Rovaniemi, Helsinki and Tallinn

On arrival in Rovaniemi, we checked into our hotel right near the city centre and later went out for dinner. Would you believe we ended up in a very nice restaurant, run by Turkish people with background Italian music. Delicious food though! Walking back to our hotel, we watched Christmas trees being decorated with lights all along the street. Very pretty in the dark.

Our last day in the Lapland area of Finland and, of course, we had to visit Santa's Village just outside the town. I had two special letters written by grandsons Huon and Mitchell, to deliver to Santa. The whole village area is very well set up with just about every Christmas decoration and souvenir imaginable.

We joined the queue for Santa and slowly made our way up through his house to where he sat. What a lovely man he was. He was very interested in reading Huon and Michell's letters, but laughed when he read that Mitchell didn't want 'girl Lego'. Lego is for everyone, he said and he asked us to tell that to Mitchell. Lots of photos taken and also a video if wanted - we did! Later on we were able to download the photos and a video to our computer. 

Plenty of souvenir shops (of course!) at Santa's Village, but also a post office for sending messages home.

Reindeer sleds for rides - but as there was only a circuit of man-made snow, it was a short ride. When snow sets in there are also snowmobile rides and other very energetic activities that we passed by. 

Communal knitting for charity in hotel foyer.

After a light lunch, we caught the Santa's Village Shuttle bus back to the city, packed our bags, had dinner and sat in the foyer to wait for the time to catch the late night train.

The overnight train to Helsinki was quite an experience - we had a first class 2 berth sleeper cabin booked  - or so we thought. Found the carriage number and discovered we were in the 'gentlemen's carriage' and in two different compartments! Totally confused and with no conductor to be seen we stood in the corridor to try and work something out. Luckily a lovely Asian man in 'my' cabin volunteered to move into the other one freeing up a cabin for Peter and me. It wasn't until the train had moved out of the station that a conductress came along and agreed there had been a mistake and that we should be together. She was all smiles when she learnt we had sorted out the problem for her. Not good enough service, Bentours!

The sleeper carriages were all double storey and very modern with their own little shower and toilet facilities. The ride, too, was very smooth and not at all like the very bumpy train ride from Melbourne to Sydney on which we travelled earlier this year. 





After 12 hours we arrived on time 12 hours next morning in Helsinki. Luckily our hotel had our room ready for us and so we were able to have a quick breakfast before getting settled for our last days in Finland.

Early next morning saw us boarding the 8.30 ferry for the two hour trip over to Tallinn in Estonia.

We and another person had a guide to show us around for several hours, then we had plenty of time to ourselves to wander through the beautiful old town area and have lunch at a traditional Estonian restaurant 'The Golden Pig'. We shared a platter of different sausages, potatoes and sauerkraut and it was delicious washed down with a beer for Peter and warm Glogg for me. 





We then wandered through the Christmas Market to buy a few Christmassy souvenirs. 

After the ferry ride back to Helsinki, we collapsed for an hour, then tidied up and walked across the road from our hotel to the beautiful, and very popular, old Fazer Cafe (opened in 1891) for a light evening meal and coffee and decadent cakes.  

With all the Christmas lights up and twinkling, Helsinki was very pretty for our last day in Finland.

It, too, had a Christmas Market but not as big as Tallinn's market. We took it easy for our last day, just browsing for a few (very cold) hours in the half light before heading to the Airport to begin our long journey home.

Summing up - We loved these three Scandinavian countries and bought flags to fly at home as a memory of our trip. There is a very nice and welcoming feel here. It took us a while to get used to the very short hours of daylight and the intense cold which we don't experience in Australia and it was a bit of a disappointment that the snow was so late this year - even in the Arctic Circle it was scarce but it was all something new for us and we enjoyed it. And we did see the Northern Lights which really was a delight.

Sad to leave after such an enjoyable four weeks. Now to start saving up again for our next trip to who knows where!