A year in review

It has been quite a while since I've been posting, but nevertheless it's better late than never, right. At the very moment when I heard this blog was listed in ulkoilublogit.blogspot.fi, where some of Finland's outdoor-related blogs are listed, I decided that maybe I should be more active in updating the blog. In a year, it has been happened quite a few things, but here's few of them in a review.

The greatest project in scouting has most probably been the vast process of harvesting, splitting and stacking firewood, because we're aiming towards changing our oil-based heating system with a wood-based one. We figured out that there's no point carrying heating oil, as there's lots of firewood potential nearby our scout hut. And even better, we got this old stove called Porin Matti for free from a girl scout group, whose hut is located really close-by. Well it didn't cost us any money and even better we had chance to do some friendly recycling, but nevertheless it was pain in the ass to haul that few-hundred-kilo stove by manpower.

What comes to the other bits of outdoor life, I've been hanging around in Lapland few weeks during the past winter. In Lapland, I've been skiing cross-country on prepared tracks and in the backcountry as well, when I gave a go for OAC's backcountry skis. They have solid skins on the traction zone so it's easy ski uphill with them, but it decreases the gliding function. But in the end, they're designed to fill the gap between traditional backcountry skis and snowshoes. I gave a go for both the wider (OAC KAR 147) and the narrower (OAC XCD 160) version and here's few pros and cons on both models from my perspective.

OAC KAR 147
+
really good uphill traction due to larger skin area
better flotation in deep and soft snow
-
heavier to ski
even with a higher hiking boot it caused minor pain in my ankles, when skiing on spring-time hard-pack snow

OAC XCD 160
+
easier to ski and felt more like a traditional backcountry ski
more ankle-friendly on hard-pack snow
-
less flotation
less traction in steep uphill-skiing, but one can always do more zig-zag to find more traction utilizing lower climbing angle

[Yours truly on OAC XCD 160 skis.]

Besides chopping firewood and enjoying Lappish nature, I've got some time to do few microadventure type of outdoor spurts. In early January, we got our-selves to Nuuksion national park for a small ponds microadventure, as I spotted few nice small ponds from the map and created a route around them. It wasn't really yet winter back then, but it was quite wet and dark, so after hiking we enjoyed rain and night-time in our lean-to shelter by sleeping around 15 hours or so. This was a two-day trip and about 20 kms.

About a week ago, we cycled a route around Nuuksio national park called Reitti 2000 (Route 2000) that starts from the central park of Helsinki and finds its way to Luukki, from where the route makes a loop around Nuuksio national park and returns the same way back to Helsinki. The route was quite cyclable the whole way as it's mostly based on roads and gravel paths, but there are few sections where it's better to have both a mountain bike and some good trail-riding skills. The section from close to Rinnekoti to Kämmenlampi is quite tricky terrain, but it's still partially cyclable even with a cyclocross bike. Even with a hardtail mountain bike, it wasn't totally cyclable at least on our skill level. Another difficult section is from Högbacka to Haukkalampi, where there are lots of rocks and roots on the way, but we actually skipped this section by using a road, because we new it would be just pain in the ass to walk through that with a bike.

The Route 2000 is around 110 kms long and the loop around Nuuksio is marked at least on the newest map of Nuuksio national park. Well, the route is marked with blue-white-blue-striped bands, but I would still recommend a map just in case. There are good possibilities to refill one's water bottles at a few places, but we decided do a refill at Salmi recreational area that is located around the halfway of the route.

There are probably even more stuff I've been doing during the last year, but they're holding a minor importance so I probably forgot to write about them. Well yes, I bought a second-hand closed-cell sleeping mattress, Therm-A-Rest Z-lite Sol, but it was pretty much unused, so I'd consider it as a new one for me at least : ).

Microadventure @ Sipoonkorpi national park

Since I decided to spend this May Day in a different way, the plan was to head out to Sipoonkorpi national park by foot from Viikki suburb. As microadventures seem to be in fashion at the moment, we decided to give a go for one in the name of scouting. Microadventure is a bit branded name for a quick outdoor spurt away from everyday life, but I would still claim it's a pretty good concept for getting more and more people to give a go for outdoor escapes.

What comes to the planning of the route, I somewhat used the point-and-shoot method encouraged by Alastair Humphreys. I spotted a pothole on the map of Sipoonkorpi national park that was the way to go. In the evening of the 30th, we hiked from Viikki suburb to the first lake area that is located in the southern part of the national park. The first half of our route followed some smaller streets and recreational paths until we arrived south of the first lake area. On May Day, we hiked into the national park's larger area, at where we had our lunch nearby the pothole located in the middle of the area. Next, we decided to head towards the main road that is located at the eastern border of the national park. By following the road southwards few kilometers, it is possible to utilize the bus no. 93, which leaves from Landbo suburb, to get back.

