This trip was my mother’s last request. At least the Hanko part.

As her end neared, she totally surprised me, when one day she announced, “Mark, I know what I want you to do with my ashes.” Pause.

I thought local, to myself, Walden Pond? Charles River? Revere Beach?

Not a chance. She had far bigger plans.

“I want you to go to Finland and throw my ashes off that rock behind Mannerheim’s place in Hanko.”

I was both stunned and proud of her. From the tone in her voice, I knew that she knew exactly what she wanted, and she had thought it through.

Lots of angles, covered. In this one request she paid homage to her family’s homeland, and she paid her last respects to her father. She pulled favorite family together. And she would go out in style. Details left to me.

None of these reasons were ever discussed. It was all between the lines. The Finnish way.

My favorite picture of my Mom is below – at her college graduation. She was 100% Finnish and looked it: A platinum blond with a touch of the exotic east.

She made it to 92. A full life. A bit of a wild child. She did it her way.

When my Mom passed last year, I knew what what needed be done. I knew where and I knew when. August 25 would be the best day, as it was the end of summer celebration in Finland. Big pagan fires and, as it turned out fireworks too. 

As long as we were going, why not make it an edge of the world bicycle adventure?

That would be the Archipelago Sea stretching between Sweden and Finland. 

World class island-hopping, undiscovered bicycling. Using a generous definition of “island,” there are about 50,000, which makes the Finnish archipelago the largest in the world.

This trip snapped into focus when I realized we could fly into Helsinki, leave our luggage at our hotel, catch a ferry to Åland on the Swedish side of the archipelago and bicycle back across the archipelago to the Finnish mainland, then south to Hanko and for the home stretch, back to Helsinki.

The stake in the ground was the end of the summer festival in Hanko on August 25. Working backwards and forwards, I booked plane tickets, our ferry to Mariehamn in Åland, and our bicycle overnights at 30 to 50 miles a day. We had a plan: 300 miles ± of bicycling over 9 days,  lots of ferries and a couple of days off in Hanko.

This story will be divided into 3 parts: Helsinki & The Åland archipelago; The Turku archipelago & Mathildedal; and Hanko & the King’s Road.

Helsinki & The Åland archipelago

Day 1 Fly from Boston to Helsinki. Overnight on plane

We left Cambridge at 6:00 PM. Two bike cases. Two carry-ons.

Hit international security at Logan Airport around 7:00 PM. 

Sharon was behind me, chatting with a young woman heading to Israel for Rabbinical Studies. I could hear them, “No I’m not doing the full seven year course of study.” Jay Leno walked by on the other side of the security glass, and my carry-on headed into a highest tech scanner I had never seen.

Sure enough, I was called over for suitcase inspection. I had feared exactly this. Mom was going to get the once over. 

He knew what he was looking for, and dug around until he found it- a suspicious 4 lbs plastic bag of chemical ash. He swabbed, checked analysis, and gave me the all-clear. 

He didn’t ask and I didn’t tell. Mom would be going to Finland. 

I exhaled.

Day 2 Helsinki Hotel F6

We arrived at our hotel in Helsinki at 3:00 PM the next day – a bit worse for wear. Little or no sleep will do that to you. The first leg to Reykjavik was the longest and our seats didn’t recline. Note to self, “No seats backing up against anything ever again.”

That said, the our hotel in Helsinki was pretty much perfect. Great location, great staff, great design. 

I get points for the buffer day on arrival. I lose those points for no buffer day on departure. But that’s jumping ahead.

We picked the Hotel F6 primarily for the location. We knew the neighborhood from our visit in 2005. Just south of the Esplanade, it was between the historic district, and the design district, next to the Marketplace and the close to the harbor where we would board our ferry to Åland in two days. 

Day 3 Helsinki Hotel F6

We awoke early the next day and after a Finno-Japanese breakfast started re-assembling the bike.

It went smoothly, except for one, not so minor problem. Our front derailleur wouldn’t move when asked. So we emailed the man who knows all things bike – Ed at Belmont Wheelworks. It would be 4:30 AM in Boston.

Within a minute we had a response,”I’ll miss my ride if I answer this – I’ll get back to you as soon as I get back.”

Fair enough, and most-promising, if you know Ed, who can be rather hard to reach, unless he feels like it.

We finished putting the tandem together. No need to panic. No need to panic. No need to panic. No need to panic … Yet.

Sure enough, 2 hours later Ed emailed us a most-condensed and thorough essay on the dual ratchet system in STI shifters and the pawls used there-in, and how to re-engage them.

