Sights in Finland
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Uspenski Cathedral
The eye-catching red-brick Uspenski Cathedral is equally imposing on nearby Katajanokka Island. The two opposing cathedrals face each other off high above the city in a contest for its soul. Built as a Russian Orthodox church in Byzantine-Slavonic style in 1868, it features classic onion-topped domes and now serves the Finnish Orthodox congregation. The high, square interior has a lavish iconostasis with the Evangelist flanking panels depicting the Last Supper and the Ascension. Orthodox services held at 6pm on Saturday and 10am Sunday are well worth attending as a discreet visitor for the fabulous chorals and candlelit atmosphere.
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Vanha Rauma
Vanha Rauma, the World Heritage-listed Old Town in the heart of modern Rauma, is not a museum but a living centre, with low-key cafés, hardware shops, residences and a smattering of artisans and lacemakers working in small studios.
Most of the low wooden buildings of Vanha Rauma were erected in the 18th and 19th centuries. There are some 600 houses and 180 shops, and each building has a name - look for it on a small oval sign near the door. You can spend a pleasant half day wandering around Vanha Rauma's cobbled streets and visiting its shops and museums. The tourist office has an excellent pamphlet detailing a self-guided walk.
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Oulu Cathedral
Oulu’s imposing cathedral was built in 1777 but then came the great fire of 1822, which severely damaged the structure. Tireless architect CL Engel rebuilt it in Empire style, adding dome and renaissance-style vaulting, which impart a powerful airiness to the fairly unadorned interior. It got promoted to cathedral in 1900 when the bishopric moved here from Kuopio; notable artworks include a fine altarpiece of the Ascension, a very Finnish Crucifixion in the transept, Finland’s oldest portrait (1611) above the door to the vestry and, typically, a hanging boat, for the protection of the sailors of this most maritime city.
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Kalevala Village
The Kalevala Village, 3km east of the centre of town, is a big drawcard but of debatable value, especially if you're not with children. Despite the name, you won't learn much about the Kalevala here; it's essentially an open-air museum of Karelian folk history and log buildings with cultural exhibitions, artisan displays and costumed staff demonstrating tar-making, woodcarving, fishing and so on.
On the marked circuit, you will see a re-creation of the cabin and desk Elias Lönnrot worked at, and Pohjola House, which includes a gallery and café. From mid-December to mid-January, the site opens as a Christmas Village.
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Zoo
The small town of Ranua is famous for its excellent zoo, which focuses almost entirely on Finnish animals, although there are also polar bears and musk oxen from further north. A boardwalk takes you on a 2.5km circuit past all the creatures, which include minks and stoats, impressive owls and eagles, wild reindeer, elk, a big bear paddock (they hibernate from November to March), lynx and wolverines. Apart from the animals, there’s plenty to do for kids, with horse rides, a minikart circuit, pettable domestic animals and little assault courses. Ice-cream stops dot the route, and there’s a cafe and lunch restaurant.
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Juminkeko
If you are interested in the Kalevala or Karelian culture, pay a visit to the excellent Juminkeko, a beautiful building made using traditional methods and modern styling. The fantastic staff can tell you anything you wish to know; there are also three to four detailed exhibitions here yearly. The auditorium, walls hand-worked by adze, has three worthwhile audiovisuals in English; also on display is a collection of Kalevala books translated into over 50 languages. With the multimedia program you can view pictures, and read and listen to extracts from the epic in anything from Japanese to Swahili.
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Lighthouse
Bengtskär is the southernmost inhabited island of Finland, which is 25km from Hanko and famous for its lighthouse. It was built in 1906 to protect ships from the dangerous waters of the archipelago and given the perilous nature of the waters it had to be 52m high, making it Scandinavia’s tallest lighthouse. Damaged extensively during the Continuation War by the departing Red Army in 1941, it remains a stunning spectacle thanks to substantial refurbishment. Today it also takes guests in simple rooms that have quite a view. There are a few exhibits explaining the historical significance of the island, and a shop.
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Aboa Vetus & Ars Nova
This pair of museums under one roof unites art and archaeology. Digging continues in the museum and along the Aurajoki, and excavations of the Convent Quarter have created an engaging display of 15th-century artefacts in the Aboa Vetus. Back in the present, Ars Nova showcases the best of contemporary art with temporary exhibitions, which peak around the Turku Biennaali, a themed show in summer in odd years. The new Oma Tila (Our Own S) is accumulating work from local artists and craftspeople, especially work produced as part of their own projects. Free guided tours offer insights into both museums.
