It was a long trip home. We left the Helsinki hotel at 5:30am Saturday morning, got home Sunday around 2:30pm – with a 10hour time difference. It was about 16 hours in the air – 3 hours to London, a very long layover; about 7 hours to JFK with an overnight in a hotel (which was shorter than our London layover); 6 hours to SFO; 2.5 hours home with a stop for lunch and groceries.

Always good to be home. Always.

Because Dan travels so much he racks up lots of miles and hotel points, and his flyer status with British Airways gives him access to airport lounges in most major airports. It’s a different experience than traveling economy to be sure, and I got my first taste of it on our Europe trip last year. On our way home we had breakfast in one in Helsinki and JFK, and switched back and forth between two different lounges in London. All of them have free food and drink, but the British Airways lounges in London were the best. A few lounge pics below.

The dining area in the first class lounge.

 

Final thoughts:
1. I said this in my last post but it’s worth repeating: I’m amazed on every trip what a non-issue language is in Europe. Once we venture out of that continent I’m sure we’ll experience something different. That said, it is helpful to have some basics down for the country your visiting. We’ve picked up little pieces of German, French and Spanish that was helpful enough; oddly never attempted to learn any Finnish or Estonian! The website/app Duolingo has been very helpful and learning introductory things. Check it out if you haven’t and are interested in picking up some additional foreign language skills – for free.

2. We love how great the public transportation is. We enjoy not driving when we’re there, and the transit option on Google maps is amazing, even showing you connections between trains/subways and buses. We literally couldn’t function without it.

3. I think we’ve finally learned our lesson on Modern Art museums. Helsinki had one and we never even considered it, despite the current Mappelthorpe exhibit. (And we’ve seen an exhibit of his before but couldn’t remember where.) But we do love the history and learning about what others have struggled with and what they’re up to now. The Estonian folks we talked to were just so great, and so excited that this 24 year period of independence is the longest they’ve had in their over 800 year history. And they’re doing some great things – especially with using technology. Skype came out of Estonia. And some cool things with voting online from your home using their national ID card. And all of their medical records are standardized and online, something we’ve been talking about for decades.

4. In January we’re doing something radical: a trip to Europe that’s not attached to a business trip for Dan. Shorter – just 9 days – but all Italy. We’ll spend New Year’s Even in Milan, then Venice, Florence, Rome. Time to change my language setting on Duolingo….

And a bit of a PS: