When you are studying in Turku, there is a "free learning week" and it is supposed to be for working on the projects which are due the following weeks. Well, I think non of the exchange students did that, we all went on trips and I wanted to tell you about my trips to Tallinn and Saint Petersburg.
Tallinn is very easy to reach, when you book early enough you can use the OnniBus for 1€ to drive to Helsinki and then you take the ferry, which costs for a trip, where you stay the night in Tallinn around 27€ and for just a day trip around 15€. When you want to book the ferry I would recommend to book it directly from Eckeröline.com, because the prices are cheaper for the inhabitants of Finland and Estonia, rather then from tourist websites. We decided to stay two nights in Tallinn and we booked the Red Emperor hostel, which was amazing! It is very clean and the people were so so nice there. The city itself is very beautiful, with the old city, with the oldest town hall of the whole Baltic region and the one of the oldest running pharmacies in Europe. But also the new parts of the town for example the Rotermann city are very nice. When you go there you should also visit the market hall and the design district of the city.
When you are in Finland it is also a good idea to visit Russia. There are ferries from Helsinki to Saint Petersburg which are not very expensive and the Russia itself is not very expensive either. When Lea and I booked our trip we went with a organizations called "open your Russia" it is a organization from students for students and we had a very good experience and I think it is a little safer, because they know how to behave and what to do and what not to do and that is very important. Also when you are from the EU you probably don't have reception on your phone and that makes everything a bit more difficult. The ferry is about 13 h over night and when we went you were allowed to stay 72 h in the country. We visited a lot of different sights and went to Pushkin, where the Catherine palace is located. It is a very nice city and it is quite young compared to Turku and Tallinn, which are around 800 years old and Saint Petersburg is "only" about 300 years old. I also really liked the Russian people, many told me that they are very unfriendly and mean but I didn't think so, and Xenia, our tour guide told us, that they just look grumpy and mean because it is unfriendly for them to smile at strangers, because you only smile at your friends or when you want something from the other person. So I guess they are just misunderstood.
Anyway, when you are in Finland and want to see some more of the world, visiting Russia and Estonia is definitely recommended,
