Helsinki; Monday, 25 July, 2005

It's Monday, it’s continental Europe and yes most things are closed. Thankfully not everything. The second most popular attraction in Helsinki (after the amusement park!) is Suomenlinna/Sveaborg. The name means Fortress of Finland/Fortress of Sweden and reflects the history of the region. When it was built it was called Sveaborg, as it was built by the Swedes who then rules Finland to protect the East of their empire from the Russians. In 1809 the Russians took control of Finland and ruled it for over 100 years. Eventually in 1919 Finland gained it's independence and at this point they renamed Suomenlinna (though it also kept it's Swedish name as Finland is a bi-lingual country). The armed forces continued to use the fortress up until the end of the 1970s at which point it was mostly handed back to the state to become a tourist attraction (some of the area is still used by the navy).

In 1991 it was added to the UNESCO list of world heritage sights, as this is no normal fort. The fort has been created by fortifying five small islands at the sea end of the archipelago and provides a stunning entrance to the city.

The site now houses a number of museums including the Suomenlinna experience, a military museum, a museum dedicated to the first commander of the fort and the only existing Finnish submarine (The Finns are a little cagey about what happened in W.W.II, though they claim that the Russians started it with them early in 1939 and it sort of lead to an uneasy alliance with the Germans). Whatever really happened, the main outcome was that the Finns were banned from having any submarines and had to pay war reparations. All of their submarines were dismantled and disposed of except this one which was kept as a museum.

I started my visit by joining one of the two daily English language guided walks of the site, after that I had a look around the main museum and "Suomenlinna Experience" - an audio visual presentation on the construction and history of the fort. After that I brought a torch and used that to explore some of the labyrinthine tunnels and casements that run under the site. Next stop, after lunch!, was the museum dedicate to coastal defence. Then it was on to the Submarine for a look round. It is far smaller than I thought it would be. It did only have a crew of 20, but at the same time this must have been very cramped!

From there I visited the museum dedicated to the first commander of the site (though it does also have some details about one of his successors - the one who handed it over to the Russians!), and then the military museum (where they claim the blue swastikas painted onto the planes were put there in 1919 as a sign of good luck - though they did stop doing it in the early 1940's)

After that (and with yesterdays blister now formally threatening war) I wandered back down to the quay to catch the boat back to town.

As it was still relatively early I caught another of the boat sightseeing tours around some of the islands. This one focused quite heavily on... Suomenlinna!!, though I did get some stunning views of the fortress from the sea.

After the tour I headed into town to grab a bite to eat before heading back to the hotel and an appointment between Mr Blister and Mr Needle!!