June 28
Arriving a bit disheveled, I was super pumped that we had booked an extra night in the hotel and were able to check in a little before 9am. We got a few hours of sleep before stumbling down to the lobby to meet back up with Jacob who had been up for a few hours and was already working on a couple beers. 
With just 24 hours in the city, we wanted to see the old town and check out as much as we could, while still catching some futbol, of course.
Finland is super into gay pride month with flags and banners everywhere we went. A bit of a change from Russia…
First stop – the food stalls down on the harbor which were serving some delicious salmon and whatever these tiny fried fish are.
Then we grabbed some ice cream and jumped on a tour boat to see the city by water. The area was beautiful, but the most amazing part of it was that within just ten or so minutes we were in complete isolation; the city had completely disappeared and all that was left was lush, beautiful islands. 
The tour didn’t give a ton of information but two items that I picked up:
1. During prohibition in Finland (which was 1919-1932), smugglers would bring ships of alcohol into the harbor. If they were caught, they would throw all of their alcohol overboard. But that booze would be tied to bags of salt. The goods would sink to the bottom of the sea, so the smugglers could not be caught. After the salt dissolved, the crates of alcohol would start to float and once it came to the top of the water at some later time, the smugglers would conveniently be there to pick it all up and continue on with their journey. 
2. During WWII, Finland originally sided with the Germans, so the Soviets came in to bomb Helsinki. Locals went out to uninhabited islands and lit huge fires to misdirect the bombers. Apparently only 5% of the Soviet bombings were successful.
After the boat tour, we popped over to a bar to watch Colombia’s defeat over Senegal… and to have a few local beers.
With an early flight the next morning to meet up with some family in Oslo, the three of us took an early dinner before
The meal was great – Michael and Jacob both had reindeer steaks. The only other thing to note was the super Finnish guy who worked there. When we arrived a few minutes after our reservation, I apologized for being a “few minutes late”. He responded with, “you’re twenty minutes late”. Ok buddy, no need to be so specific. Haha.
A shout out to Jacob – we had a great couple of days hanging out with you! Thanks for killing it with us in Russia!
We got up the next morning super early to grab our flight to Oslo. It was one of the few times in the past eight months that we have been truly stuck in the rain as we walked to get our bus. We were completely drenched by the time we got on the bus and stayed pretty wet until we were through security and waiting for our flight.
Feeling a bit like we’re living on the struggle bus, after our hour flight to Oslo, we popped into the Raddison Hotel that is connected to the airport. We grabbed a fairly cheap “day room” where we got naps, used the gym and showered again before meeting up with some of our favorite people. It was really just the ticket to prepare us for nine days with two of our favorite sobrinos.