Which involved rolling the rubber boot off the shifter and removing a most tiny phillips screw. Unfortunately we didn’t have such a tool – but the front desk did. A few pokes and knocks later, all was well.

To celebrate, we went for a walk – down to the Esplanade, 

through the marketplace and up to the Russian Orthodox Church.

Recently it has occurred to me that my grandfather Peter probably spoke Russian, to go along with his Swedish, Finnish and English. No way to know now that my mother is gone, but it makes sense. The Russians were running Finland and he was working at a prominent Swedish jewelry store in Helsinki – below. 

Peter was drafted by the Russians in 1901 to fight the Japanese. He chose instead to emigrate to the USA. Good choice.

Back at the hotel, we hung out for a while in the lobby chatting with a cordial young blond woman at the front desk. Highlights were the Japanese, Aerosmith and Swedish TV.

There were a whole, whole lot of Japanese at the hotel. She explained that Finland and Japan were sister countries with a shared design aesthetic. Finland has also become a Japanese European travel hub with new direct flights. 

Our son came ever so close to being Eero Smith. We figured the band would never come back. But got cold feet at the last minute. You never know. Lucky for him, as it turned out.

Our friend at the front desk found our story hilarious, but couldn’t understand what the problem would be. 

Then she shared that Aerosmith front man Steven Tyler was fond of Helsinki and had been known to play anonymously with Helsinki street musicians, and pulled up a YouTube video on her phone to prove it.

Which transitioned into a discussion of the exasperating political correctness of standard-fare Swedish TV which we had been watching almost every night for 9 months as part of our trip prep. 

Us, “Every chase scene, it’s the woman cop who tackles the bad guy.”

“Every show has a psychologist, who helps with understanding hurt feelings.”

“And the really bad guys are always international pharmaceutical companies.”

Finnish Blonde, “Fuck yes, that’s the Swedes for you. Always so nice and polite and condescending. You know, us Finns have some historical issues with the Swedes.”

Uh huh. Sweden lorded it over Finland for centuries. Ruling with an iron fist. Swedish was the language of the aristocracy, until replaced with Russian.

Day 4 Ferry overnight to Mariehamn

We checked out of our room. Left our luggage with the hotel, and headed for the Viking ferry for our overnight to Åland island mid-afternoon. 

We walked our loaded tandem along the Esplanade and then by the Marketplace, riding the last stretch to the check-in for vehicle loading. A pleasant young woman checked our passports and confirmed our online ticket. She then directed us to lane 4.

We were first in that line.

First in lane 5 was another bicyclist, a Finn, our age. He was headed for Germany where he was going to meet up with his son who would be bringing his American muscle car, to see how fast it would really go. 

We waited and waited. Our lane was the last to roll out. Around the corner we were directed to wait with the Jinx Crows, a Helsinki motorcycle gang, until the last remaining trucks were loaded. It was all quite entertaining.

Jinx Crows went right and we went left through the giant doors into the bowls of the ship. We were the last in. The Jinx Crows knew the drill, out came the nylon webbed straps to triangulate their bikes in place. 

We were directed back behind a semi-trailer. It occurred to me, that we had a strap too. Out came our cinch-able kevlar and steel 5 ft band lock. and lashed to a steel pipe, we were in business. Now all we needed was to find our room.

Fifth floor, up at the very front right. As we made our way down the long narrow corridor, who should pop out of a room in front of us wearing only a small towel around his waist waving at his friends behind us?

One of the Jinx Crows. A bit of skin in public. The norm.  Welcome to Finland.

We found our cabin, unpacked and then headed out for dinner. The grill on deck 7 was talking to us. We chowed, while watching the water slip away. Next we explored the ship. The door to the casino wouldn’t open from the deck, so we let that one pass. 

Up top we had pretty much a 360 degree view. The sea was calm. We could see perhaps 5 or 6 other cruise ships. Some close. Some far off. Some coming and some going. Business as usual on the Baltic, driven by tax-free shopping and cheap booze.

We turned in early, setting our alarm for 3:45 AM for our 4:30 AM departure in Mariehamn. 

The Åland Archipelago

Day 5  Mariehamn to Saltvik

It was night, or more accurately astronomical twilight, when the ferry doors opened and we followed the 6 departing cars out into Mariehamn. On the upside of the ferry terminal, we found a bench outside and waited for dawn.

Mariehamn is the capital of the the Åland archipelago, an autonomous territory under Finnish sovereignty. Back in 1920 or so, the League of Nations asked whether Åland wanted to be part of Sweden or Finland. Over 95% voted Sweden, so as the fates twist fate, the League granted sovereignty to Finland.

