sailing across the baltic

7.27 I spent my last night on the island with the whole group watching the sunset over the ocean from some little cliff area we hiked to. Of course Lenart and Guinnilla and Christo (kim's aunt and uncle), did as they do and brought lots of wine and beer to better enjoy the sunset with. We had a good time watching the sunset and then afterwards, looking at all of lenart's pictures from a few nights before when we had our crazy party. It was fun to see some of the things we had forgotten. Like swinging from the rafters and me dancing country swing style with Guinnilla (you know me and cougars)

7.28 I had to say a really sad goodbye to the crew after breakfast as I boarded the ferry back to stockholm. I was giving hugs and more hugs and the ferry's horn was blowing, so I had to run to the boat and jump on. Goodbyes are never fun. After the boat, I took the bus to the train then the train to the subway then the subway to the big ferry.
Now, I had booked this ferry on line a while ago. It's a car ferry between stockholm and helsinki that takes like 17 hours. Now I had been on some big ferry boats in the philippines before. Ones where there are huge rooms with tons of bunks for everyone to sleep. I knew this would be a bit better than that bc I had a 4 person cabin, but I was still just expecting some shabby car ferry. Boy was I in for a surprise. This was like a first rate, luxury cruise boat. The boat was complete with performances as you boarded, 2 casinos, tons of restaurants, 2 dance bars/night clubs, some pubs, a duty free store, gift shops, deck bars, a swimming pool and sauna, hairdresser, playstation zone, mini golf, a movie theatre, a huge gangway that seemed like you were in a shopping mall, free internet even when in the middle of the baltic via sattelite internet. And more. I spent a lot of time exploring the ship. But the best part was sitting on the upper deck (there were 12 floors accessible to passengers), way up there and watching as the stockholm archipelago complete with its little islands and fishing villages went buy. Of course my tiny, tiny cabin was on the lowest floor, even below both car decks and very small. But it still had a little shower and all that. There was a nice korean guy in my cabin with me, and than late, late in the night, even later than I got in, some couple (it was supposedly a male only cabin, but who cares) came in and I guess did what couples do. The little korean guy who I really liked, told me they were his worst roommates ever. He was not too happy. Luckily, I had an ipod to plug in my ears. That night I of course went to Karaoke. It was mainly swedish, but some english stuff, and of course a lot of the english being sung was abba. One funny thing is that the ship had duty free alcohol once it hit international waters. Since scandinavia has super high alcohol taxes, as soon as the ship hit international water, all the swedes and finns ran for the duty free shop. I hear some due the cruise, just to buy tons of OH.

7.29 Arrived in the morning into Helsinki, Finland. It's kind of a cute little port city. There wasn't tons to see (some parliament buildings, royal palaces, churches, the waterfront...the usual), so I had seen the main things by early afternoon. So I spent the afternoon laying in some grass and reading next to some musicians and then doing some shopping I needed to do. Though I failed at the shopping bc scandinavia is just too dang expensive. I am in need of a china lonely planet book bc I found out from some other travellers that the book is banned form being sold (and brought in, but it's easy to hide) bc the book recognizes taiwan as a separate country (china does not) and the book talks unfavorably towards china when talking about the tibet situation. I did find the book and the back cover of the booke was listed at like 30 bucks, but the book was being sold for the equivalent of US45, so I'll try my luck in russia or mongolia. The other thing I was looking for was a AA battery charger bc I either left it at the prague airport or it got removed from my luggage. That evening I boarded my 2nd cruise type ship. This one wasn't quite as fancy as the one before, but still nice. I again watched the Helsinki archipelago go by and then explored the ship. I also spent some good time preparing all my documents and such for my trip to Russia. I was bunkmates with an Italian guy. He was really nice and had studied a Univ of Ill. He was travelling with his Russian girlfriend, who now lived in europe, but they were going to see her parents. We also shared the room with some finnish guy that came in at lake 4 in the morning saying, and I quote "I gambled too much, what have i done?"