I am embarrassed to admit that until I started researching things to do during our week in Helsinki, Finland, I didn’t know that Finland has the world’s largest archipelago with more than 80,000 islands off its coastline. Mind blown.

Of course we had to add visiting some of these islands to our itinerary!

With only a week in Helsinki and a few other day trips planned, we focused on two of the more popular and accessible islands: Suomenlinna – the fortress island – and Vallisaari – the nature island.

Visiting Suomenlinna Fortress Island

Suomenlinna Fortress Island is a UNESCO-designated historic site established in the 1700s and used by Finnish, Swedish, and Russian forces through the years. Today it has museums, shops, restaurants, and some residents who live there year-round.

We enjoyed great weather for our boat ride over to the island and spent most of the day walking around and hitting the high points, including the King’s Gate, bunkers, dry docks, and more.

We only went to the main museum, which had a lot of information about the island’s history and a great film. It was a perfect starting point – we didn’t know much ahead of our visit so it was helpful to have that background before our self-guided walking tour.

Visiting Vallisaari Nature Island

Unlike busy Suomenlinna, Vallisaari Nature Island was peaceful with very few other visitors.

At one time this island was used by the Russians to prevent others from getting close to nearby Suomenlinna so there are some residual bunker-type structures you can explore via viewing platforms above the fortifications. While there isn’t much at the pier where you’re dropped off, the marina where you get picked up has a small quayside cafe, picnic benches, and restrooms.

We waited for a day with nice weather and enjoyed our boat ride and time exploring the wooded trails and coastline. In addition to hiking the 3-km Alexander trail around the main island, we also crossed the short causeway over to Kuninkaansaari Island to hike a 2.5-km trail to some old gun emplacements.

I thoroughly enjoyed our day trips to a couple of Helsinki’s nearby islands and am glad we chose the two that we did – they were very different from one another and both enjoyable.

I’d highly recommend adding at least one island visit to your Helsinki itinerary. If you’ve explored other islands you recommend, please let me know in the comments!