Not much seems to have changed in 100 years. Just about everyone in Åland still speaks Swedish, which actually makes eminent 21st century sense as coast of Sweden is only 24 miles of open sea away to the west.

We weren’t headed west, though,  but rather east, back across the archipelago to mainland Finland. First up was a very early morning wake-up ride south to the Nåtö Nature Reserve. 

And yes, it looks just like this. Except the road is pink close-up. A whole bunch of blue herons took off as we rode by. No sign of anyone else.

We were back in Mariehamn by 6:30 AM. We had an hour+ wait for Cafe Julius to open. Second-rate pastries, second-rate coffee, and an ornery owner. No problem. It was the only open cafe in town. We were happy to have a seat at a table, some food and entertainment.

Sharon had been studying Swedish for last 9 months or so. This cafe was shaping up as her first real-world test. I was curious how immersion would play out. In character she grabs a semi-used local Mariehamn paper off a neighboring table and disappears into the Swedish copy.

A few minutes later she surfaces and gives me a full run-down on the local crime report. Ending with,

“Did you lock the bicycle?” 

We were in waiting mode. Our next stop was the Mariehamn Maritime Museum, 1/4 mile away, which didn’t open for a couple of hours. Sharon disappeared once again into her Swedish paper. I refilled my coffee, and looked around. Full house. Interesting crowd.

A table of old guys were in the corner, clearly early-morning regulars. One poured me my first refill coffee. 

I recognized a family next table over from the ferry terminal. They had been asleep sprawled across chairs, also waiting for first light. Young parents, young kids. Good can-deal-with-it attitudes all around. French. 

A trio of young camping, bicyclists were yukking it up next table over.

A couple of hard-nosed working guys, perhaps at shift break, were eating the only available real food- plastic-wrapped sandwiches from at least the day before.

And one outcast local old guy off by himself at a table in the far corner, putting on a brave early-morning face. 

Folks filtered in and out. Eventually Sharon folded up her paper. Next guy over asked, in Swedish, if she were done. Having read every word, and reported on every detail in every article, she passed it over with a few words in Swedish. Time to move on. 

At the museum, we locked up on the anchor out front, found a bench and kicked back into 1/2-hour-waiting mode.

In the distance a beautiful harbor. In the foreground a big bush full of yellow-ish berries that neither of us recognized. Birds were loving them though. Sharon gets up, saunters over, picks a few, pops them in her mouth and announces, 

“They’re great!”, and starts chowing down. 

I avert my eyes. We’ve been through this many, many times before. So far, remarkably, she has survived. Each time, though, I cringe.

Sharon heads off to read all the historic signs. I lean back. Beautiful light.

A local walks by, spots the berry bush, doubles back and starts happily munching away. After he had had his fill, and departed, I venture over and tentatively give a couple a try. Quite good actually. Didn’t eat too many though.

You never know.

The Maritime Museum opened and we headed in. 

Top of the list was the pirate flag. Only two authentic pirate flags are known to exist from the 18th century. One was here. It didn’t disappoint.

What I didn’t know was that Pirate flags were either black or red. Black meant we’re going to take all your stuff.

Red meant we’re going to take all your stuff, but first you’re all going to die. 

Sharon says this flag was red. No doubt it must have stories to tell.

After a pass through the museum proper we headed off to the Pommern tall ship.

The Pommern was undergoing restoration. We had arranged a private tour as this was the only way we were going to get onboard. This morning no one else was onboard.

There had been a fund-raising event the night before. Lots of empty wine bottles. Every good cause needs a good party.

The Pommern was a working cargo ship well into the mid 20th century. Locals would ship out for up to 2 years. Tall ships had continued to be cost effective because there were no fuel costs and one could be sailed with a crew of only 26. 

Until 1949 tall ships from Åland circumnavigated the globe and carried grain from Australia to Europe. Hard life though, and more than a few had jumped ship in Australia.

The archipelago has been a maritime culture from Viking times. The tall ships were the last of the glory days.

Our tour ended, and it was time to head north to Saltvik for the evening. 

We passed by lots of vistas like this on Åland.

All day, we kept seeing tandem bicycle signs like the one below, which made no sense to us, as we never saw another tandem in Finland.  It’s always nice to have one’s existence recognized though.

We rode right by our last left turn at the Viking camp, which is kind of a fairground for re-enactments of times gone by. 

