Exploring FINNISH Islands! HELSINKI ARCHIPELAGO Who knew there were SNAKES in FINLAND?

[Music] we're craig and kirsty a british couple who got married on a beach in 2018 and instead of a honeymoon we decided to travel the world together and so we created tide not travellers we left our home and jobs behind us as we boarded a one-way flight we explored a few countries before the global pandemic hit causing us to cancel our ongoing travels and rethink our plans we spent the next six months exploring estonia before we finally made our way over to finland between us we have visited 52 countries and we'd love you to join us as we continue our travels and explore the world it is a new day here in helsinki in finland we have dodged all the showers this morning we hope that's all the showers we've literally been waiting for the showers to go because it's supposed to be sunny this afternoon we've been doing our rain dance all morning yeah and so we've just gone and grabbed ourselves some sandwiches from the supermarket we've had some lunch and now we've made our way down to the harbour to market square because we're going to be going on a boat trip across to several islands so helsinki itself the city is built on essentially a big peninsula and off the coast it's surrounded by an archipelago of several islands we're going to go and visit some of them hopefully the weather will allow that yeah the main island that i think everyone comes to see has a sea fortress so we're very interested to see and learn about that we're just by the harbour side and we're going to go and buy some tickets for the boat see you on the boat [Music] hopefully how many islands are there to go around tree island so there is a small nature island also some wartime things on the island there's two islands to explore and then there is the universe the fortress two tickets that's perfectos [Music] i wonder why no one's up there i think we might be standing up the lady was really kind gave us a load of paper towels to wipe down the benches because they're pretty wet i don't know if it's gonna do that much we just grabbed our tickets from the ticket booth here in market square and we're now on the boat i'm about to hop around to the three islands starting at balisari then we're going to go to suraman lina and then our final island is going to be honor so yeah let's get ready to go island topping so 12 euros per person for helsinki i don't think it's too bad and the sun is out yay let's go see some islands of finland or helsinki islands [Music] we've come to our first stop of the day valesare [Music] we've just arrived on valazari island and as you can see here this is the map of the island so just come in here we plan if we're able to to try to walk around to all of the main sites now if you notice you can also walk across over to this sort of attached island but what we can't do is visit any of this this is all completely prohibited under threat of penalty so we're on an island that effectively we can kind of only visit two-thirds off but there's some cool stuff to see there's the um alexander battery which is going to be quite a cool historical site to see planet is the place that's called the home of thousands of butterflies and if we get to this sandy cove just lots of nature to be seen here so yeah we're excited to go off and explore the valazari and then we're going to come back here get on the boat and head off to the next island [Music] they're friendly in valerie [Music] just walking along the main street here in valasari back in the 1950s there was a real hustle and bustle here apparently and there was around 200 people that actually lived on the island and although it's obviously very close to the main city of helsinki it was actually really rural and back in the 1950s when it was under russian occupation the locals here had kind of like their own little paradise and they really liked it apparently they had a shop here a school and their own livestock and although it was forbidden the kids and stuff here would like go out and dig up live ammunition and stuff which they weren't supposed to obviously be doing quite a rural paradise for the locals 200 people doesn't sound that much but this is a teeny little island so i can imagine there probably was quite a real hustle and bustle here on this main street as it's called [Music] you can see why they loved it here and thought of it as a paradise you could just be a million miles away from the city being just here on this island look at this this pond behind us and you can just jump in and go for a swim if we'd known we'd have bought our swimmers with us because it's actually a really sunny day now and that pond just looks delightful and then there's picnic area this side of us as well what a great little island to explore you can see why the locals would have loved it here it feels like a complete paradise just isolated from everything else we can't believe this is so close to a major city in helsinki and it's sunny and we could have gone in there so the pond behind me used to be a real meeting spot for the islanders in the summer time all the kids and families would all meet here and go for swims and hang out in the pond all day and then in the winter time it would freeze over and they would come here and they'll be skiing what a fantastic place to live literally