The itinerary as put together by Kai – originally scheduled a year earlier but it came together this year, 2015, with 17 participants! And a extra bonus was that Kai was able to order the best summer weather they had all year – just for us!
The official trip started on Thursday evening Aug 6th and ended on Saturday evening August 15th with a one day extension on Sunday August 16th for a day trip to Tallin Estonia. Some of us arrived on Wednesday before and left on the Tuesday after taking the extra opportunity to sample the Wonderful city of Helsinki.
And what a wonderful city it is – the capital of Finland – and while we were there celebrating the 150 years of the composer Sibelius. The architecture is astonishing ranging from clap board buildings, Russian imperial era palaces and art decco structures – right up to modern structures. The people are friendly and virtually all speak English – a good thing as the native Finnish is beyond the ken of ordinary men. The signage is extra confusing in that it is provided in Finnish and Swedish.
DAY ONE Thursday 06 August
The hotel was the Radisson Blu Seaside Hotel (address: Ruoholahdenranta 3, 00180 Helsinki, website http://www.radissonblu.com/seasidehotel-helsinki). One of three Radisson hotels in Helsinki this was excellently located with walking distance of the sailing club, the tourist areas (although also serviced by a 3€ tram ride) and close to the docks for the day trip to Tallinin Estonia.
For the yacht club dinner on Thu Aug. 6th. Kai met us in the hotel lobby at 6.30 pm, and we walked to the club, one of the older ones in Helsinki. I say walked but a short boat ride was also required as the marina is offshore. Prior to drinks we had a look at Kai’s own boat and took the opportunity to re-acquaint ourselves with old friends – It had been some twenty years plus since some of us had last met! This meal, as were all the others was wonderful – good food and great companions.
DAY TWO Friday 07 August
Bus to Kasnas (the Royal bus no less – but of course) and boat to Rosala.
After a morning exploring the city we were met in the hotel lobby at 1.45 pm. We took a chartered bus while Kai went by car carrying provisions. The bus ride was about 2 1/2 hours long and took us south west through a variety Finnish countryside, mostly farming and into the Archipelago of islands. At Kasnas (named by some of us as Kansas – we were looking for Dorthy and Toto) we caught a boat to Rosala and our Viking experience – a Viking feast and stay overnight at the Chieftain Hall. (http://rosala.fi/english.html) The images speak for themselves – a great tour, meal and nights sleep in our ‘Hall’ – considering the age of those there, a pretty quiet bunch – no excessive snoring!
DAY THREE Saturday 08 August
Boat back to Kasnas fromm where we got our sail boats and set sail in the Archipelago National Park. (http://www.outdoors.fi/destinations/nationalparks/archipelago/Pages/Default.aspx)
with some last minute alterations the boats were split up as follows: all were Bertrams
one nominally 42, one 37 and one 36 foot
- Kai (Commander of fleet and skipper)
- Richard K and his wife Linda
- Inga, Debbie, and Ross
- Dave Knockels AC 71 – skipper and his wife Hilary
- Geoff L, Jeff D and his wife Barbara
- Simon L – skipper and his wife Sarah
- Ruth M, Ulrich K and his partner Nathan
so in total – 16, 11 from AC72, one from AC71 and 4 honorary AC’s
The webpage above includes a map of the park, and these are some ports of call that you can find on the map:
1) Kasnäs, point of departure and arrival, to the east in the map, just outside the actual national park. Kasnäs is home to the Blue Mussel visitor centre of the park.
2) Stenskär, to the west-north-west of Kasnäs. This is a small village with the possibility of buying fresh and smoked fish, vegetables, home-made bread ets. Incidentally, you should realise that in Finland´s archipelago two houses constitute a village! There is the possibility of sauna here, and there is a nature path on the island.
3) Jungfruskär, near the north-western corner of the map. Until a few years ago this was a coastal fortress. As the island was at the time closed to the public, the nature has been preserved more or less intact. Another nature path, with some artillery pieces as an extra spice.
4) Österskär, to the west on the map. Another small village with fish for sale (Neptun permitting), a nature path, and a sauna. A beautiful outer archipelago island, one of my personal favourites.
