Students find Lappeenranta an excellent place for studying. Lappeenranta, which is located by beautiful Lake Saimaa, is a small city with 72,000 inhabitants where all the diverse services and leisure time activities are within easy reach. It is also cheaper to live in than the bigger cities. In addition, it only takes 2-3 hours to Helsinki by car, bus or train.
The city of Lappeenranta is the administrative and cultural centre of the surrounding province, South Karelia, located some 220 km northeast of Finland’s capital, and about 230 km northwest of St. Petersburg in Russia. The city covers an extensive area, stretching from the shores of beautiful Lake Saimaa to the Russian border. Its special location at the northern tip of the Saimaa Canal opens up water connections both to the Gulf of Finland and to the entire Saimaa waterway. The city is also the largest inland port in Finland. Although Lappeenranta is the centre of a major industrial region, the city itself and the surrounding countryside are a clean and beautiful mosaic of green forests and blue lakes.