giving all year round and it's a great place for bats to live here on the island they've got fantastic resources here because of all the caves and the um old buildings and things that makes for perfect places for them to live and then because of all the wildlife and all of the nature here they've got all their insects to eat so yeah what a great island for everybody pretty sustainable island it sounded like and great fun for them all [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] the archipelago of helsinki consists of around 330 islands providing a great getaway from city life the sea and the islands are an inseparable part of helsinki each island in the archipelago has its own unique character and the all-boast amazingly diverse [Music] [Applause] nature just over the other side of this rocky outcrop is the pond you walk up this outcrop that we've just come to the top of and there's an incredible view out across helsinki in the background and all of a sudden it doesn't feel so isolated also we just found out you're not allowed to swim in the pond down there so because there's wreckage at the bottom of the pond it says it needs to be investigated first before swimming's allowed in there but it's such a diverse island you go into these little pockets and these little areas where it feels so isolated but it's really not and these views up here are amazing back across um to the city who knew this was here what a great island it's an archipelago full of hundreds of islands so there must be so many others like this [Music] what an amazing view from out there totally worth climbing it wow check out this guy driving nature huge caterpillar [Music] oh wow we're just walking down this trail and oh my gosh come across a snake i nearly stood on him and he's fully hissing at us as well what is he we're okay we're in a cold country i don't know if you can hear him hissing oh he's going where we're trying to go go off the side buddy wow [Applause] really didn't expect this in finland [Applause] okay snake go we're trying to go that way [Applause] you can see how he's bent his body and bent his neck that means he's ready to flex and strike oh don't say that it's okay it's if you're within striking distance i was i didn't sit on him wow don't think i've ever seen a snake of that size in the world it's not the biggest snake but he is he seems quite aggressive as well i think he's calming down he's kind of looking to move away from my experience the smaller the snake the more scared you should be because they're usually more venomous i'm pretty sure in finland they're not venomous but either way i nearly stood on him and he didn't look too happy about it we both jumped quite a lot so i mean he's just in the path where we need to go we've got a boat to catch but we can't go there because he's facing the way we need to go looking like he's gonna strike i mean we could go but i'm too scared too he's he's actually going in the direction we're trying to go in just go off the side buddy just he could go off the side that is the path we're trying to take and he's just going along right where we need to go please just go left or right and disappear into the bushes please he just wants to come on the walk with us i think we're going to miss the boat at this rate yay he finally looks like he's leaving and heading off into the hedge a little bit of carry-on on our path off you go snake that's it it's best for everybody [Applause] phew say where are you going yeah i am so that snake's gone and we can carry on on our tour of the island well that was amazing i expect to see a reptile on an island just off the coast of finland that is amazing i just thought he looked quite an angry one i felt like if you see a snake over here they'll be chilled he didn't look chilled but then you know i wouldn't be too chilled if a giant listed on me i'm extremely curious to find out what he was now so he was quite a fairly long black snake certainly dark colors he did have some patterning inside of that and he had yellow on his hand he had yeah some white or yellow sort of either side of his head amazing can't believe that he was a similar size to like a common brown that you find in australia which is the last snake that i ever saw hence i forget and the last snake a lot of people would ever see yeah if they came across one in a bad bad situation yeah but yeah yes i was afraid i was petrified at first i was afraid i was afraid anyway we'd better watch where we're putting our feet yeah you always tell me i should look up and not down but today i'm gonna look down i don't mean look up i don't mean walk along like this i just mean in the middle don't walk along like this but yeah wow you were lucky like i said it's taken us by surprise because we're in a country where you wouldn't expect to see i don't know if it was venomous or anything along those lines but you're just not looking out for anything no along those lines when i'm in australia in australia or the tropics yeah somewhere like that you would uh you'd be looking out for it but we need to just make a lot of noise stomping so that they hear us and go away that's what i did like when i was walking around in countries where you expect to see snakes it was quite as well like we came along and he really stood his ground yeah so that was that was quite intimidating