Peregrinamur

Why Finland?

Finland had been somewhere we had wanted to go for a long time. Motor racing had played a part in that. Finnish racing drivers had seemed very dashing; we’d watched Mika Häkkinen racing against Mika Salo in British Formula 3 and seen them both progress to Formula 1. JJ Lehto had been spectacular winning the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1995. Then there were the German Touring Car Championship races in Helsinki, but somehow we never got around to going.

Bear Watching in Martinselkonen – May 2017

So our first trip to Finland was to go bear watching. Martinselkonen is in the Kainuu region of Eastern Finland, not far from the Russian border. We flew from Helsinki to Kajaani and were picked up at the airport by staff from Martinselkonen. We were given a room in their guesthouse, but that room was mostly for resting during the day. The timetable was that we had a big meal around 4pm, got taken to the hides, spent the night in the hides with a bag of snacks, and then got taken back to the guesthouse for breakfast at around 8am. The first night we spent in a big hide with other people; there were beds there and a toilet. The next two nights we spent on our own in a smaller ‘photographic’ hide; this was much more basic, with just a bucket in the corner. We were basically locked in, but had a phone to contact the staff in an emergency. We saw a lot of bears from both hides. A large male came very close to the photographic hide. The birds and sceneery were also fabulous.

The Hides

The Bears

We only managed a very distant view of this year’s cubs.

Play fighting:

The birds

Helsinki and Suomenlinna in the Snow – February 2018

Our second joint trip to Finland was a long weekend to experience Helsinki in the winter. (Annette had already been to Helsinki the previous summer to run the Helsinki marathon). We enjoyed lots of snow and reasonably bright weather.

Suomenlinna was particularly atmospheric in the wintry conditions:

A landmark boat/bar near Katajanokka:

Ice Climbing – February 2019

We noticed that Much Better Adventures offered an ice climbing weekend in Finland – so we had to try that! We flew from Helsinki to Rovaniemi in Lapland and got the ski-bus to Pyhätunturi. Ice climbing was the main activity, but we also did some snowshoeing and tried going in an ice-hole after a sauna. We were rubbish at ice climbing, but we did get to see some spectacular scenery. The highlight was a day trip to the Korouoma Canyon with the frozen waterfalls.

Kemi – A Trip on an Icebreaker – February 2022

This was a solo trip for me (Annette). I wanted to combine a visit to Helsinki with the experience of going on the icebreaker Sampo in Kemi (in Lapland, on the Gulf of Bothnia). I got an overnight train from Helsinki and arrived mid-morning in Kemi after a very comfortable journey.

Arriving in Kemi to lots of snow

The Hotel. I had booked the ‘Mannerheim suite’ at the charmingly eccentric Hotel Merihovi – a real time capsule with extremely friendly staff. I had a whole apartment filled with memorabilia associated with the great man. The hotel also had a scrap book of news clips of other famous Finns who had visited the hotel – including President Kekkonen (photo below).

A walk around Kemi. The café by the station is excellent – otherwise food was a bit hit and miss, with restaurants still partly affected by COVID restrictions. The snow meant that it was difficult to see where land ended and the frozen sea began.

The Icebreaker. The Sampo itself was beautiful and the whole trip hugely atmospheric. The crushing of the ice was very loud!

In the Sea. We were kitted out with teletubby suits and encouraged to float in the freezing water. The whole experience was well worth the trip from Helsinki. In any case, Kemi is a very pleasant town with historic buildings and a somewhat remote feel to it.