Due to specific traveling restrictions in place, Australians will continue to refrain from traveling abroad. However, to ease the news of not being able to travel internationally, the national airline, Qantas, is launching “Mystery Flights” as a way to encourage domestic travel.

Qantas Is Encouraging Domestic Travel

Travelers can choose to book one of the three journeys that are offered by Qantas, where they’ll put their fate into the hands of the Australian airline. They’re offering one-day trips that fly out of Brisbane, Melbourne, and Sydney. The available dates are in late March, mid-April, and the beginning of May.

The Boeing 737s will be limited to carrying 120 passengers, and they’ll be traveling to destinations that are within a two-hour radius. Travelers will be able to enjoy breakfast in the Qantas lounge starting at 7 AM, and they’ll return in the early evening.

Guests won’t be informed of where they’re going until the plane descents into the mystery location. However, the flight path will appear on the screens in front of each seat. In addition to this, Qantas passengers will receive filers that can help them guess where they’re going.

Hints on the Destinations

The airline also offers hints on the Qantas website. Flights departing from Brisbane will offer the perfect getaway. They encourage passengers who have a love for country hospitality, wine, gourmet food, and the outdoors to travel. For the Sydney flights, they’re targeting people who will enjoy having lunch on the beach.

Those who are interested in flying from Melbourne should enjoy the great outdoors, farmer’s markets, and gourmet food and wine. The all-inclusive packages are available for economy seats and business-class.

With a band on overseas travel, Qantas is doing its best to encourage locals to continue to travel domestically. The news from the airline is that they will resume international travel in October 2021.

Police departments around the world are known to use horses, dogs, cats, birds, and even dolphins, so it’s not totally surprising the Finns would incorporate reindeer into their police force. The next logical question is what exactly these reindeer are used for, though.

Well, they handle environmental crimes — as well as publicity, public relations, and engagements for the police — since they’re just pretty cool.

Another odd championship that made its start in Finland is the World Wife Carrying Championship — called eukonkanto in Finnish — that’s held annually in Sonkajärvi, Finland. In it, a man carries his wife through an obstacle course using one of several different techniques.

The technique in this picture is called the Estonian technique, and we’re not sure how much fun it is for the wife. These folks take the sport very seriously, though!

We can’t tell if this guy is just sitting and contemplating his life decisions while he’s surrounded by snow, but we can only assume that his beverage is a hot one. We guess when you’re surrounded by snow most of the year, sometimes you just feel the need to pretend you’re in a tropical paradise.

A common theme we’re noticing among the Finns is that they don’t mind a little cold weather, and this guy definitely lives up to that stereotype. Maybe he’s getting ready to go jump in a lake!

In Finland, it’s considered rude to talk to someone about money, specifically their annual salary. One interesting aspect of this, though, is that reindeer farmers consider the number of reindeer they have to be similar to money in the bank. So, you can’t ask them how many reindeer they have.

Most Finnish people only discuss money with very close family and friends, and their salary is considered to be a matter that stays between a person and their boss. However, they’re not wealth averse, as you’ll see below!

Most Finns dream of winning big in their national lottery, which is basically a state sport. The game is held every Saturday, and it’s pretty similar to the American PowerBall lottery. Asking someone what they would do if they won the lottery is actually a popular first date question.

However, many of the Finns who do win the lottery often show a lot of restraint and maintain the same life they had prior to winning.

In perhaps the greatest plot twist since The Sixth Sense, Finnish salaries are actually public knowledge. If you want to find out how much money someone makes, all you have to do is wander down to the closest tax office and ask to see tax returns, which are released by the Finnish government on November 1st, which they call National Jealousy Day.

It seems that even though Finns don’t want to talk about their salaries, they want to know what everyone else makes. Wonder how Lukas from down the street was able to afford that Ferrari? Now you can find out.

The Finns naturally socially distanced before it was even cool. Finns like their space, as you can see from the normal queue in the photo below. It’s not necessarily that they don’t like other people — they just don’t want to crowd anyone.

We’ve gotta say, this is probably one of the most appealing things about Finland we’ve found. Imagine not having to worry about someone sitting next to you on the bus!

As you can see from this up-scale bathroom in Helsinki, the capital of Finland, someone took the phrase porcelain throne to the next level. You wouldn’t even need your phone to keep you occupied if you had access to this awesome view!

