Hello from rainy Helsinki, Finland.

We flew via Iceland and flew over Greenland which was beautiful (but not too green!). Iceland looked flat and treeless. Both flights on Iceland Air went smoothly and were on time.

I arrived in Helsinki early this morning with Erin and Patty, player and coach for the Canadian Connolly Cup team. We took a shared taxi into town, stored our luggage (the hotel was packed with a huge tour group and no one could check in till late afternoon) and did a quick exploration of the area. We found a coffee shop and had breakfast, walked back past the big train station and then found out where the apartment I rented was located (which was straightforward but we made it rather complicated). I met up back at the hotel with Vicki Buholz and we took a taxi with our stuff to the apartment.    

It poured most of the afternoon and was pretty cool. I did some grocery shopping which was an adventure since the only languages on the packages and signs were Swedish and Finnish and I don’t know any of either one. I think I bought some turkey or chicken lunch meat but I’m not sure!

The rest of the players staying here had much delayed flights, especially Susan Wright who had her American Airlines flight cancelled out of Grand Junction for the second year in a row so she is delayed by about 14 hours in her arrival. Cindy Johnson was delayed four hours in London but finally arrived. They are both pretty beat!

Helsinki seems like a nice town, not like a big city, but is clean, with lots of trees and a nice bike path running past our apartment.

Tomorrow is my first indoor practice here, I’ve heard the courts are quite fast with low ceilings and are pretty dark,another tennis challenge awaits.

Good night from Finland…where at nearly 10pm it’s full daylight out.