1982 Heading to Finland (7/19/1982)

Monday, July 19, 1982

All through the night you could still see the sunset. Or was it a sunrise? Began to see farms, fields of grain, and small wooden cabins (hay huts?). Arrived in Boden at 1:15 and discovered there are only two trains per day to the Finnish border, the next one at 8:30. The train station was closed but the underground passage to the tracks was not. We settled on a landing, layering on clothes to keep warm since the door from the track had a window pane missing. The sun rose at 3:00!

The station door opened at 6:15 and we went in to get warm. We were able to board the electric train at 8:00, and it left on time to take us to Haparanda, passing birch tree forests. At one point a man behind me exclaimed in such a way that I automatically looked out the window in time to see the hind view of a silhouette of two deer or reindeer. I tried keeping an eye out on the woods, but fell asleep.

Arrived in Haparanda at 11:00, put our bags in lockers, and walked through the sprawling town with birch tree-lined streets and dirt sidewalks. Saw a man trimming grass wearing a face shield and ear protectors! Followed the Torneälven/Tornionjoki/Torne River which separates Sweden from Finland.

Looking across the Torne River to Finland

Decided to eat in the Domus Coop cafeteria, where we figured out you punched a button for the item you wanted (hamburgers for us) and as you made your way down the line to a window, the prepared meal would be ready. The hamburger came with Thousand Island dressing and chopped cabbage. We shared a plate of French fries and had milk, for 30 SEK/$5.

After lunch we returned to the riverfront to lie in the sun on the grass. The sun was warm, but there was a stiff cool breeze. It soon became too cool for us and we returned to the train station at 15:00. Got some ice cream and retrieved our bags before the 18:03 local electric train to Tornio, Finland.

Suomen Valtion Rautatiet (VR)/Finnish State Railways

We thought the trip to the Finnish side would take an hour, since the arrival time was 19:10, but it took 7 minutes as there is a time change in Finland. All the passengers were waved onto an older electric train to Kemi. This wasn’t on the schedule as we had expected to wait two hours in Tornio, but we went along. A half hour later we were in Kemi. We asked at the ticket window if we needed reservations; not for the 20:10 train. The schedules we could understand only had a 20:50 and a 22:10 train, so we thought perhaps we had misunderstood.

Prepared a dinner of tuna on Wasa crackers when a train was announced! We gathered our things and boarded, finding seats in a coach with tables. There we were able to finish our dinner as the train left at 20:15. Lots of military traveling on Finnish trains. Flat countryside with undeveloped land, forests, and a few farms. Later in Oulu, most of the people got off so we had our own bank of seats on either side of the table for cramped, but horizontal sleeping.