"This old town was built by hand
In the dust bowl of the Mother land.
There must be rock beneath this sand.
Oh, I'll be damned,
This town still stands."
- Nanci Griffith
With my best friend in town for the week, we took a bus 50 km east of Helsinki to the old town of Porvoo to show her a little bit more of Finland. Known as Finland's second oldest town, settlement began in the 13th and 14th centuries. The streets are made of cobblestone as they zig-zag in and out of the many wooden buildings of various color. The city has burned 4 times in history. The first 2 times by the Russians, third by a Porvoo housewife making fish soup in 1760, and the fourth in 2006 inside the Old Porvoo Cathedral.
The weather was finally on our side as we walked the boys through old town, did some window shopping, enjoyed lunch at a great riverside cafe, ran around in the city's parks, and browsed the open air market.
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