Getting to Finland

By plane

Finland's main international hub is Helsinki-Vantaa Airport near Helsinki. Finnair , Blue1 , Air Finland and Finncomm Airlines are based there. Around 30 foreign airlines fly to Helsinki-Vantaa, including low-cost carrier Easyjet from London , Manchester and Paris.

Ryanair 's Finland hub is in Tampere, while Wizz Air is building an increasingly large hub at Turku. Other airlines have limited regional services to other cities, mostly just to Sweden, and, in the winter high season, occasional direct charters (especially in December) and seasonal scheduled flights (Dec-Mar) to Lapland. It may also be worth your while to get a cheap flight to Tallinn and follow the boat instructions below to get to Finland.

By train

VR and Russian Railways have two direct train services daily from Helsinki to Saint Petersburg and one daily to Moscow in Russia. There are no direct trains between Sweden or Norway and Finland (the rail gauge is different), but the bus over the gap from Boden /Lulea (Sweden) to Kemi (Finland) is free with an Eurail / Inter Rail pass, and you can also get a 50% discount from most ferries with these passes.

By bus

Buses are the cheapest but also the slowest and least comfortable way of traveling between Russia and Finland.

• Regular scheduled buses run between St. Petersburg , Vyborg and major southern Finnish towns like Helsinki, Lappeenranta , Jyvaskyla and all the way west to Turku, check Matkahuolto for schedules. Helsinki-St. Petersburg is served three times daily, costs €38 and takes 9 hours during the day, 8 hours at night.

• Various direct minibuses run between St. Petersburg's Oktyabrskaya Hotel (opp Moskovsky train station) and Helsinki's Tennispalatsi (Etelainen Rautatiekatu 8, one block away from Kamppi). At €15 one-way, this is the cheapest option, but the minibuses leave only when full. Departures from Helsinki are most frequent in the morning (around 10 AM), while departures from St. Petersburg usually overnight (around 10 PM).

 

By boat

One of the best ways to travel to and from Finland is by sea. The boats to Estonia and Sweden, in particular, are giant, multi-story floating palaces and department stores, with cheap prices subsidized by sales of tax-free booze: a return trip to Tallinn including a cabin for up to four people can go as low as €50. If travelling by Inter Rail, you can get 50% off deck fares. The best way to arrive in Helsinki is standing on the outside deck with a view ahead

Source: Wikitravel.org