Vyborg, Russia

I'm from Lappeenranta, Finland. It's almost right on the Russian border but I've never been to Russia. ...and Vyborg would only be around 60 kilometres from where I've lived most of my life! It's just never happened. It does interest me, but my family aren't too bothered so I doubt I'll ever get to visit. Oh well, I do have a couple of postcards from Vyborg, this painted view being one of them.

Vyborg (Finnish: Viipuri) is a town and the administrative center of Vyborgsky District in Leningrad Oblast, Russia, located on the Karelian Isthmus near the head of the Vyborg Bay, 130 kilometers to the northwest of St. Petersburg and 38 kilometers south of Russia's border with Finland, where the Saimaa Canal enters the Gulf of Finland. Population: 79,962 (2010 Census).

The town lies in the boundary zone between the East Slavic/Russian and Finnish worlds and has changed hands several times in history, most recently in 1944 when it was taken by the Soviet Union from Finland during World War II.

The city hosts the Russian end of the 1,222 km Nord Stream gas pipeline, laid in 2011 and operated by a consortium led by Russia's Gazprom state hydrocarbons enterprise to pump 55 billion cu m of natural gas a year under the Baltic to Greifswald, Germany.

Round Tower, shown on this postcard, is a fortification at the market square of Vyborg. It was built in 1547–1550 by the order of Gustav I of Sweden as a part of the medieval town wall. Today it serves as a restaurant and is one of the most popular sights in Vyborg.

Round Tower was originally an arsenal. It was later used as a prison called "The Mutton Prison", a warehouse and since 1861 by the city magistrate. In 1938, as Vyborg was part of Finland, the tower was renovated for restaurant use after the design of architect Uno Ullberg. Tower's diameter is circa 21 meters.