My overnight journey from Kemi (northern Finland) to Helsinki
The night trains of VR (Finnish Railways) are often highly praised. For geographical reasons, the best routes run from north to south. I was lucky enough to test one of these trains on the way from Kemi to Helsinki. Can it keep its promise?
Driving route
The connection is particularly suitable for a Scandinavian round trip if you either:
-from Narvik or Kiruna (Norway or northern Sweden) directly to Helsinki
-am North Cape was or
-made a stopover in northern Finland.
I took the first of the routes. You can read about how to get from Lulea to Kemi by bus in this blog.
One Overview of all night trains in Finland is available on rail.cc
In many trains even Car transport to Helsinki-Pasila possible!
This blog will now focus on the journey from Kemi to Helsinki. If you would like to drive the route in the opposite direction, this blog by Peter might be of interest to you. Argon will also be publishing a blog about this route in the near future.
Journey times
My train departs Kemi at 22:33 (since 2025 at 22:28) and came from Kemijärvi. Helsinki is reached in the late morning at 09:15.
It runs carriages from Rovaniemi to Tampere and Helsinki (Pasila) and from Kemijärvi to Helsinki (Pasila). You can also find the IC274 train here.
Source journey times: Deutsche Bahn.
Journey times may vary by up to 20 minutes depending on the day!
Tickets
Tickets in the sleeping car start at 49 EUR in the normal sleeping car and 54 EUR in the "Deluxe". Realistically, however, you should budget for EUR 70 or more. More on this later. You can travel in a seating carriage from around 30 EUR. The normal price is between 80 and 90 EUR for the entire journey, and correspondingly less for partial journeys. Tickets are available here.
Booking with Interrail
A reservation is included in the normal ticket (whether economy or standard fare). With Interrail, however, you pay a reservation fee of 36 EUR or 41 EUR in the deluxe sleeper. If you would like a whole compartment, it is either 95 EUR or 105 EUR.
Where can I make a reservation? Unfortunately, so far only by calling the Finnish railway on +358 9 2319 2902. Optionally also at the railway station (counter) abroad or on site, but Kemi was not staffed, I suspect that it will be the same in northern Finland.
If you don't want to call, you can also try emailing the Finnish railway's customer service. However, I would only do this if you have at least one week's notice.
Update in the year 2020
Since 2020, Norrtag trains have been travelling from Boden via Lulea to Haparanda (Swedish/Finnish border) again. This means that you only have to travel by bus between Tornio (neighbouring town of Haparanda) and Kemi between northern Sweden and Finland. If you board the night train to Helsinki in Tornio, you no longer have to take a bus at all. The distance from Haparanda railway station to Tornio-Itäinen is about 5 km.
Reservation difficulties and a foreigner with a lot of bad luck
As I wanted my tour to be a little unplanned, I decided to book by phone the day before the trip. At least you are put through to a real person and don't have to click through numbers. So I wanted to book a normal sleeping car for 36 EUR. Everything looked fine until the man on the phone said that I had the last seat but it looked like someone else had booked it away in the meantime. I could only reserve one more seat. Oh no!
I decided to hang up without further ado, think it over and try again. One option would be to take the earlier night train from Kemi (19:29), but that's not the best option either, as I arrive in Helsinki at 6am and have to leave Kiruna at 05:48.
But when I rang again, the seat was still free and I was sent the reservation by email. The system had probably hung up and shown my own seat in the shopping basket as blocked. As I said. All good :) By the way, you have to give your email address and credit card details verbally on the phone, which is a bit strange.
Evening in Kemi
My bus from Tornio/Haparanda arrived in Kemi at around eight o'clock. So still plenty of time in such a small town. At first it was to my advantage, as a foreigner, that I can say "railway station" in 15 different languages. Finnish had recently been added to the list. So I immediately recognised the sign "Rautatiasema", which leads from the bus station to the real station. A walk of a few hundred metres, 5 minutes is enough. Incidentally, I only learnt later that the emphasis is on the "tia" and especially on the "a" of "tia". Finnish - funny language!
What do you do that evening? I heard about an ice-cream parlour that was supposed to be here and walked the 1.5 km to it.
Map of Kemi. The railway station is the red dot, the ice palace is down by the sea.
