Category: Helsinki

Today we woke up even later than yesterday. We had breakfast and watched some TV beofre showering and heading out. 

The weather was a little wet all day today, but this was to stop our plans. 

Spending just 5€ each, we got a boat ticket to Suomenlinna Island to visit the fortress. 

The island is about 20 minutes away by boat and includes a fortress and some other things. 

We got to the island and went straight to the shop that was there to buy something for lunch. We settled on a 0.79¢ baguette which we ate whilst wondering around. 

We eventually found the fortress which was free of charge and had a look around. We were able to go inside the fortress and explore the dark insides. Some parts were so dark that we couldn’t even see eachother, which can be seen in the video below of Kim emerging from the darkness!

We walked around for a good few hours and walked on the outskirts of the fortress also, discovering a small rock covered beach. We walked along the rocks for a little bit, before arriving back at the port and waiting for the boat. 

We arrived back in the centre of Helsinki at 17:00 and had to think about some dinner. We went to the supermarket but didn’t find anything we wanted, though we did find some stuff for sandwiches tomorrow.

We went to Subway to get some dinner and there was a good deal of 2 footlong subs, 2 bottled drinks and a free subway bag (for some reason) for 19.99€. that sounded good to us so we got that and came back to the room to relax and watch some TV. We watched one program and then fell asleep for a little bit, only to be woken up by remembering to do the blog! 

We are traveling again tomorrow, for a while, so we will update you when we can!

Moi moi! 

– Mr & Mrs Hale

We had no alarm set.for this morning, which was wonderful! We woke at 10:30 and had showers in the strage showers we have here…

We then needed to get some breakfast, so we went for a walk to a supermarket and bought a cake and some orange & mango juice, as well as picking up some cereal and milk for breakfast for the next couple of days.

The weather was rather hot and blue sky and then, all of a sudden, there was hard rain followed by large hailstones. It was a very strange view as there were black rain clouds in one part and then merged with that were blue skies! 

We did walk past a rather large cathedral though, which was very cool and looked very cool with the black cloud around it!

We took a walk around the market and the indoor old market area which is now a small set of food stores. This was nice and smelled wonderful!

After the market, we found somewhere to have some Finnish food, which was a Viking themed restaurant! 

The food was very nice and we got a set 3 course menu.

Once we finished our food, we walked a different way back to the hostel via the waterside which had a wooden structure which included a bar, swimming pool and sauna. We sat and looked at the view, which was a very nice one!

We then came back to the hostel to relax and watch some TV.

Moi Moi!

– Mr & Mrs Hale

🇫🇮🇫🇮🇫🇮 Hei! 🇫🇮🇫🇮🇫🇮

Our time at Sætre farm is over! 😔

We had an amazing time learning new skills that we didn’t know anything about, we managed to renovate a whole room, build fences and so much more! 

We felt like the family were our family or it felt like we were visiting friends. The atmosphere was excellent!

We started the day early and left for the bus stop, which Martin & Hege gratefully took us down to, which was kind! They both and Tarn, waited until the bus went and said goodbye which was really lovely!

We both had to get the bus to Kongsberg and Jana was also leaving so she had to do the same. We all sat in the café we used previously in Kongsberg station and had a drink whilst waiting for time to pass. Time did pass and we had to say another goodbye, this time to Jana, and we then got on the train to Oslo.

We had to change at Oslo central station and had 10 minutes to do so! We got the correct platform and train and had just a 20 minute ride to the airport. We got to the airport and sorted our bags, getting tags from the machine and using the self-bag drop machine, which made it much easier!

We then breezed through security and had about 1.5 hours to kill. We bought a couple of drinks and then took a wander to our gate and sat there. Shortly after, we started boarding and took off. The flight was nice and easy, especially for Kim who slept the whole time!

We landed in Helsinki and had to get to the centre. Paying just 10€ (by the way, Finland uses the Euro, which we didn’t know!) we caught another train to the centre, where we changed to a tram. We had a mild amount of entertainment as a drunk person was struggling, a lot, to get onto the tram, falling multiple times. Once a Finnish guy helped him on his way, he then started talking with us before he himself entered a tram, but not before saying ‘Peace & Love’ to us. What an interesting Finland experience we have had already.

We are now in our hostel, after checking in and going to the golden arches for some quick food. 

Our hostel had just 2 toilets and 3 showers per floor,per gender for 30 rooms (potential of 60 guests!!). The showers also have gaps in the glass so everyone will be able to see everything when we shower! This will be an interesting experience…

Heippa!

– Mr & Mrs Hale