Vibsville

We ended our trip to Finland with 3 nights in Berlin. As first timers there we wanted to do the main tourist spots, but wanted to avoid the large group tours. I suggest booking a free walking tour or a paid one. I booked a 4 hour paid walking tour with a local guide which was a wonderful experience. Without context of the sights, simply walking through them is meaningless. Also, a local guide can figure out a plan in terms of locations and also use the local transit such as bus, underground etc to ensure a complete experience. We were lucky to find Maria (found her online). Contact her on:  roessler-gastaldi@arcor.de She is Italian but has lived in Berlin for over 35 years and can really give an insider outsider view of the city. So many decades of information packed into one human being - remarkable!  Her toured covered the following: Old Berlin: We will start our sightseeing tour almost in front of your hotel with the beautiful square Gendarmenmarkt Within a short  walk we w

Much like all travel enthusiasts, we too, wanted to “see the light(s)”! First question is which country to see it from. Well, we tried Iceland already and were unsuccessful in our attempt, so this time the toss up was between Norway and Finland. The Norwegian fiords, train through Bergen and the cruises to see polar bears pulled us towards saving Norway for a summer holiday (the activities and place change completely with seasons here), pointing us towards Finland. Also, turns out Finland is more “affordable” compared to Norway. Destination being decided, we had to plot how long and which cities to visit. After much research and conversations with friends who had visited, we narrowed in on flying into Helsinki, which at least in the winter was bitterly cold, windy and hence really not much fun to walk around. It’s also relatively small, so a half day there gave us sufficient time to see the main sights which are: 1) market square 2) sebilious monument (Must visit the tiny but full of c