Restaurant, Satakuntatalo Hostel, 9:00

Last night I was messing around with the little piano keyboard on my phone and I think I worked out a second part to one of my partial songs. I videotaped it with my little camera, so part of the Europe video will be that. I also watched all the videos on there (about 13 minute of footage) and laughed hard once. That part will be hilarious. The dancing part might be funny too.

This mornng I’m cramming in free breakfast listening to Dutch (I only know it’s Dutch because I met that guy last night), German, Spanish, Finnish, and American English. However, this is the worst orange juice I have ever drank. But the cereal is pretty good. In a few minutes, I’m going to check out and walk down to the bus station to get on a bus to pick up my brother from the airport. We’re going to swing back here and hike around Helsinki for a bit and then head back and take the rally tour bus to Jyvaskyla! I think I’ll make Tom eat some reindeer.

Room 110, Hotel Keurusselka, 21:00

This hotel is amazing. I changed my mind, I’m not going to propose to a lady in Rostock. It’s definitely happening in this swanky lakefront hotel. Maybe it’s just because I have been in less fancy places for the last two weeks of traveling, but this is pretty nice. And I’m here for five nights!

The only drawback so far is that the internet costs 5€ a day. Oh, and the live music sucks. Oh, and we have to get up at 6:00. Oh, and my Finnish native blueberries are pretty squished. I guess I should talk about the middle of the day even though I probably won’t be uploading this for a while…

I woke up and checked out of my room at about 9:30 and made my way to the train station. I asked the friendly tourist info people where the bus to the airport was and they told me! It’s almost like it’s their job or something to be helpful! 45 minutes later and I was at the airport, waiting for my brother to arrive from Stockholm.

He did and then we got on a bus back to Helsinki. We went to my hostel and dropped off his baggage and then went and terrorized Helsinki. We rode the tram to the market (after I asked a nice old lady to make sure we were going the right way), and got lunch. I got some amazing vegan stuff from some hippie booth and I made Tom eat Reindeer Kebab. He reports that it is pretty good and he’d probably eat it again.

We strolled through the market to look for touristy stuff and I picked up a half-liter of native Finnish blueberries. They are smaller and sourer than regular kind. The also have more stems and leaves, so I just had a few and put the rest in my bag. We then walked up to see the Helsinki Cathedral and some catholic church as well. We waltzed in and checked out the various scenes. There were some good views of the city from up there as well.

We hiked back down from the churches and decided to go see if we could pick up some rally gear or some cheap Finnish football shirts at the local mall. The answer is no. So we went to the grocery store and grabbed dinner, then back to the hostel to get the luggage, then back on the bus to go to the airport to get on another bus to go to this hotel.

The bus ride was part of our rally tour package, which will be in charge of us for the next 6 days. It was full of dudes. I’m glad I didn’t sign up for this thing to meet ladies, because it’s pretty much sausage fest from here until I get back to Helsinki. At any rate, they played the Colin McCrae memorial DVD (this is run by Brits, of course) and the 2008 WRC season review to while away the four hour bus ride. The driver was pretty good, as we turned off the main highway, the road got twistier and had some good crests, but he did not slow down. Tom and I made it to the hotel in one piece and he is sleeping, since he’s been up for a long time, 36 hours maybe? I think I might go for a stroll around this fine lake before I turn in. Or try to read the local Finnish paper, which seems to be completely about Finnish rally heroes. Or maybe I’ll go punch the live musicians.

Tomorow, the rally begins with free breakfast at 6:15. Bus leaves at 7:00. Psyched!