castle

Our first sightseeing place in Helsinki was Suomenlinna (Castle of Finland). After breakfast at hostel, we walked to the Market Square and on board the municipal ferry to Suomenlinna. The weather was fine but windy because Helsinki is close to sea side. The ferries depart from Market Square to Suomenlinna once an hour in winter time however three times in an hour during summer time. The ferries accept Helsinki Card, however, we don’t buy it for our trip because we were worry we can’t visit any more sights seeing after Suomenlinna trip. The Helsinki Card just like Turku Card I have mentioned before, you can buy it at tourist office or places showing “Helsinki Card”. The journey took about fifteen minutes from Market Square to arrive at Jetty Barracks.





Suomenlinna is one of the world’s largest historical maritime fortresses. It was built on 6 islands. The Fortress was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage in the year 1991 and it was celebrated its 250th years birthday in the year 1998. History of this fortress needs go back to the year 1748 when Finland still part of the Swedish kingdom. It was built as a protection against to Russia expansionism. The construction of Suomenlinna Fortress took about 40 years to be completed. The Augustin Ehrensvärd, a Swedish military architect was played an important role on construction this fortress. Later, on the Finnish war between Sweden and Russia in the year 1808, the fortress was surrendered to Russia and then the Russia ruled the place for 110 years. The fortress originally was called Sveaborg (or Viapori in Finnish), the Fortress of Sweden. However, it was officially renamed to Suomenlinna, the Castle of Finland on the next year of Finnish independence from Russia, 1918.




* Suomenlinna photo source: Suomenlahti

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