Utö is a small island in the Finland Archipelago Sea. It is the southernmost year-round inhabited island in Finland. The written history of island dates back to the 16th century. Since the 17th century, it has been a base for pilots, lighthouse keepers, custom officials and soldiers.
The first lighthouse in Finland was built on Utö in 1753. The round lighthouse building was blown up during the Swedish-Russian war of 1808-1809. The present lighthouse was built in 1814 under the supervision of Chief Pilot Gustav Brodd. The lantern and the lights have been modernized several times. The present lens was installed in 1906.
Today Utö is popular place for a day trip. You can visit on lighthouse, a small museum and village with old wooden cottages.
The Pilgrimage Church of Wies (Wieskirche) is an oval rococo church, designed in the late 1740s by Dominikus Zimmermann. It is located in the foothills of the Alps in the municipality of Steingaden.
The sanctuary of Wies is a pilgrimage church extraordinarily well-preserved in the beautiful setting of an Alpine valley, and is a perfect masterpiece of Rococo art and creative genius, as well as an exceptional testimony to a civilization that has disappeared.
The hamlet of Wies, in 1738, is said to have been the setting of a miracle in which tears were seen on a simple wooden figure of Christ mounted on a column that was no longer venerated by the Premonstratensian monks of the Abbey. A wooden chapel constructed in the fields housed the miraculous statue for some time. However, pilgrims from Germany, Austria, Bohemia, and even Italy became so numerous that the Abbot of the Premonstratensians of Steingaden decided to construct a splendid sanctuary.