[ A rough overview of our route (length approx. 25 km) ]

What comes to the weather conditions, it couldn't have been better as sun was shining at all times. The night was though bit chilly as the temperature was around two celsius degrees. During this microadventure, I managed to test my new UL sleeping pad that didn't perform so well. The aluminium foil was ripped at some parts of the pad that I was actually bit worried about beforehand. The foil should have been thicker to resist abrasion and better glue should have been used for that kind of purpose. Otherwise, a 120-centimeter pad works fine, especially as I happen to have a built-in ~50x50cm foam pad in my Osprey Mutant backpack.

Finally, I'll have to admit that the pothole might not be worth visiting, if you've seen them before. The pothole is about 60 cm in diameter and about 80 cm deep. The national park itself is pretty nice as it is located really close to Helsinki, even-though it has the "thousand path" dilemma of the southernmost national parks. There are quite many paths and intersections that are not marked on the map, so we managed to hike some elsewhere that we should few times. Still, we managed to find the destinations, where we were about to go. If you're really into pinpoint accurate orienteering, buy a map. We used free prints from the web service of National Land Survey of Finland. We would have had a map of the Sipoonkorpi area at the meeting place of our scout group, and all the paths we missed were marked.

A day hike in Pallas-Yllästunturi national park

Since we had few days to spend after our trip to Norway, we decided to go for a day trip towards the nearby fell area, Pallastunturit. We hiked a path, which took us to the top of the national park's highest fell, Taivaskero (809 m.a.s.l). On our way, we also hiked up to the second highest fell, Laukukero (785 m.a.s.l). To summit Laukukero, it's only a one-kilometer hike off the Taivaskero route, so it's quite easy to summit them both at once. The length of the route is approx. 9 kms, and it starts from the parking lot of Hotel Pallas.

The Olympic Flame was lighted at the top of Taivaskero for the summer olympics in Helsinki in 1952.

Road trip to Kilpisjärvi and Norway

On Thursday the 26th, we headed further north towards Kilpisjärvi, where we had planned to spend few days. During the same day, after we had arrived to Kilpisjärvi, we decided to check out the second highest fell of Finland, which is called Saana. The top of Saana is located at the altitude of 1029 m.a.s.l. It's a four-kilometer journey (one way) to the top from the village.

There was also a four-legged 'person' coming down the path.

On Friday the 27th, we headed towards the 'Three-Country Cairn', which is a place, where the borders of Norway, Sweden and Finland meet each other. We took the 10-o'clock ferry over the lake of Kilpisjärvi to Sweden, where it's about a three-kilometer hike to the cairn. The wilderness hut of Kuohkimajärvi is located just a few hundred meters towards Finland from the cairn. We fried few sausages on a campfire by the wilderness hut before heading towards Kilpisjärvi along Arctic Trail. The scenery from the path is probably one of the best in Finland. The route back to Kilpisjärvi is about 16 kilometers long, if you begin from the dock in Sweden, but I decided to hike to the summit of a nearby fell called Pikku-Malla. So, the total length of my route was about 20 kms.

On Saturday the 28th, we headed to Norway, as we drove to Skibotn, from where we continued towards Alta. The road followed the shorelines of the fjords along the way to Alta. In general, the scenery was pretty awesome. During the next day, we visited the rock carvings nearby Alta. The place is a part of the UNESCO's world heritage sites.

Hiking in Nuuksio national park

A rough overview of our route

It hasn't really been happening anything during this summer in outdoor-wise, but during the last week I got a call from few scout friends, if I had time for a hiking trip to Nuuksio national park. I hadn't planned anything else outdoorsy, so I decided to go with them. We planned a few spots worth visiting from a Finnish ultralight blog called Grammari , but otherwise we started from the bus stop at Kattila (bus no. 85 from Espoo) and we were going to end up to Pirttimäki (and take bus no. 86 back to Espoo).

On Friday, I would say that the weather was pretty much not good for type one fun, cause it rained almost the whole day, so we decided to call it as type two fun on the fun scale. We started heading towards Ruuhijärvi, and then towards our final destination of the day, Kattilajärvi. The rain finally stopped during the evening and we had a chance to chill out without having our waterproofs on, while we were cooking some dinner. We even went for a swim before we decided to call it a day.

The view from Pääskyskallio cliff

On Saturday morning, we had some porridge for breakfast, and we filled our water bottles/bags at the nearby hut. Then, we started heading towards Pääskynlahti, where we hiked up to the highest point of the cliff (Pääskyskallio), where we chilled out for a while whilst enjoying the great outdoors with some really fine weather. Afterwards, we headed to Sultingträsk, where we had our lunch and just chilled out for a while. Our next spot was the nearby pond (Hynkänlampi), and its cliffs, which were again a nice spot to chill out and take some pictures. Finally, we headed further south to Sorlampi, where we spent the next night.

Our lunch break by Sultingträsk pond

My friend's diy lean-to shelter

On Sunday, we only had breakfast, and started heading towards the final destination of our trip, Pirttimäki.

During the weekend, we were also talking about the true meaning of ultralight backpacking. We ended up planning some gear for the future, like few "must have things":
a shorter and lighter sleeping mattress (maybe a 120cm one)
a diy Primaloft blanket/sleeping quilt

Helvetia part VI: Blüemlisalphütte hiking

Awesome. On air again for a while...

