Europe Trip 2013: Helsinki City

Yesterday I visited Helsinki City proper. I had held off until I found out how to get there and back to the hotel, which as it turned out was a simple case of catching a bus from the closest bus stop :-). The price for the bus was EUR4.50 each way which was not too bad for what is roughly a 30 minute trip, including both built up and relatively quite, almost rural, areas.

The city itself was quite nice. A lot of old buildings of course, but also some much newer areas in places. probably the best idea was when I saw a hop on, hop off bus. EUR25 is a bit expensive, but it did give a good look around the key parts of the city, including the ports, flash business and residential areas and key residential and political areas.

I can confirm that the Scottish Farmer's Family Restaurant [think about it...] is the same here as elsewhere :-).

One good score was the local Lutheran Cathedral - the major church in Finland and unlike many cathedrals elsewhere in Europe and the UK was free entry. There was a gift shop, but this was in a separate building so did not detract from the Cathedral itself.

Other things of note include the extensive tram network, the ports being close to much of the town, plenty of green spaces and everyone being very friendly. Actually, everywhere I have been people have been friendly, from the bus drivers to the hotel workers, from the supermarket workers to the random suit-wearing office worker from Finnair that said 'hello' at the airport earlier today [actually, he said something else, but when I said 'hello' he instantly switched to English :-)].

Anyway, here are the photos... I haven't labelled them individually - I wasn't taking notes. Just believe me when I say I enjoyed the visit and would be happy to come back again one day.