A Walk Around Town

This is for the people who have stated that they know what London looks like and have seen plenty of pictures of Norway and the Netherlands, but have no idea what Finland looks like or where we live!!
Oops, good point.

So, I took my camera on a walk yesterday and tried to capture the feeling of a nice Friday afternoon......

The first picture is a shot of the apartments we live in. As you can see there are shops down stairs which include: Chico's Restaurant (mmm good burgers and fries), S-Market (our grocery store), and Alko (a monopoly chain of stores, that is the only means in Finland, which retails beer over 4.7%, wine, and spirits). There are a couple of other shops but I never go into them, so let’s ignore them.

This 2nd picture cracks me up.
I am sure you are aware of the blue parking signs with a big ‘P’ on them, to indicate that is where you can park your car.

Well, examine the picture.....

There is a small blue sign, that has a small ‘p’, and a picture of a dog.

Yep, that sign indicates that is where you can ‘park your dog’, while you go shopping.


As, I started my walk I found this furry little friend that was parked and I could not pass up the opportunity to take a shot.

This, is our street Bulevardi. If I walk northeast from our apartment, I am walking up this street.

It is a cute street with cobblestone roads (not good for my heels), trees, and lots of shops (not good for Greg’s wallet).

On one side of our apartment complex lies a park. In the winter people sled down the hills and in the summer people picnic and laze around.

Now I will show you my FAVORITE shop on Bulevardi.

Cafe Ekberg (pronounced Eck-berry). Ekberg is the oldest cafe in Helsinki and is famous for its fabulous pastries and pulla.

Andrea has now stopped her 2 pulla a day addiction and it was very hard to pause and take pictures of this place without going in and stuffing my face full of pulla.

They even have a pulla named Dallas and Texas and they were calling my name, but I resisted and stayed outside the shop.

Yum, picture of pulla. Ok, now back from daydreaming about pulla.

This shop is very tasty in so many ways. Right now, they have a display window with an aquarium theme and have made sea creatures out of pastry!!

See those round looking objects near the ship? Those are edible meringues made to look like waves on the ocean.

Yummy sea creatures....






How is a girl not to love a shop that is so cute and yummy at the same time?!!

If I head southeast from our apartment, then we get a view of the sea.



Here are a couple of pics of the sea, as I go along my walk.






Here are some geese and a view of the road I am walking on, pretty nice eh?










Wish I had my workout buddy, Tamera, near by so that we could enjoy the sights and the feeling of such a nice summer since we never could really take many walks outside in Dallas.
I think I will text her now and let her know I am thinking about her, as I go on my walk.


The summer here has been really lovely. Usually sunny with the temperature in the upper 60's or low 70's. Sometimes it will get hot and get close to 80!
Now that midsummer has past the sun is setting at 10:40 pm (but it is still light outside at 11:30) and is rising at 4:30 am. Yikes, it is a good thing that Greg got me an eye mask to block out that pesky sun.

Here is a look of a market, that I encounter on my walk.















Here to the right is a look inside the market. Hmmm, I wonder what all I can buy??

I feel like Bubba from Forrest Gump is beside me as I look at all the 'different fish' I can buy. Let's see, there is salmon, salted salmon, smoked salmon, and fire cooked salmon.















Let's head out of the inside market and out to the market outside.
Brilliant, it looks like I can buy some more salmon if I didn't get enough inside.


The picture below shows an embassy house, and it is a pretty baby blue building. If you look closely in that picture at the upper left, you will see a white building with a green dome top which is a church and I will show you a closer picture in a second.

Bam! Here it is! Pretty isn't it.

On these steps they hosted a screening of Eurovision song contest with huge TV screens and people all around.

Ok, back to the outside market. Hmm what other must-haves can I find here......

ahh, here we go. What every girl dreams of a fake fox hat! Or at least I hope it is fake, if not that is the nastiest thing I think I have seen so far. They even put eyes on it so you can turn your hat around to scare little children. Then they will definitely believe mom has eyes in the back of her head!

Ok, it is now time to leave the market with the vast assortment of fish and scary fake hats. I will walk through Esplanade Park near the main street, Esplanade. Esplanade is Helsinki's Bond
Street or Fifth Avenue, but much smaller.


Havis Amanda (The Mermaid) is a nude female statue. The Finns refer to it as Haaviston Manta or simply Manta. Every year on Vappu eve (day before May 1st), Manta serves as a centerpiece for celebration as students of the local universities put a cap on the statue with an elaborate ceremony. I actually got to see this nearly one hundred year old tradition of placing a student cap on the head of the statue and drank champagne with all the other partygoers, er I mean graduates. Thanks Nanna for taking me to see this fun event!!
Now according to Wikipedia, Manta the mermaid is leaning backwards as if to say goodbye to her element. I've been told that when Ville Vallgren, the sculptor, went around trying to collect money for this project, from the different shopkeepers, he was told no by one particular shop. So to get even, Ville erected Manta with her posterior facing the shop that denied him money. HA! in your face stingy shopkeeper.

The park is built on east-west direction, so the sun shines nicely on the park throughout the
day.

I will end with a couple of more pictures from Park Esplanade.

Hei Hei (that's good-bye in Finnish) for now.