Of course, it didn't exist in summer, just an ice cream restaurant, which was already closed. However, the friendly staff member at the campsite next door opened it for me briefly, even free of charge, and let me take a photo.
Ice cream restaurant in Kemi.
Here on the coast, I was presented with a beautiful view of Scandinavia, just like you see in the books.
The more adventurous can optionally go swimming, there is also a beach nearby. The water temperature is as high as 15 degrees, almost at the Arctic Circle!
The train arrived on time. There is actually only one track where trains depart, and you can get there without a subway. So even if you're running out of time, there's no obstacle waiting for you.
After standing for three minutes, the train departs on time at 22:33. As I board the train, I recognise the car transport wagons.
Presentation of the Finnish night train
The Finnish night train is huge, I have respect as I stand in front of this monster. That's because Finland once belonged to Russia (until 1914) and the railway network was built in Russian broad gauge. This makes it easy to build double-decker night trains. The sleeping car compartments with their own shower and WC (deluxe) are located at the top and the normal ones at the bottom. All compartments are 2-seater, except on the Kolari-Helsinki route, where 3-seaters are used.
When I get on, an elderly gentleman with a stick is standing in the aisle. He asks me something in Finnish, which of course I don't understand. When I ask for English, he repeats "onehundredtwentytwo?" - 122 - my reservation number. I am one of the two people boarding that evening and will be sharing the compartment with him. He takes me there straight away without me having to wait for the conductor, who comes by anyway. I show her my reservation in the email on my mobile phone, which is no problem. There is even supposed to be Wi-Fi on the train, but I don't use it. The man is friendly, but we still have a bit of bad luck with the compartment. It's neither at the bottom nor at the top, but at the side of the carriage, in the transition, halfway up. That's why the door is slanted and, to make matters worse, opens inwards. Both of these factors mean that there is very little space. The poor man, who already looks a bit frail, had to lie down completely before he could close the door. Not very well organised.
UPDATE 2025: There are now only private compartments, no more shared ones.
Here is a gallery of photos of our compartment:
Modest location of the compartment at the passageway to the next carriage (top picture: second diagram on the far right)
There are a total of 4 sockets in the compartment. One at each bed + one in the room + one at the washbasin. There is actually very little space for luggage. It is best to stow it under the lower bed.
When travelling in a shared compartment, I'm always a little afraid that fellow passengers will get off before me and I'll wake up. But luckily everyone here is travelling to Helsinki, right? Not this man. Because he has to go to Tampere, the only major city on the way. I've taken the biscuit again, because he gets off at 05:40. Jackpot! But he's nice, you can't say anything. However, his attempt to start a conversation is complicated: He produces very few words of English. Every time he can't think of a word, he does what anyone would instinctively do: he replaces the word with the same word in his own language. This works quite often, I know a few words in other languages. For example, the Spanish "camino" for "way/path" came to me without any problems and even in Russian (which is already a difficult language) it sometimes works. But not in Finnish! Because every word is really different here. Even words like "centre", which are the same almost everywhere (e.g. Italian: "centro", Russian: "tsentr") are called "keskusta" here: "keskusta". So it's a shame that we can hardly have a conversation. I can only tell him where I'm from, after he first thought I was from London, automatically because I speak English.
Given the late hour, we go to bed soon after. Falling asleep wasn't a problem either, I had the top bunk with the well-known owl bed linen. The mattress is also extremely comfortable!
Here are a few insights into the upper bed:
Unfortunately, the night was a little restless. I woke up for the first time when the man below me was in a snoring phase. He also seemed to develop a certain bad breath at night, which I had to accept for better or worse. Nevertheless, the snoring soon stopped again, and in the worst case it helped to nudge him to change his breathing rhythm. As we approached Tampere (Tammerfors in Sweden), I woke up the next time when the man was packing his things. But less than five minutes later he had disappeared and I was able to go back to sleep. You really can't complain about that! I thought about those unpleasant fellows who don't put their things down properly beforehand and then start packing their suitcases at the crack of dawn, forcing you to watch the whole thing because the noise is incompatible with sleep. As I said, I have to praise this nice man!
My night, which was already a little restless, came to an abrupt end when the announcements were turned up at around eight in the morning. You can't sleep longer than that here. I tried several times to press on my personal control panel by the bed (see photo) to see if I could switch off the announcements. But unfortunately in vain. This seems to be a standard setting.
