Zoo- and amusement park days + announcement

Last week was pretty exciting, I went to visit Korkeasaari zoo and Linnanmäki amusement park in Helsinki because they had events. I haven't visited Korkeasaari in about 8 years and in Linnanmäki I haven't tried any rides in about 4 years.

So what was going on?

Korkeasaari Zoo event

In tuesday Korkeasaari Zoo held an event that you got in for free. I couldn't let this chance slip since I hadn't visited there in many years. My friend Annina went gladly with me.

We were a bit lost at first since we thought to take waterbus but it had finished for this season so we ended up taking the only option to the zoo aka bus. It was reeeeally full of people but it was short ride so it was ok.

When we arrived we just started to walk towards top of hill (Korkeasaari is actually a hill island), there we encountered peacocks. They could move freely and didn't mind people as long as people didn't chase them.

We popped to visit a cafe and then left to search for big cats area. We found it quickly but most of the cats were sleeping or resting lol. But at least I saw a lion and cute tiger cubs <3

Then we just headed forward passing some animal cages like Reindeers. Korkeasaari also had fun small nature trail representing how trails usually are in finnish forests.

We continued to wander around and saw goats, wild horses and bears. One bear was really cute, it didn't care about anyone and just comfortably sat inside it's cage.
We started to think if it would be time to go home or if we missed something. We looked zoo map and noticed we totally missed tropic animals. So we headed to tropical house where we saw alot of lizards, turtles, frogs and snakes. Also some beautiful parrots~

Then it was already approaching 3.30pm and zoo would close at 4pm so we decided to leave. We had fun day seeing all different kinds of animals.

Linnanmäki light carnival event

At friday me and Annina went to Linnanmäki light carnival which is a yearly event in Linnanmäki amusement park. It was private occasion on friday actually, organized by Nuorisosäätiö. Officially light carnival opened last saturday. The event is open until 22nd October so if you're interested you still have time :) Lights this year were fantastic and amusement park looked wonderful!

There were many people, about 5000 in this private event so we had to queue for popular rides for quite some time. Because of it we didn't have time to try every ride (event lasted from 4pm to 9pm).

But we had so much fun anyways! First ride we headed to was of course Rollercoaster. It's a classic and you cannot miss it!

There was a bit cold but we didn't really notice it while we were in rides because we had so much fun! After rollercoaster we decided to take this kind of haunted house ride. After it we queued for Linnunrata eXtra for quite some time; it was a rollercoaster where you put oculus on and it made it kind of virtual at the same time you were moving with rollercoaster so it was exciting.

After it we toured through some rides before we noticed that time had literally flewn and it was nearing 9pm. We said bye to Linnanmäki and headed home.

So this was basically how my last week was. This week I haven't had much to do except my korean lesson.
Before my korean lesson I met my friend Sirja with whom I discussed about travelling to South-Korea next year. And whoops, suddenly at the evening we had flight tickets to Incheon airport and a hostel booked xD
Ok, we had to lose our temper first because we had problems reserving the hostel and then Sirja had some problems booking her flights so both of us were losing our minds. But in the end we got what we wanted and now I have a trip to Korea booked for 18th february to 4th March :D
We have another friend too who may be coming but she has other things to confirm before it so we'll know about in december if she's coming with us~
Anyway, we'll stay in K-Guesthouse Sinchon 2 in Sinchon area (신촌) which is right between Hongdae and Ewha. Basically center of Seoul.
So that was my announcement :D Look forward to my travel posts next year^^

Other things

Cosmetics

Now that winter is coming, I might as well recommend some handcreams~ Beware that your hands don't go dry and dehydrated which will happen fast when we're still not used to cold temperatures. I have atopy so if I don't use handcream everyday my hands will go dry very quickly and I get dry spots to my hands so I have to be very careful. That's why I have tried so many handcreams to find what I like best. Here's couple I have been using this year (I go through small ones seriously fast, in about 2 weeks).

I have tried alot of handcreams but Nature Republic is my number 1 when it comes to affordably priced handcreams that treats your hands well, moisturizes and softens. They are also in convenient small package which don't take up too much space if you want to carry it in your purse. These are must-have handcreams for a skincare lover! Only minus thing is that they are available only in South-Korea and few other countries so if you want to have Nature Republic handcreams, you will have to go to online store.

In the lower photo is also two Mamonde handcreams; Jasmine cashmere and camellia petal. I have tested about four Mamonde handcreams and only Jasmine cashmere I would buy again, it softens your hands instantly and is only mild scented. Other Mamonde handcreams had really strong scent and my nose wasn't comfortable with that..

Good second place in my favorite handcreams goes to L'Occitane shea butter handcream. I just love shea butter handcreams but this smells soooo good and is gentle to your hands. It's on a pricy side especially since tube is small but I recommend this to everyone who wants to have soft feeling hands instantly. Plus most of the bigger shops in Finland at least carry this so you can just go to store and grab yours without having to go to online and wait for your order for days (though if you're not living in an area where there's L'Occitane available, they have online store).

If you need heavy cream then this is your pick. Biotherm Biomains is thick but very moisturizing. Only thing I didn't quite like about it is that it leaves that sticky feeling to your hands for a long time.

 Innisfree handcreams are too thick for me but someone who has extremely dry hands might like them and they are really affordable too. They are available for example in online stores concentrating on korean cosmetics.

This Nature republic aloe vera handcream was very good but it's light so it's more suitable for summer use. So, it's very lightweight and absorbs fast leaving cooling and soft feeling to your hands. I don't know if this is available in any online stores because I bought this while I was in Korea.

This Clinique even better handcream was very good night handcream! I use two different handcreams for day use and night use. This was on heavy side but it was caring and softening so I put it in the evening and in the morning my hands were soft~ Side note; this has quite heavy scent so if you're not used to heavy smells then I don't recommend buying this.

 This The body shop Vanilla Chai handcream I bought last week, I tried it in body shop store and ended up liking it instantly! It has nice scent and very suitable for especially christmas season :)



That's all for now~ Next post is up after next week propably. I will attend I love me beauty fair in Helsinki next week's friday and in saturday I will go to this one Korean culture event in Gloria.
Thanks for reading, see you soon^^