Helsinki

It was a short afternoon flight to reach Helsinki. One of the things we’re constantly amazed by is not having to show a passport when flying between EU countries. Just show your boarding pass and on you go. And then you’re there wherever it is you’re heading to- in a few short hours.

It seemed like the whole city was under construction from what I could see from the taxi window as we came into the city. Then we stepped out of the cab at the gate to the courtyard of the apartment building, and saw tall beautiful buildings of different colors and materials up and down the street.

Our home for our time in Helsinki was an apartment at the top of a building. It was small and very comfortable, with this lovely sauna off of the bathroom!

Rogue Rouge was close to our apartment and had been a tar warehouse back in the day. The two guys who own it are young and seem to be having fun serving Finnish fare with a bit of a French twist. It was a warm friendly place with good food.

I signed us up for a Red Umbrella Walking Tour of the city. Our tour guide introduced herself as a history and geography student who loves her city. We saw a lot and heard even more about Finland and Finnish culture. She was a good ambassador for her city, encouraging us to try the famous cinnamon buns at a few of her favorite bakeries around the city. She also shared a lot about how education is valued and free for students K-university! Or mostly free in university- she said many students have to work as well.

It was the intention of the architect and designers that this building highlight transparency and illumination of communications. The elevators are glass, notably Kone elevators that our tour guide pointed out to us; Kone is a multinational Finnish company.

I sat outside on the upper outside deck of the library to watch people as they worked at tables or just sat in the sun. The library was very busy, and I was excited to see the variety of librarians’ ages and styles as I walked through the building.

We caught a ferry to Lonna island where there is a sauna and restaurant too. The saunas were busy, and we were definitely on the older end of the age group that predominated. But it was really nice to start off chilly from the wind that was coming off the water, and then to get in the Baltic Sea after a little while in the sauna.

We’d popped into the restaurant when we got to the island to ask about making a reservation, and were excited to get one. After such a nice sauna and swim, it was very cool to be served a meal of simple and beautiful food. The brown bread was soft, with butter with coarse salt on it to put on the bread. The salad was artful. The restaurant got slammed with sauna goers though, and we could tell that things were backed up with lots of folks waiting for main courses. Someone who looked like a manager started filling water glasses and helping to get food to tables. Will and I had decided we’d just take a later boat, but when we finished up sooner than expected, we did what everyone else was doing— we ran for the boat!! Sometimes, life experience just follows us to other places huh? As it turned out, the crowd was well organized on the dock before the ferry even pulled it. All was well.

Loyly was busy but not packed on a rainy afternoon. We tried the various saunas and I found one that was not too hot to hang in for a while. Will and I got in the choppy sea outside a couple of times; it had some bounce to it but it wasn’t cold surprisingly.

The last sauna we tried is a local pool and sauna place right down on the waterfront. It was a beautiful sunny morning, so there were plenty of people swimming in the 2 warm outdoor pools they have surrounded by loungers and deck chairs. Will got into the ocean pool but said it was a little green and slimy. The saunas had views looking out to the water in most of them; very meditative and dreamy to hang out there.

I wish Will and I had taken more photos of the buildings all through the city. They are mostly tall, mult-unit apartment buildings with varying stone/veneers/ or skins as Will calls them. They were often lovely pale colors like pink or grey, and many had charming gates to open into the courtyards around which so many of the apartments are situated. The little we read about the housing styles is that these are likely the result of post WWII building for workers as Helsinki grew rapidly.

It was another rainy day when we boarded the ferry to head to Tallinn Estonia, a mere 2 hours away. But that’s for another blog post.