Over the past decades, infinite-dimensional Riemannian geometry has developed into a vibrant area of research. Interest in the field has been driven by its emergence in a wide range of applications, notably in geometric data science, mathematical shape analysis, and geometric hydrodynamics. Although the fundamental definitions of Riemannian geometry extend almost effortlessly to infinite-dimensional spaces, many classical results from the finite-dimensional theory are known to fail in the infinite setting. In this talk, I will survey several phenomena unique to infinite dimensions and discuss conditions under which certain finite-dimensional properties can be partially recovered, including the non-degeneracy of the geodesic distance and Hopf-Rinow-type results. While the results will be illustrated using simple examples modeled on spaces of sequences, I will also discuss applications to the aforementioned areas of mathematical shape analysis and geometric hydrodynamics.