We are really in Finland.
That you need to jump in the sauna and afterwards you need to jump in the sea
and these are going to be perfect for our very next stop.
Good morning everybody.
Welcome back to Helsinki here in Finland.
This is pretty much mark's day,
one of Jessica's epic European Christmas that she's dreamt about since she was a
kid.
I'm so excited right now but we have two days here in the city and the first
place that I am taking Stephen to is,
I found this cute little cafe right on the water and I've heard that they do
some of the best hot chocolate best cinnamon buns in the city and it is located
right on the water in a hundred year old,
kind of like red traditional little hut
Okay I've got the goods...
Hot chocolate cinnamon bun and some sausages because we were about to cook them
in that open fire,
they have an outdoor fire pit in front of the little cafe and you can buy some
sausages to go with your hot chocolate.
So cool and you just kind of just cook up your lunch.
We need to know really in Finland,
We need to know how that chocolate tastes.
Look at this cream
Wow-wee that's Good.
We're officially in Christmas time? So while the sausages are being cooked,
I'm going to be a little bit cheeky and jump straight into dessert.
I love cinnamon buns and I've always wanted to try one here in Finland.
Is it good? She did heat it up. Is it still hot?
Not too bad. Really good though. Something about cinnamon and Christmas.
So this is a perfect start to our holiday.
When you walk into the cafe,
it smells like Christmas because she's baking cinnamon buns all day. Oh yeah.
This looks cool by the fire.
But I'm telling you inside is so cute cause it's just like four seats in there.
It's so small.
So
we've heard when you come to Finland you cannot miss going to a Finnish sauna.
So we found one of the most popular places to go and we've heard,
because this one is located right on the Baltic sea,
that you need to jump in the sauna and afterwards you need to jump in the sea.
Now I'm pretty sure that it is almost freezing. So a good luck Steve,
I get out of this one.
Alrighty. I've just gone inside the hot sauna now.
This is the Finnish part of the sauna going into the icy cold water,
not ideal conditions. Oh my gosh, it's so cold just out here.
They say that you're fine when you're not really fine,
you just can't get into it.
[inaudible] [inaudible]
That was such an incredible experience.
Wow. I believe he did it twice.
I was skeptical on how crazy this experience was,
but I mean really the sauna like heats you up,
you almost have this heat blanket on you and then you jump in and yes,
it is a shock,
but then you go back into the sauna and it's like this numbing feeling.
It's definitely about the sensation.
That was quite good as well because there was this room with a fireplace,
so I had as chilled in the fireplace room and to go in for two hours.
It's only 19 euros, so it's not too bad for such a beautiful location.
One thing I am so upset about is that the Christmas markets here in Helsinki are
open in a few days. So we are just missing out,
but we were just walking home back to our Airbnb and we noticed that there is
this mini mini market on like there's like five stores and we're going to
pretend that that is our Christmas market moment here in Finland.
So we are going to go check it out.
alright, your first try of a hot cup of Glögi
Glug glug
It's like a mulled wine. Oh my goodness. That is so nice! You can see the steam.
Oh it is so warm,
There's like this little seating area. And then the markets are just out there.
It's like couple of degrees cold.
This is so nice and toasty.
When you have a sip, all the steam goes everywhere. Ready? Woah. Blow into it?
So you have an assortment of pre-dinner snacks?
Gingerbread?
It it, it's Gingerbreed.
Can I interest you in a handful of Sultanas?
I'm here for the free snacks. So you eat, your Glögi.
Morning guys. It is the next day and we are actually having quiet a chili one.
We were hoping for snow but I feel like it's just not there yet. But to warm up,
we are heading out to a local food market because we've heard that when you come
to Finland you need to try the Salmon soup and supposedly the best on a soup
here in Helsinki. Is it the food market.
We've just come into the market pool and there are so many places to eat but
we've come to the busiest and they were serving a lot of types of soup and one
is the salmon soup and look at this.
Chunks of salmon and potato.
let us know what it's like.
Wow, that's warming, that will warm you up as well.
It's kinda cool because we're inside this like massive shed.
But then there's like individual almost huts. Ours has a roof?
There's all different stuff. Wow.
Also, there is unlimited bread. Yum!
Oh my goodness. I am so full. That was very good value.
Like the bowl is massive. It is full of fish,
full of potatoes and only 10 Euro for lunch. That was pretty good to Finland.
But even though we are so full,
we were walking out and we saw a little bakery and there was this one thing that
caught our eye. We had never seen it before. What was it called?
Tippaleipä.
And it said that you could only get in Finland. And so I'm like, okay, okay,
we'll get some.
She put it in this bag and she told me I have to scrunch it all up and then we
eat it,
Which seemed like odd cause it looked like a piece of artwork.
Like it looked like a birdsnest.
I know I don't want to ruin it. Ready.
All right. And now we some kind looks like a funnel cake.
Ready?
Crunchy from mm it's like a crunchy pastry with the icing sugar on it.
Yum.
Yeah,
Definitely don't need it! So Full from the soup. So tonight,
well it's not actually tonight.
It's 4:00 PM we've come down to what they call Christmas street.
It's Alexander street and they cover the street full of Christmas lights.
And there are so many shops.
So I think we're going to be doing a little bit about Christmas shopping
tonight.
So a lot of the storefronts actually have some Christmas displays on those.
He walked in there.
It's a bunch of different characters and you kind of just have a look around.
It looks very Christmassy. Literally, he's just stiff into the streets. He like,
yep, it's Christmas time.
We have just come back from shopping and I think I've found the best purchase
I've ever made in my life. Okay.
You could not get these in Australia and these are going to be perfect for our
very next stop.
It is the best place to kickstart Christmas because Santa lives here.
I swear this is one of the most magical places in the world.