First stop north from Turku is the Untamala Archaelogy Center with some well preserved wooden buildings and church as well some older burial mounds. Unfortunately the signs were in Finnish only and really quite uninteligible but we still like this stop especially due to the multitude of wild strawberries we found and ate.
Continuing north we stop in Rauma which is a Unesco World Heritage site due to its well preserved downtown consisting of hundreds wooden buildings that are still lived in. Rauma persisted through multiple almost disaster events for example the townsmen of Rauma were ordered to relocate to Helsinki in 1550 but this was unsuccessful. Then fires burned the downtown in 1640 and 1682 but it was reconstructed each time.
We really want to explore the town but it is quite rainy so we mostly do it via car with a few stops whenever the rain stops for a short while.
One short exploration is of the Central Market Square and the area surrounding it including the well maintained Old Town Hall, it looks both austere and beautiful to us.
While there are many wooden buildings in the downtown area there are some that stand out like the Marela House Museum and a few others. Those are decorated beautifully and are quite photogenic. But then the rain starts again and we have to retreat to the car and it is time to move north we still have a long way to go.
