European Vacation {Day 16} – Helsinki, Finland

Today was our latest port arrival time of the week slated for 11:15am.  We were excited to sleep in.  I almost didn't set an alarm, but thought I'd set one for 10am just to be safe.  Good thing I did cause not a one of us budged until then - who knows how long we would have slept.  Vacation is exhausting!

Disney had shuttles from the port into the city center of Helsinki.  We were dropped off right by Esplanadin Puisto, a park that runs through the city which led us through Kauppatori (market square) where you can purchase souvenirs, fresh fruits, fish and flowers.  We boarded a ferry to Suomenlinna, the "fortress of Finland".  Justin is a sucker for old forts.  We explored old bunkers, fortress walls, cannons and drawbridges.

After we'd had our fill of old stuff we headed back to the city to see more old stuff {wink, wink}. 

   

We walked up to Uspenskin Katedraali, which is a red-brick cathedral towering above the island.  Unfortunately it is closed on Monday so we couldn't go inside, but it was a fun photo opp to get a picture of the kids atop it's large rock base.

We walked back through the market to another Helsinki landmark easily seen from all over the city – Helsinki Cathedral, a white hilltop chapel.  We climbed up the steep stairs to get a peek inside.

I would have loved to venture through the city of Helsinki more.  I'm drawn to their Scandinavian culture and could walk through the city for days (preferably not with five kids and a husband).  It felt so much different from other European cities that we have visited.   So while I, for the most part, enjoyed our excursion over to the fortress I didn't feel like I got enough of the Finnish lifestyle and culture that I would have liked.  Let's be honest, by this point in the trip I think we've all seen enough cathedrals and palaces (except perhaps Justin).

Back on the ship there was a Frozen party on deck.  It even snowed bubbles.

We all rejoined for dinner in Rapuzel's tonight.  Having late dinner has been tricky.  We thought it would be good to have some time between getting on the boat on port days and dinner; however, since we're not eating in port we always get back on the ship and head straight to the food.  So we're not super hungry when 8:30pm finally rolls around, but it's dinnertime and there's so much food so we order it and try to eat as much as we can even though it leaves us quite stuffed and slightly sick.  In addition, we're all so tired at that point that wrapping up dinner at 10:30pm feels really late.  Tonight Katie and Drew had apparently eaten enough and we're asking to go to the kids club before the rest of us had even been served our main courses.  So off the two of them went and the rest of us ate, and ate.  The dining rooms have a little program each night, which is fun to watch, and tonight the dessert was pretty impressive - yum!