amazing [Music] i can see why the people of this island loved it so much and this is called the gibraltar of the north [Music] i mean that's all right isn't it the views from up here are absolutely amazing you can see some more islands south of here i'm sure if you look really really carefully you can probably see estonia across the gulf of finland there used to be 200 people on this island i feel like there's only two people on this island right now we have not seen anyone two people and at least one state and it's beautiful over the other side so this is a little waterway that goes between the islands we're pretty sure that sula molina because there's a sea fortress on it which is what that island is known for so i think that's where we're going to be going next hopefully we'll make it there the snake delayed us but 20 minutes we were stuck with us hopefully get the boat over to sue molina soon useful pathway and vantage point at the end of here and also you can go on a bit of a coastal walk along here there's like wooden bridges across the coastal rocks all looks very very pretty very spectacular especially in the sunshine [Music] i mean after the snake scare this isn't bad is it a sailing boat going through the sun's out a couple of swans in the background and the beach to ourselves this is beautiful i can see why they call it the gibraltar of the north it's really beautiful here we saw a picture and i think this uh little pebbly beach is where they used to cast off to go across to sula molina and probably back to helsinki as well makes sense [Music] ah there's a lot to be said for taking the scenic route we found our way back to the main path via this beautiful picnic area overlooking that as we came from the beach and came around that corner and saw those stairs and it's all overgrown it felt like we were in tomb raider or something we just had an idea if you come when you do this tour this is three islands how i would lay this day out perfectly we couldn't do it because it just rained all morning this morning but if you've got a day where the weather is like this all day pay 12 euros spend the morning here in valisari bring yourself a picnic sit yourself here and enjoy these picnic benches and this beautiful view for lunch and then get the boat over to molina spend the afternoon there and then you can get your boat over to luna island and have dinner there in the restaurant because in luna island there's just a restaurant there so perfect that'd just be a perfect day yeah we're gonna kind of try and do that but we couldn't start until two o'clock because the weather was not on our side but now it is and look at it this picnic area is beautiful and the view over there the islands fantastically set up not only with the picnic benches and the toilet facilities but also they've got recycling facilities as well which is really good so that you can put your waste in its associated bin bottle the plastic bottle then [Music] so just to add to the jeopardy on this island i've just read this sign that says that the fortifications on valisari are in poor conditions and the digging the ground lighting a campfire and staying overnight are prohibited because on the island there may still be explosives in the soil due to an explosive accident that happened in 1937 so where i've been stomping around to try and scare the snakes away i'm not thinking probably should stop stomping and not set off any explosives so i'm just going to go back to being light fitted again i think we've just walked through the section that's called the home of a thousand butterflies and that's because there literally has been over a thousand species of butterflies and moths found on this island how insane is that that's a lot of butterflies having walked around and seen so much nature and a few butterflies well i can believe just how many different other species there must be of all kinds of things just wow that's a thousand different types of butterflies and moths what a beautiful and diverse island full of flora and fauna incredible and now we're gonna go and check out the alexander battery which is the historical part of this island that is worth exploring [Music] so [Music] so now we've made it up to the alexander battery which was named after alexander ii when his father came to visit and decided to name officer so the reason it was built was because back in 1855 during the crimean war a british french naval ship fired at sumalina island so they built this battery uh to show its might and to protect saint petersburg and helsinki which back at the time was all under russian wall so that's the reason for its existence and today it's a fantastic viewpoint they've now put all this kind of frailing across here and benches out overlooking the sea and you know i mean it's lost its importance in terms of its uh maritime protection but it has not lost its importance and its beauty look at this view you've got the sea view and then you've got the islands of helsinki archipelago to go with it plus the actual mainland of helsinki in the background oh and sunshine with the yacht who doesn't love a city skyline and an ocean view at the same time we might be able to see it through the gopro but over in helsinki i'll point out a few things and the main landmark is helsinki cathedral there's the flyer or the big wheel