Baltic Cruise Notes, Day 5: Helsinki

Today, we awoke while we were still at sea. And yes, I was rocked to sleep last night. We went to the gym (excuse me, "fitness center") after a cup of coffee at the barista. Running on a treadmill on a moving ship is a different experience. You go up and down hills without changing the settings on the machine. We ran looking out at the ocean, and it was good. Eventually, we made it to lunch and then to our tour. We took a walking tour of Helsinki, that lasted about three hours. I must say, I was not impressed by the architecture, style, or construction of the buildings and attractions. Helsinki has been called the "Pearl of the Baltic," but I think maybe the "Oyster of the Baltic" might be more appropriate. There was one exception to the dismal architecture: the Rock Church. This church was built in 1968, starting with blasting out the center of a huge stone hill, then building a dome over the massive crater that was made by the explosions. The center of the dome is solid copper, made of 15,000 miles of copper wire. It is supported by what appear to be wooden trusses that radiate from all sides of this round space, and they allow ambient light through into the interior. The walls are solid rock, the actual walls of the crater, and the above-ground parts of the walls are made of rock that was left from the explosions. While we were there, a pianist was playing classical music, mostly Chopin preludes, and the acoustics were simply spectacular. The sound and the simplicity of the structure made for an extremely worshipful environment. I would like to go there once to church, although I might not get much out of the service, being in Finnish and all. We got quite a history lesson on the tour, and I'll boil it down for you. They were ruled by the Swedes from the 1200's until 1809, then by the Russians until 1917. In WWII, they were invaded first by the Russians and then the Germans. In what they thought was a pragmatic move, they allowed the Germans to use their country to attack Russia, and were thus considered collaborators with the Nazis. In 1944, they changed alliance and made up with Russia again. They have been independent for 95 years, and are a republic. Anyhow, we returned to the ship at 5:30, and stopped into our room for our now customary afternoon nap, then dined at 8:00 at the Grand Dining Room. Once again, the cuisine lent itself to hyperbole, although not quite the heights reached last night. Denise and I both had fish, salmon for her and some kind of fish I had never heard of for me. The meals were all lovely and delicious, and I won't bore you with the details. Better than the meal, we had dinner with a lovely couple from Mobile, Alabama, named Abe and Caroline. He is a maritime lawyer, and they had a few years on us, like most people on the ship. We had a very nice time conversing with them, and left for our room after a two-hour meal. I was surprised to learn that we were setting our clocks back another hour tonight. That means there is a two-hour time difference between Stockholm and St. Petersburg. We just won't get much sleep tonight. A word about the bed in our room. I don't know what brand or type it is, but I think I'm in love. In one night, it may have cured my back pain. This mattress is fantastic. Out of time. Good night.