Up with plenty of time for a leisurely breakfast, packed up and gentle walk to the station for the 09:05 train.
The first train wasn't too bad, fairly busy but we got a seat together, and arrived in Tampere nearly 2 hours later.
We had a 90 minute wait before the next train, so enough time to walk into the centre and have a look at the river. Tampere is actually quite a big town. Interestingly they've dammed the river to provide hydroelectric and you can walk up and across the dam, seeing the water get sucked in one side and spat out the other.
The next train to Piedsamaki was busy, only 1 seat between us, so the rest sat on the floor. The conductor also did a passport check with the ticket check to make sure we were who we said we were and had a valid ticket.
What should have been a 15 minute change turned into half hour as the train was delayed. It was coming from Helsinki so was already busy before everyone got on and we ended up standing in a first. We got held about 5 minutes from our destination waiting for the line to be cleared by a double engined freight train pulling loads of wagons of tree trunks, so I was happy.
We arrived in Kuopio and a short walk across town to the harbour and our accommodation for tonight, which is an old boat. We've got a room on the bottom floor right at the front, which means the boys have portholes next to their bunks.
Kuopio is on a large lake with some nice paths for cycling and plenty of places to hire boats. There is even a sea plane which you can hire. As we had plenty of time after checking in, we went for a walk along the coast to build up an appetite ready for some balkan cuisine which was lovely.
Popped into the supermarket to grab some wine only to find out they can only sell alcohol up to 5.5% and anything stronger has to be brought from official shops, obviously none near us, so had a bottle of low alcohol wine while playing cards.
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