spring vs. winter

While people in the Southern and Central Europe are enjoying temperatures around 20 degrees here in Finland you still have to take your hat and gloves with you whenever you leave the house. And even though also here the spring slowly starts and you feel the sun getting stronger every day some days might still surprise with snow. Finns call that “taka talvi”, the last attempts of the winter to come back. With 0 to 8 degrees Helsinki is also still much colder then Stockholm which is just a few hundred kilometers further west. The reason for that is that the Gulf Stream doesn’t influence the climate in Finland as strongly as it does in Norway and Sweden.

But not just melting snow and ice show that the winter is over. Also the first blooming flowers welcome the spring to the Finnish capital.