And the World Heritage site of the day is also Suomenlinna. Honestly, these world heritage sites are a dime a dozen in Europe.
Saturday, we joined the hordes of tourists and locals on the ferry to Soumenlinna (public transit and covered by our regional transit card, of course).
As we left the harbour, this steamboat came puffing by.
No fun allowed, Helsinki style (but probably the only place in Helsinki you can't drink in public):
Leo sails out of Helsinki harbour
Soumenlinna fortress was built by the Swedish government in 1748 on an island to protect the Helsinki harbour.
In 1808 the Russians took over and built an Orthodox church and many other buildings. When Finland gained independence in 1917, the church was covered to a Lutheran Church and all the cupolas were removed. It's pretty dull looking now, but livened up by some interesting ornamentation.
Giant chains and cannons!
However, the original Russian residences remain, and some 300 people live on Suomenlinna today in apartments and private residences, so you see their bicycles parked everywhere.
After a vigorous morning of siteseeing,
it was time for a little refreshment:
We're in Finland now, so it's a Kahvi and Korvapuusti break (Connie's having strawberry-rhubarb cake)
And here's the view we enjoyed from the porch of the cafe:
We had dinner at the venerable Karl Johan restaurant.
Venerable perhaps, but the menu has been updated; my risotto came dotted with generous amounts of truffle flavored foam (wasted on me, I couldn't detect any noticeable flavour). Also the dessert was deconstructed apple pie, consisting of two small bites of what resembled apple crisp, really good homemade vanilla icecream, and, this time, apple-flavoured foam that was admittedly delicious.
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