our way back towards the riverbank, where it's located, passing through the international festival (a food festival taking place each summer, where various countries sell their local specialities to the population of Turku, a pretty cool concept I think).  The food in Mami was excellent, as it was last time we went too...

Time was running short, but we decided to visit the new municipal library, which is located just next-doors to Mami. I was rather impressed with the building! Impressive architecturally speaking, both on the outside and the inside. Seems like a really functional and modern library as well. Bravo Turku. We still had time to try "the best capuccino in Turku" at Cafe Art, before catching our bus to Helsinki.

Sad to leave the West of Finland after a great few days exploring the rural side of Finland, but more adventures awaited us in Helsinki, and beyond...!