Day 74. Leanne Here.

Today we must pack up and head out of Helsinki on a cruise to St. Petersburg later in the day. It also means saying goodbye to the cute two bedroom flat that has been compared to Communist or dorm room housing. At first, I was a bit disappointed but after 4 days, the place has grown on me by now as I have my little spot for coffee and my computer …. its hard to leave sometimes.

We've been advised that a trip to Suomenlinna is a must-see before we head out of Finland. Suomenlinna is an 18th century sea fortress with centuries-old artillery and defensive walls across 6 linked islands - just a 15 minute ferry ride from Helsinki.

Tour guide John has already mapped out our day of how to enjoy it in just under 2 hours which is all we have allowed for this UNESCO World Heritage site. By now, we are darn good at pre-planning our days (thanks to John) and getting the most out of every one of the average 10,000 steps we take each day. With the noted exception of some travel days, we are trekking anywhere between 3 to 8 miles a day. While most of the places we are going have metros and bus systems, we prefer to take in the sites while walking whenever we can.

We arrive at the Suomenlinna Museum which gives us an excellent overview of the fortress role over its history. The kids immediately bolt to the back for a 30 minute documentary on the place so I join them. I was impressed it wasn’t at my urging. It was full of battles, fires, and leadership but I must admit here that I dozed off; so the others got more out of it than I did.

We then head over to the Military Museum which was even a bigger hit because it hosted over 50 uniforms from the days of Finland’s Independence in 1917 to Swedish uniforms to Soviet uniforms. It housed a tank, artillery, and even first hand accounts from soliders. We learn even more about Finland’s rule by Sweden and Russian and then independence for over 100 years now.

On the ferry back, I feel satisfied that the teens were exposed to their fair share of world history for the day. One of my biggest goals for this trip is to have the teens realize how small the world really is and that what we do in the States matters to the world. And the world matters to us. Its a philosophy, but being more globally minded, realizing that history often repeats itself is a lesson in which I would like them to impart.

After the ferry, I convince Kyle to go on the Flying Cinema ride with and completely for me! The teens wanted to grab lunch in the markets by the harbor, but I’ve been hankering for this ride for a few days. Clearly its a touristy-thing but its one of my favorite types of ride - a 4D ride / flight over land to see what time doesn’t give us to actually experience. Kyle starts to fret we will miss our cruise to St. Petersburg but given he was trying to get there 3 1/2 hours before departure, I figured 15 minutes out of the schedule was a calculated low risk to take.

We run over to catch next “flight” on the hour, and the attendant shares we have a choice of flying over Helsinki or flying over Finland. In unison, Kyle and I tell them Finland and because a group tour didn’t show up on time, we were able to have the entire movie theater to ourselves. In just 15 minutes, we fly over forests, mountains, rivers, and even end with a realistic video of seeing the Northern Lights over the Lappland (the northernmost part of Finland). And despite my minor fear of heights, I know in my head I’m only a maximum 10 feet off the ground at any time!

Somehow now with the sea fortress history lessons at the museums and a stimulated flight over Finland, I’m feeling like we are leaving Helsinki with just a great taste of what this country had to offer. Speaking of tastes, we definitely ate the best in Finland of all the dozen or so countries we have yet visited on this tour - every meal, even the fast food lunch at the amusement park, well exceeded expectations. Absolutely scrumptious in fact — especially the Salmon soup!