Operator: VR
Headcode: PYO273
Route: HEL-ROV
Class: Sleeper Ensuite
Seat: C54, B213/214
Date: Friday 15th May 2026
With our arrival into Helsinki airport having been a bit later than planned (read about that here), we’d had a few hours to explore the city and grab some dinner before needing to be back at Helsinki Central Station ready for the next part of our adventure. Whilst we would be coming back to Helsinki and spending a few days in the Finnish capital, the first destination of our Nordic Nomads adventure was further north, on the edge of the Arctic Circle. And so, to reach our destination of Rovaniemi, we would be travelling overnight, on one of the sleeper services operated by the Finnish state railway operator, VR.
My first tip of this trip is to not get to Helsinki station too early, as there is very limited seating within the station and no waiting room that we could find. By the time we had finished having dinner and collecting our bags, we had about an hour until departure and so managed to settle down on the one bench we could find near the station’s Subway sandwich shop. Our platform was already displayed but it turned out a local train was using it until 2242 (around 30 minutes before our departure) and so we decided to head over just after that. As it turned out our timing was pretty good as the train arrived into the platform at 2255, having been propelled in by the loco at the north end, and we were onboard shortly after.
The train was formed of nine double-deck carriages, hauled by a single electric locomotive and we were in coach 54 at the very rear of the train. Of the nine carriages, six were sleeper carriages, two had regular standard class seating and the final was a restaurant car, with both a proper seating area and a standing area adjacent to the bar. With the chaos of everyone boarding, we ended up departed at 2318, five minutes late, and shortly after departure were calling at the first of 23 stops that the train would make over the course of our just under 12-hour journey north. The first stop of Pasila is quite a busy one, with it serving northern Helsinki as well as being the station where the passengers travelling with their cars board the train.
The next stop of Tikkurila (Vantaa) is usually around 10 minutes from Pasila, however immediately after departing the latter we pulled into a large rail yard to the north of the station where Pasila Motorail station is located. Here a number of car carrying wagons are added to the train, allowing passengers to take their cars to Lapland without the lengthy drive. After a bit of shunting to get these wagons onto the rear of the train, we were back underway and reached Tikkurila (Vantaa) around 30 minutes after departing Pasia. It was around the time the wagon shunting was going on that we decided to make our way forward to check out the restaurant car where there was a reasonable choice of full meals (the meatballs looked excellent) along with both sweet and savoury snacks. I went for the ‘meat pie’ expecting something along the lines of a Scotch Pie, however when it arrived it was more like someone had poorly described a Cornish Pasty. Either way, it tasted ok, and two hot drinks, a chocolate muffin and my ‘pie’ cost €14.90.
With the conductor scanning our tickets just before we left the restaurant car, we headed back to our room around midnight, shortly before the stop at Tikkurila (Vantaa). Our room was an ensuite room, which had a small toilet/shower room attached alongside the standard sleeper cabin. All rooms have bunk beds, European plug sockets, reading lights, some bedside storage and a tiny rubbish bin. There’s also a decent amount of underbed storage for larger bags, along with free WiFi being available throughout the train. If you have lots of luggage, you can also pay for access to the larger luggage storage onboard, with this only being accessible via the guard, so if you need it, find them as you board the train. We’d recovered our earlier five-minute delay and the third stop on the journey, Riihimäki came on time at 0044, at which point we decided it was time for lights out and hopefully some sleep as we continued north.
Whilst we were sleeping, we had ticked off 14 more stations, including Finland’s third largest city, Tampere, which I had visited on my previous trip to Finland back in 2024 (read about that here). The stop at Tampere is the longest enroute at around 45 minutes as it is where the sleeper train from the port city of Turku joins with the sleeper from Helsinki to form a combined train to Rovaniemi. I woke up around 0800, just as we were leaving stop 18, Kempele, having had an okay but slightly disturbed sleep. Having become a bit of a sleeper train connoisseur over the past few years, I found the VR offering better than some, and although the mattress could have been thicker, it was leaps and bounds ahead of the sleeper I had taken between Budapest and Bucharest earlier in the year. Checking my phone, I found that I had a few notifications from the VR app, as it had kept me up to date with our progress as I slept, with a couple of delays having been incurred but then recovered.
Around 10 minutes after I woke up, we stopped in the city of Oulu, where the Oulu River meets the Bay of Bothnia, and here we had an extended stop of around 15 minutes. The scenery had certainly changed overnight as now in northern Finland there were pine forests as far as the eye could see. Not wanting to have to head to the restaurant car, we had pre-ordered our breakfast online and this was delivered around 90 minutes before arrival at 0935. There is a choice of either the Scandinavian Breakfast, essentially porridge with berries, or the Train Traveller’s Brunch, which has a choice of rye bread with cheese, a roast beef ciabatta, an oat roll with cheese or a croissant with jam. We both went for the Train Traveller’s Brunch with roast beef ciabatta and I’ve got to say, for a pre-packaged train breakfast, it was very nice. The Train Traveller’s Brunch also comes with a yoghurt, and all options come with an orange juice and a choice of tea, coffee or hot chocolate. Of course, there are also gluten free or children’s options available.
The town of Kemi was the last majorish settlement on the coast, close to the Swedish border and after leaving here we turned to head inland, following the Kemijoki River north-east. At 1006 we stopped at Tervola which had a couple of sidings but no proper platform, just gravel next to the track. We left here moving quite slowly and stopped again shortly after in a passing loop to allow a daytime Intercity service to pass on its way south to Helsinki. At our penultimate stop, Murrola, we were technically within the city limits of Rovaniemi and yet were still 20 minutes away from the city’s main railway station, with Rovaniemi being Finland’s second largest city by area. We departed Murrola around seven minutes late, which considering we’d been travelling for over 11 hours, didn’t seem too bad.
As we approached Rovaniemi’s railway station, we passed a large rail yard which seemed to be the centre of the area’s wood industry, as lots of logs were stacked up next to the sidings and engine shed, where a lonely shunt locomotive sat awaiting its next duties. Pulling into Rovaniemi’s platform 1 at 1104, our journey came to an end five minutes late after exactly 11 hours and 45 minutes of travelling, as we had travelled from the Finnish capital to the capital of Finnish Lapland. After getting all our luggage off the train, I made my way to the front of the train to get a photo of our locomotive, which ran away as I arrived and so I had to wait for it to shunt back into one of the adjacent sidings to get a picture. We were also able to see them shunting the car carrying wagons from the rear of the train onto the offload ramp, before making our way into the station building to collect our hire car.
Whilst I’d travelled with VR before between Helsinki and Tampere, this was my first time on one of their sleeper services and by far the longest and overall, I was impressed. All the staff were friendly and helpful, and the sleeper cabin was an okay size with the beds being reasonably comfortable, which is the most important thing. The pre-ordered breakfast was certainly much better than many sleeper train breakfasts I’ve had, and the restaurant car served a decent choice of food ranging from snacks to full meals. My only real criticism would be the lack of a decent waiting room, or any sort of lounge at Helsinki Central Station, as it was not the most comfortable place to wait for a train at 2300. Impressively, given the distance travelled and the large amount of single track sections north of Oulu, our five-minute late arrival falls within the margin of error for an on time arrival.
Lounge 0*
Seat/Facilities 3*
Food 4*
Service 5*
Punctuality 5*
Overall Rating 17/25 (read about my rating system here!)
