As I got off the flight, the first thing I thought of was "aren't these stairs rather shallow?". And they were. It is not something you notice usually, but it was the first thing.
I was late into Helsinki and that meant I was definitely going to be late to meet my cousin. And late I was, but he knew this already as I had told him. It seems barely plausible that this would have caused major problems in the past but we were connected (via the internet in the air) while I was on my way so it was not a huge problem. I got the train into Helsinki Central but not before getting the bus. Helsinki airport prides itself (link) on the compact scale of it, saying that it is a very easy airport to navigate but I found the exit quite unclear. There was not a sign to the trains and I needed to actually get a bus to the train station. There were also buses but it seemed to make sense to go by train. I wanted to get a day pass as I knew I would be travelling around and the airport transport was included in the zone. Once I got to the train station, rather farcically, you could only buy single tickets as there was no ticket machine or even ticket office - just what appeared to be a stall selling tickets. I asked about passes and the lady said that it was not possible until I reached Helsinki. The station was still in the process of being built, but I think they should have got this right! After this, I walked through the station being hewn from rock all the way down - it was quite impressive. The station had two platforms and both went to the same place but in opposite directions. I was confused by this and the signage was generally quite poor but the airport station sits, effectively, at one end of a loop with Helsinki Central at the other. Once I had worked this out, a young lady came and asked me how to buy a ticket... I told her that I got mine from upstairs (it was quite a long walk) but someone kindly interjected that it was possible to buy on the train. It is interesting, when travelling, how variable the quality of signs and directions are but it took me far longer to work out what to do than it should have. Helsinki Central is a beautiful station so it is a great introduction to the city proper.
I found my cousin (hereafter, C) waiting outside as planned - this part had worked like clockwork. We hadn't seen each other for almost ten years so I was just glad that I could recognise him[1]. We exchanged pleasantries and then we set off in search of something to eat (quickly) and to try and extract something of Helsinki from the day within the few hours of daylight remaining by wandering.
C lived in Espoo which is theoretically a town outside Helsinki[2] and so we needed to get out of Helsinki by bus from Kampi (an area near the centre with a large bus station).
I got up much later than I wanted to but a plan is a plan and we had planned to go to the nearby Nuuksio national park. It seemed close enough but the journey was quite long as we needed to get two buses and neither was frequent so we waited for a long time at each[3]. The bus there eventually full and then emptied a stop or two before the end and so, in the spirit of adventure, we also got off and walked. It was a place to walk, so why not?
A good few hours later, including some time getting lost, time had pleasantly passed by. I was often told to "get lost" as a child and this is advice I have always taken to heart and so it was quite an enjoyable walk around the park along some well signposted[4] trails.
We returned to Helsinki later for the evening for no particular reason.
I was leaving Helsinki on the third day and, as chance would have it, C was leaving Espoo on that day too (to move to Vantaa) and so we said our goodbyes in the morning as I headed to Helsinki for a day of wandering[5] after dropping my bag off at the station[6]. My boat out of town was at 5pm and I was told that to get to the terminal for 4pm would be sensible so I planned a few hours of walking around based on that.
I started out near Market Square which is where many people seem to consider the centre of the city is. Here, there are a number of fishy items for sale and some food and drink. It is also quite near Helsinki Cathedral which is white and so even the redevelopment of one side of it using white cloth to cover it is quite well hidden. The took me towards the docks and here I wandered in quite a quiet area in the sun to look back on Helsinki. This reminded me a little of a much ranier day in Zurich actually. I also went to the Olympic stadium area and a Rock cathedral which were both distraction enough for me and involved taking the tram for part of the way. There was not a huge desirre to traipse around so I made my way to the boat after a little detour to collect my bag and have some food and then walked down to the terminal from Market Square.
I boarded the boat and thought, "these stairs are
rather shallow" again.
And so on to Stockholm ->
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| Helsinki 2015 - click for photo album |
1. I speak, fluently, one language but I can speak Bengali a fair amount. Last time I saw C, I was in Bangladesh and my relationship with him has always been in Bengali but I was not really sure what to do here. I am quite awkward with these kinds of things and I have a terrible memory for how my relationships are manifested which is most obvious with female friends. I find it really hard to remember if I have a nodding, hugging, kissing or just inane smiling welcome with them. It is easier with male friends as it is usually nothing at all as I have a rational dislike of handshakes with friends. How do people remember? If you could drop me a line in the comments or directly to help me with a system, that would be great.↩
2. Finland is so centralised in terms of population that the 3 biggest cities (Helsinki (~625k), Espoo (~265k) and Vantaa(~210k)) in the country are all basically next to each other within the “capital region”. I would not go as far as saying it is exactly a megalopolis as the greater Tokyo-Yokohama conurbation is, but it is all connected in the sense that it seems that they serve each other. Finland’s population is about 5.5m and with some other smaller towns in the capital region taking the population to about 1.5m – the capital region has over a quarter of the whole population.↩
3. I don't usually wait for buses for very long when I am abroad but I caught myself waiting as I do in London. What this meant was that I was looking the wrong way - in the opposite direction to the traffic and at all the people (the stop sign was still at that end). It was quite odd but I could not break the habit throughout the trip. Public transport muscle memory - if only there was a compound noun for that. There probably is in German.↩
4. I am, however, colourblind and mixing red and brown up does not always aid navigation.↩
5. I had changed my plans for the Monday as I felt that I should spend some more time in Helsinki after the slight delay on Saturday. I was going to go to Turku, which was the old capital and also had a ferry to Stockholm, but I had seen little of the sights in Helsinki.↩
6. The Finnish Railways company is called VR and the logo is remarkably similar to the JR of Japanese Railways. On this, the most flimsy of reasons, I assumed that lockers would be plentiful at the station as they are at most major JR stations. I was right.↩
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