When my relatives came here for a visit from 29th July to 3rd August, I got nice chance to have two days off in row. As the plan was to hike up to Blüemlisalphütte with my cousin, and so we did it. Although, the weather forecast was quite crappy for those two days, we still headed towards Blüemlisalphütte after a delicious moment at Marmotte, the local tea room. The weather was really a bit crappy, but luckily it didn't rain that much. Only some drizzle just above Oeschinensee and just before the hut. Otherwise, it was just really cloudy and foggy all the way up there.

We finally reached Blüemlisalphütte few hours before the dinner. Blüemlisalphütte locates at the altitude of 2840m above the sea level, so the views should be really awesome. Unluckily, the hut was basicly inside of the clouds all the time, so no nice pictures from alpine views. The dinner was pretty nice, cause we were basicly allowed to eat as much as we could.

When we woke up next morning, there was some snow around the hut and the famous visibility was still pretty crap. Although, we were able to take some nice snowy pictures of the hut. Just after having some breakfast, we started heading down and as we reached lower altitudes the weather started to clear up a bit, but the hut seemed to be still inside of clouds.


All in all, it was very cool hike and nice few days off, although the weather was what it was...

Helvetia part IV: A pretty nice day off

Awesome...

I started my day off by taking the Sunnbüel cable car up at 8.30. From the cable car station, I started hiking towards Gemmipass passing the mountain hotel, Schwarenbach, around 9.30. I continued hiking after a short break at Schwarenbach. After hiking uphill for a while, the path suddenly started to go along the lakeside of Daubensee.

After the lakeside path, the route reached quite quickly the viewpoint of Gemmipass. At the viewpoint just by the Gemmipass cable car station, I had my packed lunch and took some photos of the mountains and the view down towards the town of Leukerbad. There was also a mountain side restaurant, where I had a coke. Actually, it was pretty amazing to drink a coke on the terrace, which was almost hanging from a cliff at the altitude of around 2340 meters, while Leukerbad locates at around 1400 meters.

Then, I decided to head back towards Schwarenbach and Sunnbüel cable car station.

Helvetia part III: Lötschenpass hike, department selections and the first whole day off

Lötschenpasshütte 2690m

On Wednesday, we had our last hike of the basic training season. The one day Lötschenpass hike started in the morning by taking a bus to Gasterntal valley, the village of Selden. From Selden, we started to hike up towards Lötschenglacier. At first, the path was mostly quite easy, but after a while it started getting steeper and doing more 'zic-zac'. Finally, we reached the beginning of the glacier, which is by the way called 'the world's safest glacier'. Mainly, because it doesn't move so much, so there are no unexpected crags under the surface snow. Then we hiked up the glacier to the Lötschenpass hut, 2690m. From the hut, we hiked down to Lötschental valley and to the village of Ferden. We took a bus from Ferden to Goppenstein, where we jumped off and took a train to Kandersteg, through the Lötschbergtunnel.

On Friday morning, we got to know in which department we are mainly going to work. Luckily, I got my first choice, which was programme. On our first day, we had the Gasterntal hike. It's one of the easiest hikes of KISC. We took a bus to the village of Selden and we hiked up further to Gasterntal valley to the Heimritx's viewpoint. At the viewpoint, we had a really long lunch break, when we also got to know each other a bit better. The programme department is devided into smaller sections and I got chosen to the climbing section, which is pretty much more than okay. Then, we hiked down the Gasterntal valley back to Kandersteg.

On Saturday, we had the first day off of our department. We checked out the local Allmenalp via ferrata route with a few other programme shorties. I can just only say that it was really amazing with all the rock faces and two cable bridges crossing a waterfall. Maybe you can find more about the 'awesomeness' from the photos...

Helvetia part II: Cheesery hike, aborted Three valley's hike and rafting

For now, the famous cheesery hike is done. A few days ago we hiked up to this alpine cheesery, which is located quite nearby the centre. It was just a nice steep uphill to the cheesery, at least most of the route. Although, the weather was really foggy, so we couldn't really see that much. The cheesery is located around 1800m altitude and it's quite traditional alpine cheesery with some really good home-made cheese to offer.

2500m before the ridge

On Friday 18th June, we had another training hike to the centre's Upperhut, Ueschinenhütte, which is located in the famous Ueschinen valley. The altitude is 1890m. We spent a night there and headed for the Three valley's hike next morning. The weather wasn't that good (raining all the time). When we got up to the ridge of this route around 2500m, the snow fall started to get heavier and wind was blowing harder than we expected. So we had to turn back at the beginning of the ridge and head back to the centre.

Although the visibility was actually quite bad, the ridge of the route is quite awesome. The ridge is a couple meters wide and there's a few hundred meter drop on both sides, nice...

On 20th Sunday, we had just this amazing rafting experience from KISC's external activity supplier. We took train to Boltigen, where the rafting down the river started from. We went down the river about 15kms. It was just so awesome to raft in white water...