5) Jurmo, near the south-west corner of the map. The island mostly consists of gravel, not solid rock as most islands in the area. This is because it is an ice-age formation. A small village on this island as well, possibly with fish etc. for sale. Most of the island is almost bare, only a small forest planted in the 1930s (with the trees still very small) can be found. There is also a small church surrounded by a cemetery.
The ports were not visited in this order and we stayed the final sailing night at a sixth port – newly opened this year that had previously been a military site (the name escapes me) and then we returned to Kasnas and spent a final night on the boats there.
update: Simon kept track of the actual ports and the order of them and has supplied them to correct my factual error above. They were:
- Day 1 Hogsara
- Day 2 Jurmo
- Day 3 Osterskar
- Day 4 Korpostrom
- Day 5 Stenskar
- Day 6 Oro (the military island whose name you couldn’t recall)
- Day 7 Kasnas
(Lots of “umlauts”, or whatever the Finns call those double dots over letters, missing from the above spellings!)
Simon has provided a .kmz file here that can be downloaded and opened with the free application Google Earth available here – http://www.google.com/earth/ . That will allow you to see, where available the mooring locations and route we took.
The weather could not have been better – on one occasion for maybe 20 minutes there was enough rain to justify those who had paid for rain gear to use it – but it really was not needed. The food that was prepared on each boat, for each boat seemed to please all but varied greatly depending on the crew – Simons boat wins master chef I believe. The smoked fish that Kai was able to obtain was fantastic and the meals we had at the more formal marinas was also good, albeit limited in that we were ‘out of season’
DAY TEN Saturday 15 August
We returned to Kasnäs on Friday Aug. 14th, and cleaned the boats and ourselves. Some crews ate remaining food on board and some took the opportunity eat on land. The following morning we took the chartered bus back to Helsinki and back to the hotel where we arrived about midday. The afternoon was spent sleeping and sightseeing or some combination of those, and then in the evening we all met again at a Lap restaurant (owned and run by the same people as the yacht club) and had a final meal together. As a appreciation for all the work Kai put into this reunion we had all contributed to a beautiful fountain pen with a nautical theme that Richard had made – a true work of art!
Unfortunately that was it – Dave, Hilary, Jeff and Barb left from there for the airport and an early morning flight – Geoff, Simon and Sarah flew out later on Sunday. The rest of us met again early the next morning.
DAY ELEVEN Sunday 16 August
We left the hotel at about 7.30 am, after the more than ample buffet breakfast that the hotel provided each morning, remembering to take our passports as Estonia is a different country, part of the EU but must have your passport with you. The boat is a car ferry, quite a large one and the trip again was about 2 1/2 hour. It is basically a floating Bar – or more correctly, Bars! Live music in the morning. Food and drink, drink drink.
Tallinin, the capital of Estonia is again a beautiful old town, within walking distance of the port with upper and lower old towns. All the charm of the old world – complete with a town square full of market revelry. We found a wonderful restaurant that served old style meals and drink for lunch and just ambled the streets.
The boat trip back was two more people down – Richard and Linda having chosen to spend the night in Estonia – saying goodbye is always hard. We had such a great time.
On the voyage back the main reason for most of the shipmates became more obvious as did the level of inebriation of some of them. The cost or alcohol and tobacco is so much cheaper that the trip is made for that reason only – never seen so many mobile wheels under stacks of cases a beer, wine etc – as both are EU countries there appeared to be “a what you can carry” limit.
And this is when we found out how much work Kai had really done for the success of our trip. He had taken advantage of a deal the shipping lines has to take the return trip, 5 hours to and fro, without leaving the boat so that he could by the supplies of beer and wine for the boats! So not only were all the eating places and moorings known, the bus organized and the boats – if you want to be the host on a reunion like this there is a lot of work to do – We all toasted him, a few times, on the voyage back to Helsinki.
Some of us stayed on and flew home, to Rome and the UK, on Tuesday morning having spent another day exploring the city – we took the opportunity to try Kai’s favorite bar – a mock English pub – complete with Newcastle Brown Ale and fish & chips.
What a wonderful time we all had – old friendships renewed and great times together. May we be lucky to have the opportunity do so so many times and in many places again – one of the benefits of our UWC experience.
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