DAY 26: Helsinki (NH Collection Grand Hansa Hotel)

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Another quiet day in Helsinki. (I think we may have planned a few too many days here!)

It was raining a little, but not enough to make walking around unpleasant. After breakfast at a cafe, we visited the Ateneum Art Museum to see the Modern Gothic Exhibition.

It was a lovely exhibition, in spite of being full of primary school children on an excursion. (One of them asked Jim where a certain painting was because he thought he was an attendant. He first spoke in Finnish and then smoothly switched to English when Jim didn't understand. They are amazing!)

Here are some of my favourite paintings. The first one was voted Finland's national painting.

Hugo Simberg: A Wounded Angel


Arnold Bocklin: Self Portrait with the Devil

Marianne Stokes: Death & the Maiden

After the Museum, we did a bit of shopping and then had lunch of pho at a Vietnamese restaurant. The pho was good but the spring rolls we ordered were like nothing I have ever seen. They were enormous and made of a strange pastry, with an even stranger filling. They reminded me of chiko rolls.

We went back to the hotel for a rest, before heading out later in the afternoon for a walk around the streets. We had a cake and a coffee and decided to skip dinner. (We feel like we've been eating such a lot lately, we hardly feel hungry.)

Comments

  1. Barbara19 December 2024 at 12:46

    I have to wonder a bit about the Finns if that painting was their favourite.

    ReplyDelete

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