Our second last day in Helsinki

At the start of the day, today was a rainy day, but after having breakfast at our hotel, we decided to stick to our original plan, which was to visit the Museum of Seurasaari, which is an outdoors museum. So after a bit of research- conducted by the chief planner, Pam – we took bus number 24 from around the corner of our hotel on route to the area in Helsinki known as Seurasaari. The weather cleared later in the day.

This museum displays the traditional Finnish way of life is displayed in the cottages, farmsteads and manors of the past four centuries that have been relocated from all around Finland. The museum consists of buildings from the different provinces of Finland. Relocated to Seurasaari Island, they give an overall view of the life in Finnish countryside from the 18th to the 20th century.

This island has a variety of wildlife, especially birds, but also red squirrels and hares, and whilst we did not see any hares, we did see red squirrels in the island today.  There was a reference in one of the museum’s boards that they also have woodpeckers in this area, but sadly we did not see any during our visit today.

There are many huts and houses in this museum, from machinery sheds, to working men’s living quarters, to mansions and churches.  In many of these buildings are is a guide to provide more information to the visitors about the origin and purpose of the house or building, including the region of Finland from which the building originated.

Whilst initially I was not very keen to spend a lot of time in this place, I have to say that by the end of the visit I had changed my mind. This was very much a great place to visit.

Prior to leaving the museum we had a drink and a bite to eat at one of the cafes located in this open air museum, another great way to end the visit to this great museum.

We travelled on bus 24 back to the centre of Helsinki, but to our surprise the female conductor did not charge us the return fare. 

As we had some time prior to dinner we decided to visit the Old Market Hall. This market is situated in the port area in a historical building, it has  a variety food stalls with many of them offering local delicacies – such as deer pies and sandwiches, as well as the traditional fish from this area, with plenty of salmon on display. The oldest stall in the hall, the Hongiston leipämyymälä bakery, has been operating there since 1903.  We we commenting that it is a pity that it is not open later, otherwise it would prove to be a great place for us to eat dinner.

As I am finishing the blog tonight we are preparing for dinner, it will be either Nepalese or Mayan cuisine.

Please see more photos of today’s journey here.

In spite of the weather, this was another great day in Finland.