Alarm system: unfortunately, the volume of the early announcements cannot be controlled.
Otherwise, you can see the time all night long, set your alarm clock and switch the light on, off or half on in various modes.
It was no use: the tired traveller had to get up. I'm not a fan of such automatic wake-up times. At least in the sleeping car you should be able to choose something like that yourself! Especially as there is unfortunately no breakfast included... Instead, you can or must switch to the dining car, which I would like to introduce to you here at the end. Since 2024, you can at least order your breakfast in advance and it will be brought to your compartment early. However, you still have to pay extra for this.
The current menu from 2024 is provided as a link.
During my morning tour of the train, I also found a few extras. Firstly, the seating carriages (which I wouldn't have wanted to swap, though, as the reservation price was EUR 10). Incidentally, these were sorted out in 2024 and replaced by more modern Edg carriages.
Here, too, there appears to be first and second class. The second class has 2+2 fabric seats in a row, the first class 2+1 leather seats. Both seat types are also available as compartments. Additional luggage compartments are available.
Bicycle transport is guaranteed! I've never seen anything like it anywhere else. Bicycles should also travel easily here.
And of course I also stopped by the deluxe sleeping compartments. These are upstairs and have their own shower and toilet. The shower can be used by pushing a button and then sliding the washbasin wall to the side.
Visually, the deluxe compartments (upper level) hardly differ from the normal compartments below. But these do not have a shower, only a washbasin. Here are two photos:
But every passenger can still shower. Because there is a communal shower downstairs. An indicator lights up green if it is free. You can get in using the lock card that everyone has in their compartment. There are also two other toilets on the train. One of them is barrier-free.
Of course, I still have to explain how the locking system works. Each sleeping car compartment can be locked separately from the inside. A card serves as the key. You can also slide a second bolt forward (at the bottom).
Last but not least, there is also a pet compartment on the train. Yes, you really get the feeling that there is something for everyone here! Except for couchettes, there are none. The pet compartment (one per carriage) is adjacent to the stairs, leaving extra space underneath for luggage or the pet. See first photo below right. The compartment is labelled with a green paw sticker.
Arrival in Helsinki
We arrived in Pasila well ahead of schedule (around half or three quarters of nine instead of 09:07), where the car transporters are unhooked. Meanwhile, I was eating my own breakfast. Then it's only a five-minute journey to the main railway station: Päärautatiasema, where we are about 7 minutes late. This is a terminus station and architecturally quite impressive. Toilets (1.10EUR, as of Oct. 2024) and lockers are located in the basement.
Counter hall in Helsinki Rautatiasema.
Staying overnight in Helsinki
As all the reasonably priced hostels close to the city were already gone on my day, I decided without further ado to travel directly to Tallinn (Reval) in the evening. You can read a blog about the ferry trip to Tallinn here . For Helsinki, however, you will certainly have to hostelworld.com or booking.com but I strongly recommend booking/reserving a few days in advance.
Conclusion!
Unfortunately, after my journey I decide in favour of: All that glitters is not gold! I was certainly a little unlucky with the early exit of my fellow passenger and the tightest compartment on the whole train. Nevertheless: forced wake-up call, no breakfast included? - Not convincing by sleeping car standards. So my personal European night train crown remains with ÖBB and their NightJet (NJ). Finally, however, a few positive words: the mattresses were very cosy and the train looks brand new and clean. There should generally be enough space in most compartments and the deluxe compartments seemed a tad better. Dining cars are also a rarity on night trains! The train also offers plenty of extras for all types of travellers!
Finally, our booking links for normal tickets and Interrail passes (either Europe or Finland single).
If you use these booking links, RailDude will receive a small commission as a thank you for our free content and blogs. The price does not change and I would of course be very grateful! If you have any questions about your upcoming trip, we are here to help and advise you!
Wenn Dir mein Bericht gefallen hat, dann empfiehl uns doch gern weiter! Bis bald im nächsten Nachtzug. 🙂
Important links
Timetable / journey time approx. 10:45 hours: VR - Finnish railway
Buy train tickets. Price depends on date of travel and train class, from 30 EUR: VR - Finnish railway
Book a hotel in Rovaniemi, Kemi or Helsinki: Booking.com
InterRail - a train ticket for the whole of Europe: InterRail
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