Our next stop on our impromptu abbreviated Scandinavian tour was Helsinki, Finland. We flew out of the Oslo airport and landed in Helsinki around 3pm– once again, in complete darkness. We never got used to the dark while we were in Scandinavia. It was hard to wake up in the morning, because it didn’t get light until about 9:30-10am. Then, the sun set around 3pm. It messes with your head. Well, it messed with mine. There were several days up in Scandinavia that we felt as though it was late at night because it had been dark for hours, only to discover that it was not even 6pm yet. We never really had a sense for what time of day it was at all while we were in Helsinki.
Our first night there we found our hotel and wandered around the city center. In order to complete a hotel promotion we booked the Crown Plaza in Helsinki (when we complete the promotion we will have enough points to book 22 nights with points-*eeeeeee* so excited to have this cost saving opportunity presented to us!!). So we checked into the oh-so-swanky Crown Plaza and got upgraded to a Junior Suite complete with living room and heated bathroom floors (although, that seems to be the norm up here, we had it in our very basic hostel in Oslo and in our cheap room at another hotel…).
Our hotel was very close to several churches and within walking distance of the city center. We walked in to the center to get some dinner and ended up having pizza at a cute little restaurant overlooking a very small Christmas market. In keeping with our tradition of trying new and unusual foods here in Scandinavia, we opted for the deer pizza- deer, pineapple and salami pizza, actually. The deer was a little gamey (which I guess we expected) but overall the pizza was really quite nice! One thing that surprised me was how close to Russia we are (because I am terrible at geography, but getting better with every country we visit!!). The restaurants all had menus in Finnish, English and Russian.
After our dinner we wandered down to the area where the Christmas Market was supposed to be. It was at the base of the imposing and beautiful Helsinki Cathedral. Unfortunately, the market was not yet open- a huge bummer as we are in full blown Christmas Market mode. While the market was not yet open, the streets of Helsinki are still festively decorated and incredibly beautiful. There are Christmas trees and lights on every block. The storefronts at a large department store, Stockmann, were drawing large crowds of children with their festive Christmas scenes and ostentatious toy displays. It was a fun, but very wet and chilly night.
The next day was not much better- it was a mix of rain and snow. Unbeknownst to us, it was also independence day. We learned this the hard way, as absolutely nothing was open. We spent the day wandering around. Some of it was wandering around to take pictures and enjoy the city, but most of it was wandering around trying to find a place to eat lunch and get warm! It wasn’t until we got back to our hotel that we learned that nothing was open because it was independence day. The rain/snow mixture was cold and pretty miserable, so we didn’t spend much time exploring the city. Turns out, we may be better tourists in the summer months. Its hard to explore a city when you cannot feel your toes!
The next day we actually saw a little crack of sunshine- but only for about 10 minutes. And we were boarding a ferry to take us to our next destination- Tallinn, Estonia. As we were checking out of hotel to head to the ferry we asked how to get to the ferry terminal. We were given directions involving the tram, but after looking at a map we decided that we could walk it. Ha! Worst idea ever. It ended up being a long, cold, windy walk. And somehow it seems like every time we pack our bags, they weigh more….weird. So we got the ferry terminal, cranky and tired. We managed to get over it though as we boarded our ferry and found ourselves on a huge, cruise-ship like boat. There were several restaurants, duty free shopping, gambling, and more- pretty fancy for a three hour ferry! Right before we boarded, a man and a woman approached us and asked if we knew where the ferry docked. We said no, but proceeded to chat with them… the whole way to Tallinn. They were two friends from Moldova who were on a week long trip through St. Petersburg, Helsinki and then Tallinn. We sat and chatted with them and before we knew it we were in Tallinn!!
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