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Lenin Museum
Admirers of bearded revolutionaries won’t want to miss the small Lenin museum, housed in the Workers’ Hall where Lenin and Stalin first met at a conference in 1905. His life is documented by way of photos and documents; it’s a little dry but it’s fascinating to see, for example, his old school report (a straight-A student) or a threadbare couch that the man slept on. One note, penned shortly before his death in 1924, recommends Comrade Stalin to be ousted from his position as General Secretary. There’s a crazy gift shop where you can buy Lenin pens, badges, T-shirts and other souvenirs of the Soviet era.
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Vakoilumuseo
The offbeat spy museum under the Finlayson centre plays to the budding secret agent in all of us, with a large and well-assembled display of devices of international espionage, mainly from the Cold War era. As well as histories of famous Finnish and foreign spies, it has numerous Bond-style gadgets and some interactive displays – write your name in invisible ink, tap a telephone call, intercept an email or measure the microwave emissions of your mobile. The folders with English translations are slightly unsatisfying though. For a little extra, the kids can take a suitability test for KGB cadet school.
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Mannerheim Museum
This fascinating museum in Kaivopuisto Park was the home of Baron Gustav Mannerheim, former president, Commander in Chief of the Finnish army and Finnish Civil War victor. The great Field Marshal never owned the building; he rented it from chocolate magnate, Karl Fazer, until his death. The house tells of Mannerheim’s intrepid life with hundreds of military medals and photographs from his Asian expedition travelling 14,000km along the Silk Road from Samarkand to Beijing. Entry includes an informative one-hour guided tour in six languages, plus free plastic booties to keep the hallowed floor clean.
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Bomarsund
East of Kastelholm are the ruins of the Russian fortress at Bomarsund. After the war of 1809, Russian troops began to build Bomarsund as a defence against the Swedes. Construction took decades, and the mammoth building was operational but not wholly complete by the time the Crimean War (1854) came around. Twenty-five British and French ships bombarded it heavily from the sea; after two days it capitulated and was demolished by the victors. The evocative honeycomb ruins can be seen on both sides of the main road at the eastern end of Sund, by the bridge leading across a beautiful sound to Prästö island.
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Tytyri Mine Museum
The Tytyri Mine Museum is an authentic limestone mine well worth visiting. An excellent descent into the bowels of the earth in a funicular takes you to the wide spaces below, where there are good information panels in English. Here, as elsewhere in Finland, new mine shafts were painted with tar to keep out devils. The deepest shaft measures 384m and is used to test elevators. The highlight of the visit is a short sound-and-light presentation looking into an awesomely large quarried cavern.
It's cold in the mine, so take a jacket. The museum is 500m north of the town centre, past the tourist office.
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Pohjois Pohjanmaan Museo
This park museum merits exploration but has almost too much information to take in at first bite. It covers the earliest habitation of the region through to the 20th century, including plenty of information on the tar trade. Cameras allow you to zoom in on the impressive scale model of 1938 Oulu; a traditional pharmacy, paintings of the great fire, and a schoolroom are included in the wide-ranging display. A series of reconstructed rooms from different periods of history range from formal 19th-century salons to a student’s 1960s bedroom with Che poster, typewriter and hair-curlers.
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Petäjävesi Church
Thirty-five kilometres west of Jyväskylä, pause at Petäjävesi to see the wonderfully gnarled Unesco-listed wooden church. Finished in 1765, it’s a marvellous example of 18th-century rustic Finnish architecture with crooked wooden pews and a fairytale shingle roof. Prior to its construction, there had been some debate about whether this village should get a church at all. Jaakko Leppänen started the job minus planning permission and properly drawn instructions. Burials took place under the floorboards, and there’s also a spooky wine cellar under the nave – ask the guide to show you.
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Museum Ships
Outside the Forum Marinum, anchored in the river, are four museum ships which you can climb aboard and poke around in, above and below deck.
The WWII mine layer Keihässalmi and the corvette Karjala give an insight into wartime conditions at sea; the beautiful three-masted barque Sigyn, originally launched from Göteborg in 1887, has well preserved cabins; and the impressive 1902 sailing ship Suomen Joutsen (Swan of Finland), which was built in France, was used by the Finnish Navy during WWII as a mother ship for submarines and as a hospital.
