Keeping with my new tradition of ending each city’s posts with a photo spread, I present to you some impressions of Helsinki in picture form.
With a population of almost 300,000, Espoo is Finland’s largest city and acts western-lying suburb of the capital, having officially been been folded into the greater Helsinki metropolitan region. You can reach Espoo from downtown Helsinki either by Metro or local commuter trains; a new light rail line is set to open in 2024 and connect Espoo with Eastern Helsinki
Suomenlinna is an 18th-Century fortress and UNESCO World Heritage Site built on six of Helsinki’s 315 islands. Five of the six islands are interconnected by a footbridge, but Suomenlinna can only be reached from the mainland by ferry or water taxi.
Much like Reykjavík, Helsinki has a thriving, if under-publicized art scene. People travel to places like Iceland and Finland seeking natural beauty, but the work on display indoors rivals any forest or glacier out in the wild.
I began my Helsinki posts with an exploration of Seurasaari, one of the capital’s 315 islands, but now I want to put our feet back on solid ground and check out what the mainland has to offer.
Helsinki was not high on my list of must-visit capitals. I had recently returned from an amazing trip to The Caucasus where I absolutely fell in love with Baku, Tbilisi and Yerevan.