Helsinki, Round II

I've already regaled you with a quick description of my first first venture to Helsinki. The brief time I spent there was not nearly long enough. As a general rule, at least at this point, I tend to avoid visiting the same place twice, as a my traveling time and budget are both quite limited. But in this case, I was willing to make an exception, and it really paid off. I also got a much better look at the city this time since I had a really awesome local dude to show me around. We spent a really wonderful day walking all around the city, checking out a lot of areas and enjoying lunch at nice little harbor-side café I'll try to avoid to many duplicate pictures, but a few repeats will be hard to avoid.

The front of this statue has the Finnish national anthem on it. Which is for some reason written here in Swedish.

We aren't entirely sure what denomination this church is, but it's pretty rad looking.

The Helsinki Lutheran cathedral, from a slightly different angle than before.

Another church of undisclosed denomination. Rather Soviet looking.

Ducks.

Bridge over the train tracks.

Weeds next to a lake. Being able to walk across the lakes here makes getting around much faster and easier. Talk about shortcuts.

We went to the Olympic stadium.

There was a fantastic view from the top of the tower there.

Sunset from inside the Sibelius Monument.

Tubes on tubes on tubes.

Finland has really struck a chord with me, to the point that I'm already looking at flights back for the summer. I think enjoying 20 hours of sunlight in the woods or towns there would be an amazing experience.