Day 4 – The Shape of Water

Pensar to Nagu, 20Km

It was an 8:30 ferry this morning from Pensar to Kirjais. Breakfast was very good but not to my liking so I left early and arrived at the harbour soon after 8am, just as the ferry arrived. There were no vehicles so I jumped on board and off we went. These boats start on schedule but they skip stops without passenger reservations so they are soon ahead of schedule. They may be the lifeblood of the archipelago but you’ll be left behind if you treat them like British Rail.

I met another pilgrim on the ferry to Pensar yesterday, a young woman from Munich intending to camp all the way along St Olav’s trail to Trondheim. This is her first long distance walk. She was once more on the ferry this morning and said she hadn’t slept well last night and would stay on the boat to save some kilometres. She looked enviously at my backpack and I remembered my own inept beginnings on the Camino.

Last night’s hotel was a gem. Although I was the only guest, the place was busy with boat people who paid to moor for the night and who dined in the restaurant. There was a lovely relaxed holiday atmosphere and the barmaid was chatting away to a group from one of the boats. Finnish is a strange language, closer to Hungarian than anything nearby. Of course everyone talks English to me so it was interesting to listen to the flow of Finnish words. Eventually they left with their drinks and I got a short burst of Finnish from the barmaid. I said I was British and she said “Awesome!” and switched to perfect American. Although she was Finnish, she was brought up in Boston, Mass. and is now studying in DC. We had a great chat and she suggested the best places to see the fall in New England. I said “Brilliant!” and she said “that’s so British!” And she told me the girl in that group was applying to her college in DC. “It’s a small world!”, she said. That’s so Disney.

The fine weather broke overnight and it was a wet day today. Soon after leaving the ferry, I passed a big house and a large car drove out. It pulled over, the electric window lowered and the man asked if I’d like a lift to Nagu. I assured him that I was having the time of my life and I felt sorry for him, driving in such conditions. He wished me well. Despite the weather, it was a nice walk along old roads and tracks, across rocky bits covered in all sorts of flowering moss and along the water’s edge. They say the landscape and the water here in the archipelago have been shaped by generations of farmers and fishermen.

Nagu is the “big city” of the Finnish archipelago but everything’s relative. It’s not a city, nor is it big. Just a couple of shops. It’s also the “St Tropez” of the archipelago with its huge marina packed with luxury yachts. There’s also a medieval church with a milestone to the Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim, 1130Km.