Turku and Stockholm Story!

So. Jackie and I left our apartment to get the 7:25am bus to the train station. For some reason, the bus times had changed that day so we had to call a cab to take us because we didn't have time to walk. We met Gunter(Austria), Tereza(Czech Rep.) and Dalma(Hungary) at the train station. We took a train to Tampere then changed and took another one to Turku. On the train from Tampere to Turku, a battery exploded in Tereza's bag and there was a small fire in her bag with a lot of smoke; it was because her bag was sitting in the sun. We got to Turku and found something to eat, which took a good hour because no one could agree on anything. After lunch we went to sit by the river then went to a Cathedral. On the way to the cathedral there was a massive parade of people from young to old wearing what looked like American Boy Scout uniforms. We tried asking, but were never able to figure out what it was for. From the cathedral we walked to the other side of the city to the ferry station. We boarded the ferry around 8:00pm. We didn't have cabins on the way there, but we did on the way back. So, we sat in seats that were like on and airplane. The ferry was 11 hours. I had never been on a boat like that before and I was surprised at the size of it! Jackie and I walked around after we left the dock; there were 2 restaurants, 2 cafes, a huge tax free shop, a dance club and some other stuff. We were walking the opposite way the ferry was going, so as we were walking I looked out the big window and nearly fell over. We tried to sleep that night but 11 hours in one seat wasn't working. We made a stop about half way through and a bunch of people got off the boat. So I hoped over and slept across 2 seats. When I woke up Tereza was on the floor in front of me between the seats cocooned in her sleeping bag. Gunter, along with the rest of the people in our area had also moved to the floor. We got to Stockholm at 6:30am and got a much needed coffee. We changed our money and decided what to do for the day. We left around 7:30 and walked to the old City Hall. We got into some trouble here with other tourists because Dalma peed in a bush because she couldn't hold it and it was so early no where would be open for her to use a bathroom for another hour or so. Then we headed to the hostel Gunter, Tereza and Dalma were staying at. I have a friend from high school who lives in Stockholm so Jackie and I stayed with her. After the hostel, we went to two churches then stopped at a grocery store to get some bread and meat and had lunch in a park. We walked back to the hostel to get out bags and shower then went to meet Elin at her apartment. Elin, Jackie and I went to dinner then down by the water so Elin could show us where to go in the morning.
The next morning, we met back with the others and went to the Royal Castle. As we got there the changing of the royal guard ceremony was starting. This was neat, but sooo long. After the ceremony we went into the Royal apartments. Then walked through old town, Gamla Stan. After, we went back to Elin's apartment to get our stuff while the others went to the hostel to get theirs. We walked around the other side of the city center for a bit then Elin walked us to the ferry.
This time we had cabins, which were on the very bottom deck...the cars were even above us. There were big metal things in the hallway and we asked what they were for. The woman said "Well, if the ship goes Titanic those close automatically so don't stand there our you'll get squished and die." Which is funny because if you don't get squished by them you are going to drown, anyways. But she said "Don't worry, there are no icebergs", we told her that is also what they thought on the Titanic. We went to sit in the cafe area for some coffee after getting on the boat. Gunter and Tereza had been eating a package of cookies all day and they gave me one when we got coffee. I took one bite and recognized them as being the same cookies we give our residents at work to keep their digestive systems working regularly because they are loaded with fiber. I asked to see the package and asked them if they knew what digestive meant because the package said "Digestive Cookies" on it. They thought it was a cookie flavor; needless to say after a whole package of cookies, they had a rough night. We walked around the boat a little and took showers. We went into Tereza and Gunter's cabin to play Uno. Which I didn't know, but Uno is different all over the world...and we play probably the least entertaining way. After that we went to sleep. Everyone had a really hard time sleeping because they said the boat was loud but I never woke up once. We got into Turku at 7:30 and walked to the train station for our train back.
This trip was when I learned the difficulties of traveling with other people. After the first day, we all nearly killed eachother. However, Stockholm was really nice and it is huge! We were only there for 2 days but we really should have planned to be there for around 4 because we didn't even see nearly the whole city.

I have taken my last exam for the semester, so I am finally done with the exception of a short essay. However, I have been done with lectures since April 8th.

Next Stop: London on tuesday...Spain for a week...Finland for a week...back home on May 29th! Its been 5 months already! yikes!