HELSINKI

Helsinki Cathedral is an Evangelical Lutheran Cathedral and iconic landmark of Helsinki. The church was originally built as a tribute to Tsar Nicholas I of Russia and was completed in 1852.

Today was dull and quite cool in Helsinki in stark contrast to our two days in St Petersburg which were very warm and sunny. M's hip is giving off all the same alarms that ended with a hip replacement about eight years ago. Nevertheless we took the ship's shuttle bus down town and wandered slowly down the streets of Helsinki to catch the Hop On Hop Off Bus that will give us a broad view of the city.

Like Estonia, Finland's history has been one of being squeezed between the more powerful States of Sweden and Russia who controlled Finland as a Grand Duchy for various periods. It did not become a country in its own right until 1917. During WWII they had a loose alliance with Germany because of past antipathies to Russia and Sweden. However they refused to release any of their Jewish population to the Nazis. They are of course now a fiercely independent country of six million people. There are 620,000 in Helsinki. The tax rate ranges from 28 to 90 percent but health and education services are free. A two bedroom condominium will cost around $1M. The one word that is uniquely Finnish is sauna. Typically the process requires a shower room, a steam room, and a cold plunge outdoors or indoors along with lightly flailing a birch branch to increase blood flow. Tap water is tunnelled untreated as the highest quality water through 200 kms of rock tunnels. Much is bottled and marketed in Saudi Arabia. Finland is the producer of Nokia phones and rubber tyres. Finland was one of the first to join the European Common Market and its currency is the Euro. The architecture of the street buildings in Helsinki are Soviet in nature- grey and austere. A number of movies have been shot here in Helsinki streets including Dr Zhivago.

Last night we had dinner with an American couple. He looked a bit like Burl Ives - rotund, a round, pleasant but well lived in face, a small beard and untidy curling grey hair. He wore a necklace with what looked like a fish hook carved in Ivory at his ample chest. She looked a bit like a school teacher with tight grey hair pulled primly back, and taut lips that might have easily reprimanded a naughty child. Howard was from New York and Bete was from Florida. Both appear to be in their seventies. As soon as she spoke it was clear Bete was not a native American. She was born in Holland and her husband was a sea captain who plied the routes to countries around the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean. Sometimes she would travel with him and even after having her first child; but by the time number four had come along, each born in a different country, joining him at sea was not practical. They ended up living in the Bahamas cruising on their own yacht until her sea captain partner died five years ago. And I can hear a little rawness still chokes in her throat at the mention of his memory.

She introduced us to Howard whom she described as her travelling partner. Howard had been very helpful to her after her husband died. He had helped her sell their cruising yacht and he too had been a sea captain with an unlimited licence to captain any ship but he mostly did smaller ships around the New York seaways. Howard doesn't say much as Bete does most of the talking. He appears somewhat shy and raises an eyebrow or curls the corner of his mouth into the hint of a smile at something Bete has said. With a little more prodding about how he spends his days as a landlubber he reveals he bought himself a lathe two years ago and is busy wood turning and carving. And somehow that just seems right. This old salt whittling on a piece of wood as gulls squeal above the dock where his boat is moored. But no, this is a bit more sophisticated. He takes off his necklace with two pieces attached to a leather thong that have been intricately carved in wood. And they are beautifully crafted. Then as if he is drawing a sword from its scabbard he pulls out from under the table the walking stick he has fashioned with scrolls from the handle to the tip end. The head of a bird with its sharp beak provides a useful handle. Beneath the bird's head is carved the face of an old man that looks remarkably like him. "Who is this?" I ask tentatively. "It could be you," he says, "or it could be me!" And they are happy in each other's company, the old sea captain and the widow who sailed the seven seas a lifetime ago.