King Carl Gustaf and Queen Silvia of Sweden visited the Muumilaakso Museum (Moomin, or Munindalen) at the Tampere Art Museum in Tampere, on the second and last day of their official visit to neighbouring Finland.
The Moominvalley of the Tampere Art Museum is a museum devoted to original works by writer and artist Tove Jansson. Its unique collections comprise around 2,000 works. Finland's President Tanja Halonen and her husband accompanied the Swedish visitors.
King Carl Gustaf and Queen Silvia arrived in Finland on Tuesday, where they were welcomed by Finland's President at her summer residence Gullranda.
By presidential boat the royal and Finnish company travelled to Turku, Åbo in Swedish, where they lunched at the castle and attended a seminar on the September 1809 forced and in many ways traumatic separation of Sweden and Finland (which was to become a Grand-Duchy under Russian rule). The bicentenary, which for Sweden meant the loss of a third of its territory and a fourth of the population, was earlier this year already marked in the Rksdag, Sweden's parliament.
The Swedish royal couple and their Finnish hosts travelled to Tampere (Tammerfors in Swedish; some five percent of Finland's population is Swedish speaking) to visit the Swedish school and the art museum. © GPD; Photo: GPD © AP
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