On second pass, we had a better look at the perimeter fencing which we would see across the archipelago. This was the real deal. Practical, functional and efficient. Proven over the centuries.

Museum-grade, but for now still just working. 

Good design lasts or lingers – depending on how one thinks about it. 

Saltvik was a highlight of the trip. And rightly so. It took a bit of edging into though. We were tired, still jet lagged, and it had been a very long day, when we pulled into Kvarnbo Gästhem, our B&B for the night. 

We found out later that, Kvarnbo Gästhem had been sold out for over 100 days. When I first checked it was indeed sold out, but I kept checking, and one day, Bingo, there it was.

A couple of clicks later, this night was ours. 

As we sat munching our dinner, we could overhear several Americans discussing their non-reservation with Martin, who runs the B&B with his wife Anna.

“We had this night reserved”

“Actually you didn’t. I emailed you that the reservation hadn’t gone through properly”

Silence. We had nothing to add.  

Later, we told Martin about our riding into the ferry in Helsinki with the Jinx Crows. From his decidedly neutral expression I could tell I was missing something.

What I hadn’t picked up on was how seriously he was into motorcycles. This hadn’t been lost on Sharon, who knew all about such as one of her ex’s had been a biker. 

Martin took us over to his garage to show us his bikes. First he showed Sharon his pinball machine.

The showpiece was this 1944 Indian Chief motorcycle, immortalized on this Åland postage stamp below.

Martin had found it in boxes in Australia – unwanted Army surplus, brought it back to Åland and restored it. 

Relatives had been tall-ship sailers who had jumped ship in Australia. The Indian Chief we saw wasn’t for show, but a working bike. Martin had just gotten back from a 1250 mile ride across Europe.

We just missed Martin’s wife Anna – 2010 photo from the local paper below.

Anna, a sommelier, is drinking the world’s oldest drinkable champagne, Veuve Clicquot vintage somewhere between 1841 and 1850. This bottle might have been sampled by Madame Clicquot herself, the French “Grande Dame of Champagne.” who would have been between 64 and 73 at the time. 

Another bottle from this batch later sold for close to $50,000 at auction.

So how did a local girl from Åland come to be drinking a $50,000 bottle of champagne?

It helps to live in an archipelago where there are a lot of shipwrecks and next to shipping lanes to historic courts like St. Petersburg. 

It helps too, if a particular shipwreck  carrying a particular cargo of champagne just happened to settle at a depth characterized by minimal light and temperatures ranging between 35 and 39 degrees Fahrenheit- Conditions pretty much perfect for preserving champagne.

And it helps if you are a local with good, curious friends who dive and like to party. 

This being Scandinavia there are all kinds of rules about shipwrecks, with government ownership front and center. This being Scandinavia there are local grey areas.

A local diver finds some bottles, brings a couple over to share with friends- not a problem, before anything is official. 

A media-twist later it’s a heart-warming world-class Saltvik tale, picked up around the world.

As the Smithsonian put the question,  “What does this stuff taste like?”

Martin said it was very tasty with tobacco overtones. 

A second bottle is still in the fridge. But don’t tell anybody.

Day 6  Sunday August 19 Saltvik to Vardo Island

Kvarnbo Gästhem is famous for their breakfasts. Ours didn’t disappoint. 

The next morning, on our way out of town, we stopped at St. Mary’s Lutheran church. Sharon had visited earlier that day with Martin who is a church warden. He showed Sharon around.

One highlights was the silver Eucharist chalice from the 1300s – the oldest chalice in Finland. 

Martin had noted with amusement that it might be made of “hack” silver.  A Viking reference. Plundered silver was hacked-up silver. Value for the Vikings was weight not form. 

A Christian silver chalice made of Viking plunder, which may have been Christian in the first place. And perhaps nabbed from the Vikings before that.

St. Mary’s vicar was a 29 year old woman. Sharon said the blind organist singer sang like an angel.

The Church is located in the middle of the biggest Viking graveyard in Åland, which makes a certain amount of sense, as this is the oldest place in the archipelago.

10,000 years ago there was no archipelago. The islands began rising after the last ice age when the weight of the glaciers was gone. 

First out the water was Saltvik.

The islands in the archipelago are still rising. Faster than sea levels. Faster than the erosion is wearing the islands away.  Up to 4 inches every 10 years.

Around the corner from the Church is Putin’s place. Yes, that Putin. It used to be Anna’s grandmother’s. The Russians grabbed it as war reparations. Many were, and still are offended.

So how does one tweak the nose of the macho Russian bear?

