Oulu travel guide

Top 10 sights in Oulu

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1. 

   1© kallerna · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Oulu Cathedral

   The Lutheran cathedral of Oulu, rebuilt after the fire of 1822 by Carl Ludvig Engel, who designed Helsinki's. It holds a portrait of a sixteenth-century Swedish priest that is reckoned the oldest painting on wood in Finland.

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2. 

   2© Estormiz · CC BY-SA 3.0

   Holy Trinity Cathedral

   An Eastern Orthodox cathedral in the Heinäpää district about a kilometre south of central Oulu. The architect Mikko Huhtela designed it and it was completed in 1957.

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   3

   Holy Family of Nazareth Church

   A Catholic church in Oulu, built when Catholic worship revived in northern Finland in the twentieth century after centuries of absence since the Reformation. A small congregation has kept it going since.

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4. 

   4© TeVe · CC BY-SA 3.0

   University of Oulu Botanical Gardens

   The botanical garden of Oulu University, among the northernmost scientific gardens anywhere. Its two glass pyramids, known as Romeo and Juliet, grow rainforest and Mediterranean plants a short way from the Arctic Circle.

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   5

   Oulu Castle

   The site of a medieval castle at Oulu. Sweden built it in the sixteenth century to hold the mouth of the Oulu river; lightning struck its powder magazine in 1793 and brought it down, and only the mound and a lookout tower remain.

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   6

   Oulu Market Hall

   A market building on the harbour square in Oulu, put up in red brick in 1901. With the open-air market beside it, it forms the centre of the town.

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   7

   Northern Ostrobothnia museum

   The North Ostrobothnia museum in Oulu, covering the history of the region, Sámi culture and the years of prosperity from the tar trade.

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   8

   Oulu Art Museum

   The Oulu art museum, in a converted glue factory, showing Finnish contemporary art.

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   9

   Tietomaa

   A science centre in Oulu, opened in 1988 and among the earliest hands-on science centres in the Nordic countries. Its displays are built to be touched and tried.

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    10

    Hupisaaret Islands

    A group of islands at the mouth of the Oulu river. The small islands, linked by bridges, have become a public park, and in summer walking paths follow the channels between them.

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1. 

   1© Riposti · CC BY-SA 4.0

   Tuira

   A district on the north bank of the Oulu river, developed as housing in the middle of the twentieth century and linked to the centre by bridge.

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   2

   Karjasilta

   A district just south of the centre, largely built for war veterans in the 1940s and 1950s and still full of their plain wooden houses. Finns voted it the best neighbourhood to live in in the country in 2009; the Oulu Music Centre stands on its eastern edge.

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   3

   Turkansaari Open Air Museum

   An open-air museum on an island in the Oulu river outside Oulu. Storehouses, tar kilns and a wooden church of the years when the region prospered on the tar trade have been moved here and reassembled.

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   4

   Haukipudas Church

   A wooden church at Haukipudas outside Oulu, built in the eighteenth century. Wall paintings by Mikael Toppelius cover its interior completely.

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   5

   Kontinkangas

   A district of Oulu where the university hospital and the medical faculties are concentrated, making it the centre of health care in the city.

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   6

   Raksila

   A district east of the railway station, half housing and half sports ground: the ice hall, swimming pool, the Ouluhalli arena and the pesapallo stadium all stand here. Its artificial rink hosted the Bandy World Championship in 2001, and the Valkkyla student flats went up in 1966.

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   7

   Kiiminki Church

   A wooden church at Kiiminki outside Oulu, built in the eighteenth century and showing the form of the northern Finnish timber church exactly.

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   8

   St. Luke's Chapel

   A chapel in Oulu, standing beside the university hospital and used as a space for patients and their families.

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   9

   Oulujoki Church

   A church on the bank of the Oulu river, built in the twentieth century and serving as the parish church of the villages upstream.

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    10

    Mannerheim Park

    A park in Oulu named after Marshal Mannerheim of Finland, close to the centre of the town.

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