On Friday I stayed in Siilinjärvi, near to its golf course, with forest trails and frisbee golf also, but it was quiet, as the afternoon had brought drizzly rain. It was about half an hour’s drive south to Kuopio from here. I was headed for Kuopio as I had tentatively arranged to meet an Austrian family that I had met in Ouijjane in Morocco last Christmas. We had got on well, exchanging travel stories, and they knew I was in the area as they follow the blog, and had contacted me to say they were going to be a day late, and would be staying at the campsite at Rauhalati, arriving on the Sunday, not the Saturday as they had previously thought. they had booked a pitch for the Saturday though, and told me to use it if I was there. It actually did help, as there is very little solar power gained these autumnal days, and I use quite a bit of electric on weekends watching sport.
Kuopio is the eighth most populous city in Finland, with about 130,000 people, about the size of Preston, though with more space around it, and in debatably a more appealing setting, half of its area is forest, and the population is spread over 40 square kilometres. That is actually quite densely populated for Finland. It is second to Tampere as being the most attractive city in the country. It has one of Finland’s best universities and tourism is an important industry, with a busy airport.
Very little of what the city offered interested me though. The campsite was in forested land 4 kilometres away from the city centre and directly on Lake Kallavesi which surrounds the city.
I spent Saturday exploring the trails around the area and watching rugby. The rugby fits in quite well with the two hour time difference, as the 3 pm kick off is at 5 pm, and by this time the light is starting to go out of the day at this time in October.
Raif and Ema, from Austria, arrived the their campervan, at lunchtime on Sunday, with the two children, Max and Lula, aged 8 and 5. They have taken a year off work, though are doing a bit online, as it’s their own business. They are returning from three months in the north of Scandinavia, and their year trip will come to an end in a few weeks. They wanted to take a sauna, and one of the main swimming pools was near, so we spent a couple of hours there. The weather was only just warm enough for us to take a drink and some food outside later in the afternoon, hovering around 11C for much of the day and night. This morning they left at 9 am to continue south. I walked Rua for an hour, then headed west.
I’ve driven to the Saarijärvi area where there are two national parks I want to visit later this week. On route we stopped for a couple of hours to hike some of the Laulava Mörkö Trail, which is another hike designed to be completed in full over two or three days that runs north – south through a spectacular area of country with ancient beech forests, rocky ridges and hills like dumplings that give great views of the many lakes in the region. Some of the attraction to the trail for me is the word ‘Mörkö’ which means bogeyman, or monster, and refers to the trolls that legend says, make their home along the trail. Rather than to scare people off, the idea of this marketing is to attract children. There is artwork and sculptures on that theme at certain places on the trail.
I’ve stopped for the night a half hour or so north, on a small island called Sumassari, just south of the town of Saarijärvi.
I’ve slightly changed my route. I was going to go further south before heading back to the coast, but the diesel price has risen again, and in fact did so while I was watching this morning. I had pulled in at Lidl, and was about to refuel at the gas station there at €2.45 a litre, and the board flashed and the next moment it was €2.67… the most expensive I think I have ever purchased fuel at. I think it’s the most expensive in Europe, it usually is, though there are no road tolls here, so the duty is used to maintain the transport infrastructure, which there is a lot of, and not so many people to share it between.
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