The Scandinavian solution was to set up a pop-up copy of the infamous Gay Bar from the movie “Police Academy” on the property, take a few photos, and post them on the internet. 

Mission accomplished.

The Russians were not amused. The perpetrators were brought into court. Charges were dismissed, though, by the local authorities. It was, after all, a brilliant tweak.

A half hours ride brought us to Kastelholm Castle, a Swedish-built medieval castle built in the 14th century. Time to practice stopping and seeing the sights. Off with the bicycle shoes and on with the sandals.

We climbed up to the top of the ramparts.

Where we could look out across the rolling green landscape. A far cry from the water days of the 1300s, when the castle was surrounded by moats and sharpened stakes. 

Today it sits high and dry – 700+ years of uplift changes things. 

The interior courtyards and spaces were actually more interesting than the outside.

One of the most compelling places was inside the inside – a small room on the third floor of the Kure tower, where Swedish King Erik XIV was imprisoned by his brother in the autumn of 1571. The official line is that Erik was insane by then. I have my doubts. 

Erik died 6 years later of arsenic poisoning, while imprisoned in another castle. 

Back on our bike we headed for Vardo Island. We had asked Martin about a place to stop for a late lunch/early dinner. It was Sunday and not much would be open. He checked and there was cafe/campground on Prästö Island that would be open.

“If you get to the ferry, you have gone too far.”

We crossed the bridge to Prästö and watched for cafes. We got to the ferry and doubled back. When we reached the bridge, we doubled back again across Prästö to the ferry. No cafe. 

On our next very slow pass back we pulled off at a clearly closed resort- just to make sure. There was one car. The owner had been running. We asked about our cafe. 

“Oh, that’s back on Åland across the bridge.”

We told our story.

“If you’re headed to Sandösunds Radhus, they have food”

News to us, and good news. 

Sharon had wandered over to a small roofed structure, the size of a big outhouse.

She reported that inside was a vending machine- for vegetables. Perhaps I should take a photo?

So regrets are born. I blithely replied,

“We’ll see others”

Well, actually no, and when I asked our Finnish relatives about such, they looked back blankly. 

The ferry to Vardo Island was a cable ferry pretty much exactly like the Ticonderoga Ferry on Lake Champlain between Ticonderoga, New York and Shoreham, Vermont. 

We pulled into Sandösunds Radhus mid afternoon. Sandösunds Radhus is a resort on the far eastern edge of the Åland archipelago. Not much out here. 

We checked into our room – a bit like a USA Motel 6 with a green sod roof .

Our casement windows, at first glance, were nothing special. 

However on closer inspection they were, hands-down, the most impressive we saw in Finland. Operable, built for extreme cold, with many insulated glass panes working like pivoting parallelograms, sealed with multiple weatherstripping gaskets. 

Besides our motel-like home, Sandösunds Radhus had floating saunas, a campground, a hermit cottage, a chalet, mini-golf, swimming, kayaking, bike rentals, a restaurant and behind us a super-sized teepee. 

Here in the middle of nowhere on the edge of the Åland archipelago, at the end of a gravel road, the owner was clearly having fun as a self-styled entrepreneur.  Our age-ish with plenty of pep.  

After unpacking we headed down to the campground restaurant for dinner. Sharon noticed Åland pancakes on the menu. She knew them from her Swedish studies – a signature dish of the archipelago. Not to be missed.

Once served, we recognized them. Having had them twice before. Previous incarnations had been small baked rice pudding pastry bars with a fruit topping and whipped cream. A sure-grab for me at a buffet breakfast, but … 

This time around they were bigger, thicker, and less professional. My guess an old local recipe. Not particularly sweet with a touch of cardamom. A bit foreign – in a good way.

The young woman running the register was clearly not a local. Sharon asked. 

“Oh I’m from the Philippines. In the winter I work in the ice hotels up north. Summers, I come south and work here.”

Sheesh. The Philippines are close to the equator. We were standing at 60 degrees north latitude, about the same latitude as Anchorage Alaska.

And yes, the ice hotels are much further north, made of ice and snow, and have to be rebuilt every year, since they melt in the summer. 

Purportedly excellent for viewing the northern lights in the dead of the arctic winter. Now on our non-bicycling list.

Our next day was going to be a biggie- crossing from the Åland archipelago to the Turku archipelago. 

The morning ferry from Hummelvik was a must-catch, departing at 9:30. We were about 6 miles away. No problem, if there were no problems. We turned in early.

Next: The Turku Archipelago & Mathildedal [add new link. This is old]