Мой самый любимый район в Хельсинки. My favorite area in Helsinki.

Rating 9110

For several years now we have been starting our walks in Helsinki from Katajanokki. This is a beautiful respectable area with blocks of houses built in the Art Nouveau style and populated by wealthy residents. I don't even believe it. that some 100 years ago it was a dangerous outback where the poor and convicts lived. Initially, Katajanokka was a peninsula, but now it is separated from the mainland by a small canal, through which several small bridges are thrown, one of which is a “love bridge” tightly hung with locks, similar to which can be found in almost any city in the world.
The decoration and historical center of this area is the majestic Assumption Cathedral, built of red brick.
In addition to the Assumption Cathedral, in Katajanokka you can see the building of the former district prison, built under Nicholas I and functioning, by the way, right up to 2002 - now there is a hotel and the original restaurant "Criminal", the building of the Finnish Ministry of Foreign Affairs (former barracks of the Marine Corps) , Casino - a former club of Russian officers of the Baltic Fleet, the building of the Katayanokk elementary school (functioning since 1817), brick warehouse buildings, which today house expensive cafes and restaurants. Several icebreakers are also permanently moored in Katajanokka, and not far from them there is a modest monument to sappers who participated in mine clearing of the Gulf of Finland after the Second World War. If you think Helsinki is "boring" and "gray", visit Katajanokka, walk along its elegant streets, sit on a bench in a quiet park on the shores of the Gulf of Finland, and you will change your mind about this city forever.