A week in HEL

I wish I came up with this clever pun, but Helsinki airport beat me to it.

As the title suggests, we spent a week working in Helsinki and exploring this wonderful city. Of course, I had time for aircraft photography in HEL, too.

As it's often the case, not having a car meant that my only option was to use a spot with a grandiose sounding name Scenic Terrace. In reality, it's not much of a terrace, but rather a balcony-like area on a corner of a building. Scenic it ain't either, although it provides a decent view of the RWY 04R/22L.

The outdoor area of the terrace is closed during inclement weather, which is exactly what happened the first two times I was there. Thankfully, there is also also an indoors area with large windows panes, so it was possible to photograph airplanes through the glass. But the windows panes are made of two layers of fairly thick glass, so the results of my photographic endeavors were rather mediocre. But hey, at least it was warm!

I had better luck on Thursday: the outdoor area was opened, which greatly improved the the success rate and the overall quality of my results.

Airplanes wearing Finnair livery are by far the most common sight in HEL, which is hardly surprising since the airport is the airline's hub. Finnair operates a diverse fleet that includes Embraer, Airbus, and ATR aircraft. The latter are rare guests in our neck of the woods, so it was a good opportunity to capture them.

Besides that, I was lucky to photograph a Finnair Airbus A330-300 wearing Marimekko livery and a Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner from Juneyao Airlines featuring Genshin Impact (原神号) livery.

I'd be lying if I said that I was perfectly happy with my haul. I wish I had more time, I wish the light was better, I wish the backdrop was cleaner. But I'm not complaining: I was lucky I had a chance to visit HEL, and I thoroughly enjoyed my time capturing airplanes — even if the catch wasn't all that impressive.

Random Helsinki impressions

• People are friendly, ready to help, and practically everyone speaks English.
• Helsinki Central Library Oodi is the best public library in my book (hah!). Workshops, 3-D printers, large working areas, meeting rooms, fast Wi-Fi, excellent food — the place has everything. Yes, there are books, too.
• Cinnamon buns in Helsinki are out of this world.
• We tried salmiak ice cream, and it was absolutely fantastic.
• I tried reindeer meat, and I liked it. I wanted to try bear meat too, but it was too expensive. Speaking of which...
• Prices are eye-watering.
• Public toilets are super clean. Trains are well-maintained, and they run on time (take that, Deutsche Bahn!).