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Neristan
This delightful area of wooden houses known as Neristan is what remains of the working class area of Kokkola (Neristan means 'lower town') where the sailors and fishermen lived. Until relatively recently, the river was wide and navigable up to here, and fishing boats docked to unload their finny cargo and sell it in the kauppatori.
It's a pleasure to wander around these streets (one of the most picturesque is Läntinen kirkkokatu), which have a range of antique shops as well as a couple of cafés and restaurants. The tourist office publishes a good walking tour of town.
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Arktikum
With its beautifully designed glass tunnel stretching out to the Ounasjoki, Arktikum is one of Finland’s best museums and well worth the admission fee if you are interested in the north. There are two main exhibitions; one side deals with Lapland, with some information on Sámi culture, including both traditional and modern music, and a variety of costumes. There’s a display of canoes, dwellings and fishing materials, as well as a room devoted to the history of Rovaniemi itself. A scale model shows the destruction wrought by the German retreat in 1944.
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Pielpajärvi Wilderness Church
The Pielpajärvi Wilderness Church of Pielpajärvi is accessible from Inari by a marked walking track (7.5km one way) from the parking area at SIIDA. If you have a vehicle there's another car park 2.5km beyond here, up Sarviniementie, from where it's a 4.3km walk to the church. In winter, you'll need snowshoes and a keen attitude to do this.
The church area has been an important marketplace for the Sámi over the centuries, with the first church erected here in 1646. The present church was built in 1760, and restored in the 1970s. It's always open.
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Jalokibigalleria
The Jalokibigalleria, in an old seaside customs house, has an internationally notable collection of over 3000 beautiful, rare stones and jewellery, including a crown made using a design that was meant for the short-lived king of Finland. The crown was made in the 1980s by the gallery's founder, who created the 'first and only' crown of the king of Finland from original drawings. Sheets translated into various languages guide you in an offbeat manner around the exhibits, which include replicas of the world's most famous diamonds, and a solid dose of Finnish humour.
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Vapriikki
Tampere’s premier exhibition space is Vapriikki, a bright, modern glass and steel gallery in the renovated Tampella textile mill. As well as regularly changing exhibitions on anything from bicycles to Buddhism, there’s a permanent display on Tampere’s history from prehistoric times to the present as well as a small but cluttered ice-hockey museum, with memorabilia of the players and teams that star in Finland’s sporting passion. There’s also a museum of shoes – Tampere was known for its footwear industry – and a pleasant cafe.
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Castle
The castle is 14km east of Ekenäs, and about 2km west of the wonderfully named village of Snappertuna. It’s signposted Slottsruiner/Linnanrauniot off the main road; buy your tickets at the cafe. There’s not a lot of explanatory material in English, but it’s great to climb up and down the levels and patrol the ramparts. There are free tours from mid-May to August weekends at 3pm. During July there are evening concerts at Raseborg; contact the Ekenäs tourist office for details. There are occasional buses to Snappertuna from Ekenäs or Karis.
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Lahti Historical Museum
Lahti Historical Museum is in a beautiful old manor house by the bus station. The ground and top floors hold changing exhibitions on aspects of Lahti’s history (a little English information is usually available), while the middle floor is mostly devoted to the collection of Klaus Holma, a 20th-century Finnish diplomat. It’s a treasury of French and Italian religious art, rococo furniture and fine porcelain, and an excellent series of interactive computer screens allows you to access detailed information (also in English) on every piece.
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Rapids Shows
These days, the water is allowed to flow free only for the 20-minute Rapids Shows from May to September. There's a nightly show at 01:00 from early May to early July. Check the tourist office's information website for other shows between May and September (it's on, for example, at 22:00 every Saturday in August, and 21:00 every Saturday in September). There's an accompanying sound-and-light show.
It's undeniably spectacular and definitely worth seeing if you're in town that day, but not quite memorable enough to structure your trip around.
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Pohjanmaan Museo
Pohjanmaan Museo is a dynamic modern museum with plenty of opportunity for interaction. Downstairs in the Terranova section there’s a brilliant evocation of natural history including information on the nearby Kvarken area. Upstairs there are exhibitions about daily life in yesteryear Vaasa and the Hedman collection (named for the museum’s great patron who donated much of this collection), which includes a Tintoretto, a pair of Luca Giordanos, and a round Botticelli Madonna. There are also coins and ceramics.
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