Straight to HEL

Today we dragged two sleepy, confused but enthusiastic kids out of bed at 4:30am to catch a 5am cab--our own private mini-bus, really--to Keflavik airport to catch a 7:30am flight to Helsinki. It was as close to pleasurable as economy air travel gets these days. IcelandAir is really good to kids. They sent us to the front of the check-in line and the kids got a special little boxed snack and activity on board. 

We landed 3 hours later in the glitzy Helsinki airport, picked up our rental car (an Opel) and got on the highway to Mikkeli. We stopped at Subway for lunch--the closest, easiest thing, and $37 CAD for two 6" and 1 foot-long subs, no drinks or cookies--and then the kids conked out in the back seat. We pushed on until we reached Mikkeli, where we stopped at Lidl for groceries. We got what looks like enough food for the week for about $210 CAD, which, compared to the money we'd been dropping for prepared food in Iceland, seemed like a steal. We found the house we're renting deep in the woods on Lake Saimaa, pulled into the driveway, decided it didn't look exactly like the pictures, freaked out and decided it wasn't the right place, pulled out, drove down the road a bit, realized it was in fact the house we rented, and returned to a puzzled host standing in the driveway wondering why we peeled away earlier. 

The house is old and lovely and the property is peaceful and beautiful. There are two saunas, a gorgeous view of the lake, an unexpected piano (!!!), and all the amenities we could want. It is a bit daunting, though, thinking about spending a whole month here without any friends (if you know us, you know we are pretty social), especially for the kids. And without our usual obligations, what will we do with ourselves? Be alone with our thoughts? But as soon as we finished dinner, those kids were out in the yard playing together, exploring the new surroundings, totally undaunted by the 'how will we?' questions. There's a lesson in there somewhere.