Wintery Finland

Of course, a visit to Finland was kind of mandatory before heading off to the land of the rising sun. As often, I had a pretty full program planned by the time I arrived, the basic idea being having the time to see as many people as possible in one week.

I arrived in Helsinki late Thursday, and spent Friday day just chilling out basically, and enjoying a not very wintery Helsinki. For the evening, I made my way over to Katja and Janne's place, where Rasmus and young Philip joined us for our traditional gaming night (it actually snowed on the way to their place, yippee!!). Let the nerdy times rule - we kept on playing Dominion until about 3 in the morning!).

The next day, I drove up to Turku with dad, where I was planning to meet up with the old gang from Pargas for a few beers. We started in Koulu (where else?), with Oski, Jocke, Tomppi, Jani and Jonas showing up. After some heavy debating about Brexit, Trump and so forth (with Jani being a bit outnumbered...), we carried on to Apteekki, another classic Turku drinking establishment. I ended up crashing at Jonas' place, where we wore off the hangover by watching Family guy and other intellectual stuff on Netflix...

On the way back, we stopped by to say hi to Tomi and his family, and check out Suvelan Kappeli (they chose quite an unexpected location for such an interesting architectural creation - after all, Suvela is a bit like the Bronx of Espoo ;-) ).

I spent Monday doing what I love doing in Helsinki, that is walking around and taking photos. The weather was not the best for it, as it was a bit cloudy, and VERY windy indeed. So it felt like a bit of a polar expedition at times, since I didn't have any gloves. But I was treated to some pretty nice views, especially towards Katajanokka from Tervasaari (a small island located in Pohjoissatama). I also checked out Uspenski cathedral (the orthodox cathedral, in my opinion the prettiest church in Helsinki), after which I headed off for my lunch date with Jocke in Bellevue. Bellevue is, in spite of the somewhat misleading name, actually the oldest Russian restaurant in Helsinki. The reason for this choice of venue was that I wanted to try blinis, and what better place than this to try this Russian delicacy?

On Tuesday, the plan was to celebrate Janne's 40th birthday (OK, a month or so too late, but better late than never, eh?). To mark this milestone, we decided to go to Chef and Sommelier. It's a place I've wanted to try for ages, since the sommelier, Johan, is actually a childhood friend of mine. And they do have a Michelin Star as well. So expectations were high. And Chef and Sommelier surely didn't disappoint! I love the concept - modern nordic cuisine, all made of locally sourced ingredients. There were some real surprises, like pine soup. What I like about the place too is the laid back atmosphere - this is not your typical Michelin starred restaurant at all. Hats off to Sasu and Johan for a great culinary experience!