Welcome to Turku!
The city of Turku is located by the Baltic sea, in the south-west coast of Finland. Although Turku is the oldest city in Finland, it is the place for young people because of the various possibilities for studying. The student card provides benefits for nearly 35 000 students in Turku and its neighboring towns.
Since Turku is located both by the sea and at the mouth of river Aura, water is an important element for its citizens. Make sure that you will do what surely nearly every inhabitant in Turku has done, namely take a cruise to our neighborhood Stockholm or Estonia. To get the real cultural taste of everyday life in our city, it is essential to experience a one-way or two-way trip across the river Aura with our own beloved ferry Föri.
The great city of Turku is the fifth largest in Finland by population. It is often said elsewhere in Finland that it is characteristic for the people who consider themselves as true and permanent citizens of Turku to, first of all, have a not so pretty dialect. The other commonality is that we often tend to consider Turku as the capital of Finland as it used to be until 1812.
Turku is also known for its various cultural events. In the summer time the city is full of different music festivals such as Ruisrock, Down by the Laituri, New Music Festival and Turku Music Festival. When the long warm hemiboreal summer is at its end and the wind begins to blow some autumnal rains into the shores of Turku, we can start guessing if river Aura gets its ice coat this year or not. Turku is the official Christmas city of Finland and the Declaration of Christmas Peace has traditionally taken place on the Old Great Square of Turku at noon on Christmas Eve since the Middle Ages.