It began as a drizzle, became a shower, and ended in a down pour. The rain came down hard, forcing me to move faster than I intended, leaving my home and beelining to the taxi stand. The beating of the rain felt like being whipped by a stage coach driver, spurring me further on reckless not paying attention to the pavement. Steady, I thought, I was using a different backpack for this trip and had my day pack on the front, not used to this new weight balance.

A river of water under foot, I glided, right foot aquaplaning over the foot path and into the ungripable air. Balance lost, the weight of the backpacks drawing me forward, I took the weight onto my left ankle, the crashed down onto my right knee. Still wildly unbalanced, gravity grasped me by the collar and threw me down onto my belly, lying there like an upturned turtle soaking in the deluge of rain.

Needless to say the next 24 hours were not fun. The Qantas flight from Sydney was delayed and we had a tarmac boarding, involving descending two floors via stairs, a bus that thankfully I got a seat, and finally a struggle up the cabin stairs to the plane. Being stuck on small plane for an 8 hour flight to Singapore was hell, counting down the time by trying to figure out the god awful iPad entertainment system they used.

Limping to the closest bar in Changi airport, the beer soothed the pain, but stung the wallet. Next stop was Helsinki, but first a side mission to buy some Panadol that targeted muscle and joint pain, eating half the pack, and feeling the pain start to melt away on a very enjoyable 14 hour flight.

We arrived in Helsinki at 6:30am, jumped into a taxi, and headed for the city centre half an hour away. Checked in, showered, and rested for a couple of hours catching up on YouTube videos. I started to feel guilty for not get out and start seeing the city, capital of the Finnish. I’d only booked two nights, so I strained through the pain of putting my shoes back on and headed out around 10:30am, a whole day ahead to start to explore! … only to find everything closed.

I was told later that afternoon by locals that nothing opens on the weekend until at least midday, but 2pm was a safer bet that restaurants and bars would be open by then. I think I understand why; it doesn’t get dark here until 9:30pm, which was a surprise after dozing off in the afternoon and waking to broad daylight, convinced it was 9am while it was in fact 9pm.

The only sights I visited was the art gallery and trying to find the entrance to Helsinki museum, which I saw a couple also trying to get into the building to no avail. I’d even checked their website if they were open on Sundays, and apparently they were meant to be, however the locked door said otherwise.

The art museum was predominately Finnish artists. The most interesting section was an introspective of what you thought were the Finnish people. Artists around the world had different portraits of who the Finnish people are, with differing races and cultures that make up the peoples of the country. The sign describing the section was quite poignant, saying these portraits represent how the world view it’s people; but has anyone been missed? It resonates with Australian multiculturalism too.

Across the road to where the closed Helsinki Museum sat, there was the Helsinki Cathedral. Oddly the was a graffiti decorated rock band looking caravan in the square out front, and a solo guitarist sat playing some somber tune. Not very rock star, and I thought I heard him say “hallelujah” several times. Slowly I noticed all the cool graffiti on the other side of the caravan had a giant Jesus with writing under him. Even though it was in Finnish, I could read it was to protest Antisemitism. As I was leaving, a lone lady became his audience, singing along with him, swaying her arms to the heavens.

Thinking of rock bands, one very noticeable demographic of person exists in Helsinki. The metal heads. I’m not even really surprised by this, we know the Nords love their metal. But it sure is on display here. The area around my hotel in particular had roaming metal heads on the streets, presumedly finishing a gig somewhere. If I were staying longer and not injured, I would have loved to seek out where exactly the metal bars are. But I do think its all bars, even a bar outside the fine art museum had couples decked out in Slayer shirts and leather pants at lunch time.

On Monday I had the ferry to Tallinn, Estonia, booked for 10:30am. The ankle was slowly being less painful and the swelling had gone down a bit. Putting a shoe on was noticeably less nightmarish, but the foot was still days away of being fully healed. Never-the-less, I chose to walk across the city centre over to the port area where Viking Line’s terminal lived, passing by a cool looking market being set up that I wished I could stay one more day to explore, but onward to the terminal I went and the ferry… not really a ferry, an actual cruise ship, took us across the Gulf of Finland to Tallinn, Estonia, and the start to the Baltic adventure.