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Day 10 Helsinki to home

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We have 2 things to do before going to the airport so we gad an early breakfast and checked out.  It was very warm today and we saw butterflies and dragonflies. Firstly we caught the 9.40 ferry to Suomenlinna, also known as the Fortress island.  The ferry is part of the Helsinki Transport System so we just needed to buy a ticket from a vending machine at the harbour.  It took 15 minutes to get there and there werent many on the boat.     Looking back at the city from the boat   Gull following the boat     One of the islands in the archipeligo in Helsinki Harbour This was a really good place to visit.  It is a sea fortress made up of 8 islands.  We were able to walk to 4 of them as they are joined by bridges.  The fortresses were were first created in 1748  by the Swedish rulers to protect against the Russians but were surrendered to Russia in 1808 and used as a base for the Baltic Fleet in WWI.   Finland took the isla...
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Day 9 Oulu to Helsinki

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We were up early to catch the 9.16 train back to Helsinki.  It was another beautiful morning and the wind had dropped so we walked the 1 mile to the station.    View from our room this morning The train arrived half an hour before scheduled departure as it is starting from here in Oulu. We had booked upstairs seats in the quiet carriage where we have complimentary tea, coffee and water. The journey was not as spectacular as I imagined it would be.  For the first 4 hours it was mainly trees - millions of them.  Lots of silver birch and pine trees. The landscape is very flat so no hills or mountains.  There were a few breaks in the trees for arable farmland or small towns and villages where the train stopped.  Also a few lakes and rivers but if you blinked you woukd miss them.     One of the few photos of a river that I managed to get  as we pulled into a small town.   The scenery got better as we approached Tampere where there were...
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