To balance mine and Nick's differing preferred travel styles we often have to come up with some compromises. If left to my own devices I'd fly everywhere in economy and Nick, for various reasons that do make total sense, would fly everywhere business class. As we'd prefer to sit together on flights we compromise and take shorter flights in economy and then either use points to upgrade or find fun and interesting ways to make business class happen without breaking the bank. This time around we found a good deal with Finnair but our flight had to originate outside the UK to make it work. We slept at Gatwick airport so that we'd be able to catch the 6am flight to Stockholm where the business class fun would begin. We actually hung out at Stockholm Arlanda for ages but lounge access made that fun rather than a tediouous and boring ordeal - there were beanbags! And wifi! And free crackers! After catching our flight to Helsinki we spent 36 hours there on layover and then caught our onward flight to Bangkok. It was a fun journey for sure and my favourite bonus (okay, getting a flat seat is pretty okay too) was getting to explore Helsinki. I've always wanted to visit Finland and Helsinki seemed like a great place to start. It must've made a great impression as I've been talking non-stop ever since about spending some time exploring the Nordic countries in the not too distant future.
We arrived pretty late and pretty hungry so after navigating our way through the shiny new still-in-construction airport and purchasing a couple of two day HSL rail passes, which are valid on all forms of local transport including trams and ferries, we were on our way.
I'd scoped out dining options in-between the central station and Eurohostel, our chosen place to crash during our Northern adventure, and come up pretty lacking as it was after 6pm when we arrived. It seems like in Finland, just like in the UK, a lot of places close super early. Our best bet seemed to be a stop at K Supermarket followed by a bed picnic and as soon as we stumbled upon the Wheaty section I knew we'd hit the jackpot. Soon we had bread, tofu, faux meat slices and cream cheese for dinner, juices, yoghurts and a snack bar for hostel breakfasting and, the most exciting thing ever, Delicatoboll's!
