We started off our second full day in Finland with some berry-picking in the forest. We’d heard that the wild berries were phenomenal so we were very excited to have this outing. Our journey to the forest was about a three minute walk through Arto and Tarja’s neighborhood.
Here are some pictures from our foraging expedition.
We collected lots of tiny blueberries and strawberries.
While the berries didn’t knock our socks off, the beauty of the area and the novelty of berry-picking in the forest made for a great experience.
Bruce and I got out for a quick bike ride around Riihimäki.
And then we joined up with everyone else to head to Hämeenlinna. We picked up some lunch and had a picnic by a lake.
After lunch, the lucky ducks in the pond got a whole bunch of bread thrown to them.
From there we went to an elevated area where we had the chance to spend some time looking at this view.
Arto snapped a family picture for us.
Here’s one of all of us.
We did a lot of stair-climbing that day. First, down the stairs.
We hung out with the bear statue.
Then back up those stairs, and up some more stairs into the tower.
And back down.
After a quick coffee break, we moved on to the castle, which was really too extensive for me to photograph well but here are a few shots.
After that we went back to Arto and Tarja’s lake cottage, which would be our home for the next two nights. Bruce and Finn spent a while enjoying the sauna and the lake.
I had my first sauna, too, and Ezra also partook, but Finn and Bruce were the real diehards. After a while, we enjoyed a wonderful barbecue by the lake.
The landscape can’t be beat.
Here’s a slideshow of all of my photos.