My route took me through forest, a sunny market square with strawberries and xylophone music, and the big sand dunes of Yyteri.
Day 27. 122km. Pyhäranta – Yyteri. Map and gpx.
The sun was bright, beckoning me to start as early as I want to. It’s only really too dark to cycle for a couple of hours a night.
The road passed through a lot of forest. To have some variation, I followed my recommended route on a big detour into the town of Rauma. The market square was a hive of activity, selling fruit and vegetables – especially strawberries.
To keep my mind nimble, I try to pronounce the words I see on the sign posts. I found myself repeating the town Uusikaupunki to myself (out loud) as I cycled along. Here are some of the more challenging sign posts.
The recommended bike route – the Eurovelo 10, is a lovely route, and the gpx file I downloaded helped me a lot – it is very detailed. The signposts have seen better days, though. Most are faded to pure white. This was one of the more recognisable ones.
I met a German couple cycling several times today. We cycled at different speeds so we didn’t actually cycle together, but we had lunch together, met in the town of Pori, and again at the camping ground. The guy of the couple has cycled through the Baltic countries and has passed through quite a few places that I have been to.
I am staying at Yyteri. Many say it is the nicest beach in Finland. A wide beach and sand dunes. The weather in the afternoon had got cloudy and it even tried to rain. On arriving in Yyteri, the sun came out and the beach called out to me.
arctic-cycler.com 
Yeah, but it can’t be as good as Brighton!
It is the best beach in Finland. I didn’t say it was the best beach in the world. We both know where that is.. 😉
Hi Matthew,
great to read your stories along the way, especially in places that are familiar to me! Just a comment: The roadsigns that have turned into white due to their old age – that’s not actually true. Those ones are the “new” ones that were replaced somewhere in the 1990’s and they were white from the very beginning. The white ones are for public roads and black ones for private ones.
“Kaupunginsairaala” = City hospital
“Pääterveysasema” = Main communal healthcare center
These just to teach you some more Finnish 🙂 Tomorrow then Sweden I guess? Heja Sverige! Jag önskar dig lycka till, mycket framgång och vacker väderlek! Hejdå!
-Jarno
Hey Jarno. Great to hear from you. I hope all is well in Eindhoven.
Regarding the bike sign, I was talking about the small, faded square below the white street sign with the black writing. It used to be brown with a white symbol of a bike but it is now just a white square unless you look really closely. I saw one that was brand new and really clear today. I’ll take a photo of one if I see another one like that. 🙂
Actually, it turns out I will be still in Finland tomorrow night. There’s no late boat to Sweden tomorrow. Looking forward to seeing Vaasa.
All the best from Kristiinankaupunki. 🙂