And the last opera was .....

 Lohengrin, which after my experience in Stockholm with Parsifal I was not looking forward to at all. 

The place where we stayed was very on the ball about the opera festival and arranged a shared taxi every evening to take those who wanted it to the opera. We had to go early to Lohengrin as they had also arranged for me to be met with a wheelchair that evening so there was a bit of hanging around while we waited for that to turn up. It gave me the opportunity to take some photographs of the castle and surroundings. 

 

I did feel sorry for the two young boys who had to push me in the wheelchair to the seating; it's quite a long way, some of it is uphill  and I'm no lightweight. But they got me there (and back to the taxi at the end of the evening too). I wondered if I was supposed to tip them; it's not much of a thing in the Nordic countries and I didn't. However I discovered at breakfast the next morning that they come from a local ice hockey team and the son of our accommodation provider plays on it. Not only that but the Dad is in charge of fundraising for the team so I was able to give him a nice donation for that, so I felt better. 

Lohengrin is all about the swan and the big question every time it is done is 'how will they 'do the swan?' The answer in Savonlinna was build a huge one out of paper - comme ci

which isn't the world's most convincing but they have to do something. Personally I thought they overdid the swan motif, as this wasn't its only iteration, and there were quite a lot of things I would have done differently, but then I'm not an opera director, I was just sat in the audience watching. Given my time over again, I wouldn't mind having a go at being an opera director but I probably couldn't take the criticism so better off how I am. 

Lohengrin is long, not gonna lie, but it's not as long as Parsifal thank goodness,  and it was infinitely more comprehensible. The music was lovely and it would have been a perfect evening had it not been for the knee. Once again chorus cast and orchestra were amazing: 

here's the tenor and some of the rest of the cast at the curtain call. In a truly great cast, he was outstanding.

Next day we drove back to Helsinki and the OH sorted out airport assistance from BA and Finnair. Plaudits to BA, which I don't often say, who were very helpful, and thumbs down to Finnair who said such things weren't their responsibility because we had booked the flight through a travel agent. After reiterating several times that we had done no such thing and getting nowhere, the OH said well if they couldn't provide assistance their desk staff would just have to watch me die and rot at their desk as I couldn't walk, which I thought a trifle OTT but it did the trick because whoever was on the phone went away and came back and then said it was all sorted. Which it was. Personally I think she had taken the opportunity to re-check the booking and discover that actually no it hadn't been booked through a travel agent after all, but whether she discovered her mistake or the OH's threats spurred her into action it got done, which was the main thing. I don't think I would recommend it, if you can avoid it, but I had been dreading the flights back and in the end with all the help  it was less of a nightmare than anticipated. 

I am rather off foreign travel just now and the most exciting thing on the calendar currently is a trip to Stirling next month for Bloody Scotland, the crime fiction festival. But I have been asked to submit an abstract for consideration for a conference in Chambery in November and I'm planning to do that. If it gets accepted then perhaps I should cast my eye about for a virgin to sacrifice to the god of travel before I go!