Clearly, the Finns are people who know how to go to the bathroom in style. That’s something we can fully get behind.

In the 1960s and 1970s, Finnish architect Matti Suuronen designed a prefabricated house that looks an awful lot like a flying saucer. Dubbed FUTURO, there were only several hundred made, but the ease with which they can be moved around makes them a highly sought after collector’s item.

We don’t know if there are currently any for sale in Finland, but one was listed in NJ in 2017 for $290K, and another recently in New Zealand for $300k. Hope you brought your checkbook!

In what may surprise absolutely nobody, the Finns are a hardy people who don’t shy away from cold weather. Many of them find a dip in an icy lake to be refreshing — so much so that they have an entire sport for it, called “Avantouinti.” It’s also called winter swimming around the world.

Winter swimming isn’t unique to Finland, but its popularity does solidify Finland’s status as in the tip-top ranks of the craziest northern nations out there.

There’s probably a fair amount of people who would look at a coffee packet and think to themselves, “I could make a bag out of this.” At least one person did in Finland, as evidenced by these matching bags. They actually look quite well made and very sturdy.

Hey, we’re totally not judging someone for wanting to recycle their old coffee packets and throw them away. This just took a lot of time commitment!

Finland is a pretty rural country, with a very low population density and plenty of farmland. Agriculture is a pretty important industry, especially in the rural areas, so it’s not at all uncommon to come across a rather large cow completely blocking one of the few roads through a forest.

We’d imagine you can just hop out of your car and gently prod the cow out of the way, which wouldn’t be much fun in the cold, but at least it’s not a bear!

Driving through a foreign city can be daunting, especially if you have no idea what the signs mean and you can’t read the language. Imagine coming across this situation, though, where you’ve got a wall of text sandwiched between some symbols that you are clueless to translate.

If you’re driving through Helsinki and you see this spot, you are fully within your rights to find the nearest parking spot and start crying.

The Finns usually won’t seek out a confrontation — if you have a loud party in your apartment, your neighbors are more likely to leave a note on your door. However, sometimes that can take an unpleasant turn, as it did for this guy who made the mistake of parking in front of a dog-doo bin.

At least the annoyed pet owner had the decency to put their dog’s waste in a bag. We’re guessing that if this had been New York City, that car would not have been as lucky.

This image was captured in Helsinki, and we’re assuming it has something to do with leaving your dog in a hot car. It’s definitely eye-catching, but it might take a few minutes to figure out exactly what they were trying to say when they put it up.

No, the Finns don’t have anything in particular against hot dogs, they’re just looking out for our furry friends. We appreciate you, Finland!

Imagine you’re walking through a park with your child, enjoying a nice ice cream on a hot day. You’re tired, so you’d like to take a load off and have a seat somewhere. And you come face-to-face with this — two one-seat park benches.

While it’s supremely awkward when a stranger sits down next to you on a park bench, we’ve never considered just removing the option altogether. Finland might really be on to something here.

This isn’t just some playing field that’s been run over a few too many times — this is definitely a swamp, or at least just a patch of mud. However, that didn’t stop these four friends from having a friendly game of swamp soccer, which is a popular sport in Finland that we imagine is pretty strenuous.

We appreciate that the Finnish aren’t afraid to get dirty, even if it means falling down in mud multiple times. Hope they have Tide up there!

First of all, female reindeer weigh upwards of 180 pounds, so there’s no way this guy is just carrying a dead reindeer under his arm down the street. We’re guessing it’s a dummy reindeer, or maybe it’s stuffed, but that of course begs the question of why?

We wonder if this is a common sight in a city like Helsinki or Turku — you glance out your 12th story bathroom palace to see a guy carrying a reindeer down the street.

When rural meets urban, the results can be quite comical. Here’s a guy just leading his horse down the streets of Helsinki without a care in the world. We could see if he was at least riding it, but he’s walking. We wonder how much parking costs for a horse?

One thing is that he’s at least respecting the rules of the road by traveling with traffic instead of against it. Can’t fault him for that!

Every country has a few landmarks it’s known for, and Finland isn’t any different. One of its most striking pieces of architecture is the Oodi Library in Helsinki, which was finished in 2018. Apart from its unusual exterior, Oodi features multiple conference locations, 3D printers for public use, an urban workshop, and a café.

The library even uses robots to transport books back to their shelves, completing the futuristic theme of this strange-looking building.