and just above the cruise ship you can see uspensky cathedral behind that i can see the theme park which is in more of the northern part of helsinki and there's another cathedral which we did show in our helsinki city vlog just over there you can see the two spires looks quite similar to sagrada familiar in barcelona [Music] hi estonia this island is seriously treacherous it really is trying to kill us i think so this time not a snake this time we're walking along and we heard this massive noise and a huge branch just fell just in front of us and it's now just cracked across the path right where we're about to walk you can see it here i don't feel like we should really be stood here but to be honest we're gonna show the branch it doesn't look like much but it did make quite a noise most of it is in there but it fell and just took a load of leaves and branches with it and it was quite the commotion i was just sort of looking up and filming upwards and then i just heard this and i knew kirsty was in front of me so i just okay or walking into these things luckily not literally walking just missing these things but it's just so calm and serene there's no one else here and then all of a sudden it just went smash i don't know i thought it was someone jumping out on us or something we've just been reading these scary sort of comic stories as you go around they're like running jokes as you go around about a ghost in the forest and someone being murdered about a colonel who was hanged here in the forest so we just read about that and so it's now haunted and then i my heart is still pumping i can't believe it scott me that much but i wasn't thinking that i was just scared that we were gonna hit in my head let me show you the branch the branch is now it's in about 10 pieces yeah look all of this [Applause] anyway let's not stand here anymore wow the whole way is like it just keep your whips about you because you know you've got snakes jumping out you've got branches falling like a foot in front of you like what the heck all that being said we do still love this island i love it that is fantastic having read about that haunted story and the joke story just being a bit away with the fairies because i was doing some filming and looking up and then smash wow well i just thought what next is like a silverback gorilla jumping out on us or something it's funny this way to kill in kansai island [Music] we've now walked all the way around the main island of alessari back to here where the boat dropped us off we've quickly walked across here across this causeway to cancun asari across here we're now going to check out this sandy cove [Music] they made it to the cave in killen kansai island wow totally worth walking across the causeway to get here this is so tranquil and beautiful technically does this mean we've already gotten to island number two because we walked across from valasari island across the causeway and now we're in kulinkansari island so you know technically we've done two islands already and we've got about 10 minutes to get back to the boat ready to get over to suamen lina so we've got a kind of rash but look at this [Music] now we're going back across the causeway over to balisari what a beautiful sunny view we've got about seven minutes until the boat it just dawned on us but this is the last vote of the day that leaves from this island i say this island we're kind of between two islands right now but you're not allowed to stay on this island what would happen if we missed it there's nowhere to stay we'd just be stuck but luckily from here we can see where the boat's going to be so we'll get it we're just on the causeway craig's still on the causeway and i can just see the boat coming in now [Music] join us next time as we continue our tour of the islands in the helsinki archipelago and head over to the unesco world heritage site sue monlina if you can't wait that long head over to our instagram tag not travellers for daily updates on what we're currently up to and what's coming up in our future videos [Music] then we're going to go to the suit lina then we're going to go to assuming then we're going to go to summa lila then we're going to go to sue then we're going to go to sina and then our final and we're going to start off with valisary then we're going to go to suemenlina ready to get over to sue menlini suman alina we've got about 10 minutes to get back to the boat to get to sum suaman lina so we've got and they would dig up although it was forbidden they would dig up um live uh it's called live bombs what's the word help me out like bombs a million miles from anywhere you come up this up crop you walk up this outcrop so you didn't go anywhere you

Channel: Tide Knot Travellers

Views: 8,906

Rating: 4.9295154 out of 5

Keywords: exploring Finnish Islands! HELSINKI ARCHIPELAGO, helsinki finland, helsinki finland tour, travel couple videos, tide knot travellers, finnish nature, snake discovery, beach snakes, couple vlog channel, travel couple vlog, nordic countries happiness, couple vlog ideas, things to do in helsinki finland, british couple travel, europe travel vlog 2020, finnish archipelago, things to do in finland, finland vlog, helsinki travel vlog, visit helsinki, couple vloggers, travel blog

Id: L1-1w1A0z4w

Length: 28min 56sec (1736 seconds)

Published: Fri Jan 29 2021