My husband and I are planning on spending 2 weeks in Finland in July 2010. We start in Helsinki and will head north. But where to go and what to see? Should we travel by train or hire a car. Once at the top of the country we wish to scoot across to Norway by train, so if we hire a car it will be one way. Should we stick to trains? We like nature and villages as opposed to large cities. Should we book accommodation or just wing it as we go, how busy is it in July? Any ideas would be appreciated.
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First, you need to do some basic reading to identify what interests you in Finland. Try http://www.finnguide.fi/
Lots of visitors hire a car and zip around, seeing zillions of lakes and forests till they%26#39;re sick of the sight of them. Avoid this. Stop and get to know a particular lake, make that one forest special to you. The traditional Finnish holiday is spent in a cabin with sauna by a lake, which sounds like it would suit you. July is prime holiday season for Finns, so book early. This site will help you along: http://www.lomarengas.fi/
Trains don%26#39;t take you everywhere in Finland. Lapland Province is particularly thinly served by rail. You could, however, take a bus from Finnish Lapland into Norway.
Perhaps hiring a car to explore the south combined with train and bus for the northern leg of your journey might be the best option.
The drive from Helsinki to Turku has plenty of attractions along the way, from the craft %26amp; design village of Fiskars to the impressively reconstructed castle of Raseborg in Snappertuna (foreigners love the names).
Here are a couple more useful sites:
www.visithelsinki.fi/In_English/Visitor.iw3
http://www.helsinki.fi/en/index.html
I hope this ragbag of ideas gives you something to start on, and please feel free to ask us more detailed questions as your plans take shape. We try to be helpful!
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There are no trains in the northernmost Finland, even less in the Northern Norway. Railway tracks in Norway reach only up to Bodo and Narvik can be reached by railways via the Swedish railway network (via Kiruna), but even there the tracks are mainly used by cargo trains transporting ore from the Kiruna mine to the port of Narvik.
So, I would suggest renting a car - will also allow you to plan your trip more freely. Then drop the car off into a car rental agency in Finland, take a bus to Norway and then you could rent a car there again, or travel by bus down to Bodo where you can take a train. Or you can of course also travel by the Hurtigruten coastal ferry towards south.
July will be the peak season both in Finland and in Norway, so booking accommodation in advance will save you from a lot of headache...
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Just a warning that its a long, boring drive to Lapland from Helsinki, its mostly single carriageway roads with a lot of speed cameras (and traffic). I hope you like trees because thats all you see :-)
The West side of Finland is very dull, I%26#39;d recommend driving up the East side via the Savo/Lake District area (Savonlinna/Kuopio), Suomossalmi and Kajaani to Lapland, then return via Oulu, Tampere and Hameenlinna (all three very nice towns). Lapland beyond Rovaniemi looks pretty much the same so I don%26#39;t think there%26#39;s much to be gained by heading further north. The scenery towards Narvik in Norway is wonderful.
You can also put your car on the train from Helsinki and Rovaniemi, travel overnight in a sleeper car. It won%26#39;t be cheap but it saves a long drive.
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