Best Western Premier Htl Katajanokka Helsinki

... at the first train station and then head south. We were actually at the other end of the city wondering around the ferry ports. So after a couple of hours we reached our hostel which was the stand for the 1952 Olympic stadium. Later on after throwing our bags into our room, we walked into town to consult the Information Center and visited the indoor market, which was conveniently just over the road. There we tried freshly-caught ...

... before, including the beautifully named 'cloudberry', which I sampled in ice-cream form... mmmm! After grimacing at reindeer horns and skins, admiring the traditional woolly hats, examing the wooden cups from Lapland and declining to taste the small fired fish, we moved on to explore the two cathedrals before boarding the ferry to the ...

... really early :S

I'm not sure if it's the jet-lag or the sun's unusual timing, but I can NOT seem to get a grip on my sleep schedule. Either way, the night ended early because I was falling asleep in my c******nay... Sorry Pauliina....

... a problem with our reservation – as in, it wasn’t there – but luckily there was one room left and we took it. We finally drifted off to sleep at 2am local time.

May 16 - It’s Saturday (I think?) and a sunny but cool day – especially without our warm clothes which are hopefully on their way from London. We ate a nice Finnish breakfast with meatballs, pastries, local berries and yummy fresh bread then headed out ...

... for some breakfast. I sat in the morning sunshine and had a doughnut with vanilla sauce filling, and a coffee for 4 Euros! Then I went to the Kauppahalli and bought a bread roll and some cheese, and a pulla (sweet raisin bun) for dessert. I went and looked at the KIASMA Contempory Art Museum, and when I finished there, visited the famous Rock Church. I still had plenty of time before my ferry took off, so I walked all the way around Lake Toolonlahti and ...

... to 'make a fire'."Oohh, fun, I thought, who all is going to this bonfire?" "us two" "...hm, I think I'll stay here..." This is the guy who went to sleep in the woods one night, just because he thought it'd be fun. Seems like a cool guy, if a little different. Naveen, an apartment mate of Mark's, who cooks amazingly good-smelling concoctions. A whole assortment of other Americans who are studying abroad. Steve and Barry, who are in the ...

... of the Election. In response to the credit crisis, bank meltdown, government takeover being perpetuated at the moment, I think some guy put it best somewhere in the New York Times website that the government has figured out how to "publicize the debt and privatize the profits." It could, I suppose, be a lot worse, but it could also get a lot worse. It's hard to figure out what exactly is happening, and everyone, it seems, has an equally valid but ...

... coat (it was by then less than 10 C) but the hardy Finns were sitting in tee shirts at outdoor cafes. David said that he was starting to feel "jaded". Now this was after 6 pm on Monday and around 6.15 pm on Sunday we'd still be home in Narraweena having a snack dinner before going out to the airport. We saw lots of sushi places, pizza, mexican, several italian places - but I said I'd like something "Finnish". There was a "sports grill" we considered ...

... t get a chance to see... Oh, and the seats in the movie theaters are assigned. Interesting.... haven't been to movie theaters anywhere else in Europe so far (partly because of time, and partly because --FUN FACT--in Spain--they dub all their films in Spanish--a left over from the Franco regime I've heard. Though they've tried to move towards subtitles, it would put a lot of people out of work who have built ...