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From Helsinki to Lemmenjoki

This corona spring has been particularly difficult for an international relationship, we have missed several dates and holidays. Three weeks ago, I was standing at Helsinki airport both very nervous and extremely excited. Luckily, a speedy engagement (that’s another story) and a letter of invitation later, I was finally holding my boyfriend. After a lovely night in Helsinki with a very filling three-course-meal, we headed out for our two-week road trip around Finland! We started our journey from the beautiful, serene Porvoo. A short drive away from Helsinki, Porvoo has stunning wooden houses, cute antique shops, a chocolate factory and delicious lunch places. We ate lunch behind the cathedral at Vanhan Porvoon Glassikko which certainly didn’t disappoint. I would highly recommend it!



We proceeded our trip to Lappeenranta where we stayed at a hotel made of old army barracks. Lappeenranta is an adorable city to walk around, we visited the house-sized sand sculptures on the beach, ate at Wanha Makasiini (thumbs up), climbed the old castle hill and enjoyed a beer on the cute harbour boats.





The next day we drove to the Eastern shores of Saimaa hoping to camp for the night and take out a boat or a kayak. We found mentions of two campsites online and drove to the first one only to find it abandoned and unwelcoming. We decided to test out the second one at Äitsaari which turned out to be summer cottages rather than camping but for 70 e a night we got ourselves a cottage with a boat and a sauna so we settled for that option. We took the boat out for a little day trip and spent the evening having a bbq. turned out to be a good decision to rent the cottage since it rained all night.



Our next stop was Koli National Park that I had visited many times before and is one of my favourite places in Finland. We decided to stay at the Ollila Turula campsite since our research showed it as the only campsite around with drinking water. It turned out that the public parking for your car is 400 meters away from the Ollila farm which is actually a privately owned farm where the water well just happens to be. The campsite is another 300 meters behind the building accessed through a narrow walking path. We got special permission from the landowner to drive our car to her yard while we unloaded it giving that we parked the car back to the public parking lot. Due to this arrangement, we had to carry all our stuff through this path and then have it inside the tent with us for the night. It was an utter disaster also due to the huge storm that hit Finland and we woke up to find trees fallen around the national park and the power being off in many places. Not the best way to start the camping part of our journey. We did manage an evening trip to the highest peak: Ukko Koli. The one benefit from the lousy weather was that we had most of the place to ourselves which has never happened to me before at Koli.



In the morning we packed up and headed for the Sokos Hotel Koli where we were staying the following night. Luckily, we were able to check in early and the weather cleared so we had the entire day to explore the park. We hiked to the harbour and Koli town and had another look at the peaks. After a day of sweating in the forests, we rewarded ourselves with a spa. I think the spa is brilliantly planned for people recovering from hikes! Three different saunas, two cold pools, jacuzzies, ice shower and a musical pool. It was super relaxing. Afterwards, we ate the restaurant and slept like babies.


The next day, before we headed to Nurmes where we spent the night at my godmum’s place, we took a round-trip on a ski lift to see the views from one final angle. The ticket was 9 euros and the view well worth it!


We headed further north to Hossa. It was super easy to find a camping ground, and this time we got fortunate, we were the only campers, got our car right next to our tent and had a private beach and a barbeque spot all to ourselves. We decided to get the most important part right out of the way and headed into the national park to hike the Julma Ölkky canyon. There are two options; a 5 km hike or a 10 km hike. Since there were billions of mosquitos, we settled for the 5 km route which takes you to the hanging bridge and back on the other side. The timing worked brilliantly since it started raining just as we got back. Fortunately, it was a quick shower, and as we got back to the tent, it was already sunny. We had the most beautiful, calm evening by the lake perfectly finished with a stunning midnight sun(set). Now that we didn’t have all our camping gear in the tent, our little pop up worked well.



The Julma Ölkky canyon is stunning and it was great to see the views from both sides. The short hike was surprisingly demanding with ups and downs but still popular with small families as well. There's also a boat cruise that takes you all the way to the end of the canyon but since the rain started when we finished, we didn't hop on it.


After our explorations in the national park, we embarked on a drive to Saariselkä where we stayed at the Kakslauttanen Igloo Hotel right outside Urho Kekkonen National Park. The reindeer territory starts as you enter Lapland, so you must take extra care when driving and flash your lights at people approaching if you have spotted a reindeer on the road. Luckily, unlike elks, reindeer are usually quite calm and don’t erratically jump around making them easier to dodge.


During our first day, we went to see the midnight sun at the highest peak of the park; Kiilopää. The peak is easily accessible from the information centre and you can see all the way to Russia from the top of the hill.



The next day we tackled a 14 km hike around the national park called Ahopää. We barely ran into any people and managed to find some mountain snow as well. I was very impressed by how well the park is paved and signed and the walk was pure leisure. A reindeer herd ran right past us! The calves are born in early May so they were tiny and adorable.


We drove up to Inari to visit Siida, the Sami Museum. The museum was well-made and very informative. I’ve long been sad about my ignorance of our only indigenous people and I cannot fathom why we don’t have better coverage of them and their culture in school.


We saw some more reindeer and I had a staring contest with one of them. I guess he

wanted to exert dominance. We drove to Lemmenjoki (the river of love) where we ate lunch, did a small day hike before taking a cruise on the river. Interestingly, masks were compulsory on the river while we hadn’t seen any other indicators of corona on our trip otherwise. The river cruise cost 40 euros per person and lasted for three hours. The boat drops you at a waterfall 40-minutes away where you have an hour and a half time to explore the fabulous 4-tier waterfall. You can then do a short hike to a wilderness cottage where people can stay during their hikes. The boat will pick you up from the pier and take you back to the beginning.



On our way back we saw a reindeer mommy with her calf swimming across the river right past our boat. A few minutes later we spotted an entire herd on the riverside and managed to slow down to get a real look at them. They are so adorable. This was one of the most stunning places we visited and I am very glad that we went.


We drove down to Ivalo to camp for the night to get a few kilometres off the journey south. We found a peaceful camp spot right by the river and had a lovely final night in Lapland there.



We were heading down south to Kasnäs (near Taalintehdas) to my friend’s summer cottage 14-hour drive away from Ivalo. We decided to drive as far south as we could on our first day and then camp there before finishing our journey the next day. We drove through Rovaniemi, where Santa Clause is from, and Oulu. As we were driving towards Jyväskylä, a friend of mine messaged me offering us a bed for the night if we took a detour towards her summer place. We were all going to Kasnäs together the next day. It was extra two hours to our drive but a warm bed was so tempting that we changed our course to Karvia where a sauna and a meal were waiting for us. We drove 11 hours and 45 minutes that day and slept so well after. The next morning, we spent an entire 5 minutes exploring the huge Karvia town before heading further south.


The next summer house is in the outer archipelago in South Finland and we spent three days eating and drinking and relaxing and hopping in between sauna and the sea. We picked some blueberries and made a real summer pie.



This was a perfect finish to our trip and we headed home with excellent memories, more knowledge and fantastic adventures. I had a lovely weekend in Helsinki with my boyfriend before he headed back to Germany and I embarked on my next adventure: 82 km hike called Karhunkierros (the bear trail) starting from the Ruka centre. That will be in the next blog!


Stay tuned,


Mira




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