The Oulanka Hanging Bridges are another cool but odd piece of architecture in Finland. They’re part of the Oulanka National Park, one of Finland’s most popular national parks — with trails, nature walks, and campgrounds available year-round.

These aren’t the rickety old rope bridges you’d see in the movies; these hanging bridges are well-made and well-maintained so thousands of visitors can use them every year.

High school kids can get up to some hijinks sometimes, so maybe this isn’t all that odd. However, when you’re surrounded by snow seven or eight months out of the year, sometimes you just have to let loose. We’re guessing that’s why this hallway sculpture was made.

We wonder how they were able to pull this off without any teachers coming along and breaking it up, but it’s so impressive maybe faculty did notice and just let it happen anyway.

With much of the country covered in snow until May at the earliest, this is a bonafide picture of what spring in Finland might look like. Not a ton of new growth going on there, huh? Snow in much of Finland starts in November, and will often go until May or even later.

Don’t let all that snow fool you, though — Finnish summers are very nice and mild, with temperatures ranging from 60° to 70° Fahrenheit.

Helsinki isn’t necessarily known for its storms, but being a coastal country, Finland can sometimes get strong winds from the Baltic Sea. Obviously, this means there will probably be some debris lying around, like this sign that was completely blown over in Helsinki.

While it may not get strong winds too often, Finland does get a lot of snowstorms, and its coastal proximity can make for some pretty intense fluctuations in temperatures and precipitation.

In a place with so much snow, it’s not a surprise that the Finns are a country that likes to ski. However, we’d think they’d want a break from winter activities when the weather is nice and warm. Clearly, that’s not the case, as this picture shows.

We guess you can get rusty after a few months off the slopes, which is a good reason to have a summer-time practice ski jump ramp.

As we’ve already mentioned, the weather can change pretty drastically in Finland at just a moment’s notice. At least this time, it went from cold to warm, so you could at least take your jacket off that you brought! It’s pretty incredible that all the snow was melted in about five minutes.

Warm air currents coming in from the Baltic Sea, as well as the Gulf Stream, help provide the Finns with enough warm air to temper the coldest winters.

Most countries have some popular national children’s characters that show up in movies, TV shows, and books. In Finland, these characters are the Moomins — a fictional group of characters that resemble hippos but are actually called trolls who live in Moominvalley.

The Moomins even have their very own amusement park in Naantali, along with cafés like the one where this picture was taken.

Saunas were actually first created in Finland, and one of Finland’s cities — Tampere — is officially called the “Sauna Capital of the World.” In fact, there are about two million saunas in Finland, which is enough for each person in the country to have their own!

Many Finnish people have saunas in their houses, which they can follow up with a dip in icy waters or in the snow, just to cool off.

Finland has quite a few bears, and the brown bear is actually their national animal. As you can imagine, living with bears isn’t easy, but the Finns are definitely proud of their bear population and have found a way to peacefully coexist with these ferocious predators.

Bears aren’t all bad, though, as these cubs show. Dancing cubs may not be a common occurrence, but anything is possible in the wilderness of Finland!

We have no idea of the context of this next photo, but it shows that you might see just about anything in the downtown of a Finnish city. This sad looking teddy bear looks like it might have been fished out of the garbage, and he might even be getting salvaged.

We have just so many questions, but maybe the Finnish garbageman — so proud of the brown bear, his national animal — couldn’t bear to see one so mistreated.

Finland is actually pretty well-known as having a rich and varied culinary offering, with a bustling agricultural industry that can provide fresh vegetables. Their proximity to the Baltic Sea may be the reason for this next dish, which we found interesting, to say the least.

This is called a pikeperch, and pikeperch is a common game fish in Finland’s many lakes. This dish made us do a double-take, though, since the fish looks like it’s still alive.

Finland apparently has some pretty large thrift stores, as seen in this picture. It’s almost like a cross between a huge rummage sale and some sort of storage warehouse. Evidently, the Finns love shopping around for a good deal! Who knows what you could find?!

For a place that has a very high GDP, you might think Finns don’t need to shop for stuff secondhand, but it appears that they’re not averse to finding gently-loved treasures.

We get it, police often do publicity photos that show them as normal people, but if this picture is any indication, the Finnish police might not be too busy. Apparently, they like to kick back and enjoy a see-saw at their local playground just as much as the next guy.

Finland actually ranks pretty high in the world on various crime statistics, so maybe these cops are just enjoying a well-deserved break before they get back to fighting crime.

Finland is nothing if not a very unique vacation spot, and if you’re looking to rough it out in the wilderness, you’ve come to the right place. You can even rent a teepee out in the middle of the wilderness, with nothing but a small fire to keep you warm.

Yes, there are plenty of adventures to be had in the backcountry of Finland, but hopefully, you don’t run into their national animal out there!

The Finns are very proud of their hockey teams, with their national team having won the world championship title in 2019. However, if you’re visiting Finland, take care before you discuss their team. The Finns are allegedly very protective of their national hockey heritage.

Even though they might be protective, many Finns love sports and follow them with almost religious zeal, making their victorious hockey team almost a national treasure.

If you need a little more convincing that the Finns love their winter wonderland, check out this recently opened hotel that’s designed around a Game of Thrones theme. You can even get a room with the Night King, although we’re not sure why you’d ever want to. Don’t forget to pack dragonglass!

This Westeros-themed hotel is found in Lapland, and they design their rooms around different themes each year. Last year was the Game of Thrones motif. We wonder what they’ll think of next…

There aren’t many places on Earth where you can get a glimpse of the famous Northern Lights, but Finland happens to be one of them. If you’re looking for a wonderful yet exceedingly strange sight, make your way up there between August and April, and you just might catch a glimpse.

The Northern Lights — also called aurora borealis — are a strange phenomenon that’s visible in night skies towards the poles of the Earth.

If the thought of wandering outside in sub-freezing temperatures in nothing but a bathing suit doesn’t appeal to you, you’re probably not from Finland. Saunas in Finland are meant to be enjoyed by cooling off in snow or ice after heating up, and this one definitely shows that.

In Finnish public saunas, you’re actually expected to be fully nude, and opposite sexes don’t go in the same public sauna.

Finland has its fair share of mythical creatures and fascinating folklore, but some of it is pretty odd. Like the gigantic Iko-Tursa, a huge sea monster that looks a lot like an octopus, or the leprechaun-like Menninkäinen that dwells deep in the vast forests of Finland.

If you ever see some strange looking characters during your travels through Finland, you’re probably seeing a reference to their rich folklore and mythology.

Finland is called the land of a thousand lakes, but in reality, it has almost 200,000 of them. That works out to about one lake per 26 people in Finland, so finding some waterfront property probably isn’t too difficult. Of course, it’ll most likely be frozen most of the year.

If your roads and trails are covered in snow, a lake might actually seem like a nice flat surface to go for a run on. And there’s plenty of lakes to choose from!

Finland is home to its fair share of weird championships, like the world cellphone throwing championship they hold every year in Savonlinna, Finland. We wonder if this is sanctioned by Nokia, which is the mobile phone maker that’s headquartered in Finland as well.

The current record for cell phone throwing is held by Dries Feremans, with a distance of about 362 feet — that’s farther than a football field!

If the last two championships were just weird, this next one is absolutely nuts. Apparently, Finland is the home of the World Ant Nest Sitting Championship, which we’re guessing is pretty much filled with high school boys daring each other to sit on the nest.

The rules are quite simple — you and a competitor sit on two ant nests with your bare rear ends, and the first person to get up loses. Sounds like a real fun time.

Apparently the Finnish are no strangers to guys who don’t leave their parents’ basements, as they have an entire term for them. Actually, their term — Peräkammarin poika — literally translates to “the boy who lives in the room at the back of the house.”

This is the bachelor who spends his life taking care of his parents’ house, even when they pass on and he’s still living there, alone. We have quite a few of those in America, too!

For some reason, Finland imposes a TV tax on its citizens that, if left unpaid, could leave the offender facing some jail time. It’s been steadily rising over the years, and right now, it’s at a hefty 2.5% of a household’s taxable income. Yikes!

It’s to help pay for Finland’s public broadcasting stations, but you’re required to pay the tax, even if you don’t own a TV.

Finland has had a… contentious relationship with Russia, to say the least. Finland was annexed in the early 1800s by their overbearing neighbor, and they were ruled until the Bolshevik Revolution when they declared independence from Russia. They maintained their independence since.

As you can see from this comic from the early 20th century, Finland didn’t have too great an opinion of Russia, envisioning them as a pack of wolves nipping at their heels.