A BEACH AND A BIG TREE

A bike packing micro adventure in Southern Finland

By Erik Plankton

July 28^th, 2016

the plan

I remembered reading an article about a massive oak, that was said to be one of the most beautiful trees in Finland. So why not head out and go check out a tree - with a little detour?
First I cycled the 35km to Helsinki and had lunch on the way. From there I took the afternoon train to Hanko to catch the last drops of rain.

PIZZA & BEER

Hanko is best known for the legendary regatta weekend which turns the town into a carnival. The regatta mayhem had been in full swing over the weekend and now on Tuesday evening the town seemed some what sleepy with not many people around. Still I managed to pick the one and only restaurant that took 1,5 hours to serve me a pizza and coffee. I didn’t really mind since I had time to sip a couple of beers and wait for the rain to pass by while freezing on the terrace. Went to the supermarket on bought two bananas and more beer for the road.

LAPPOHJA

Since the dinner took so long I had time to spec my next move. While googling for possible camping spots I came upon the Lappohja area, which looked perfect. A nice 20km ride from town on empty roads took me to some pretty impressive sand dunes and a huge beach. The water runs for about 150 meters from the shore at a depth of 1 meter before it suddenly drops. The beach was totally empty apart from two guys dancing mostly naked around a bonfire about 500 meters from my camp.

BEACH LIfe

I got up around 7 and enjoyed breakfast in the sunshine on the beach. Such bliss.

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Finland basic

I chose some random gravel road that took me towards my planned destination. Nice but very normal scenery of lakes and fields.

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error

Somewhere I missed a turn and realised I had been going for over 10 km on the wrong road. I decided to continue anyway. Soon I met a tractor with a levelling drag. The next 10 km would be on soft gravel that was very sketchy to ride on. Eventually I came upon the main road and thought it wouldn’t be nice to ride amongst the heavy truck traffic, so I continued to Fiskars village for lunch.

Fiskars

The village is a very nice place with a lot of industrial history. Nowadays a lot of artists and craftsmen live there. I have been there previously so I didn’t really look around for anything else than a good lunch. There are a lot of restaurants and cafes, so I chose the one with a good fat sans serif font the logo: Laundry. The place was nice, but their only choice for lunch was either vegetable soup or mushroom soup. All time low calorie count for a cycling lunch.

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Svartå Manor

From Fiskars the road took me to the Svartå Manor area which was built between 1783 - 1792. Pretty impressive place that is in really good shape these days with a lot of activities going on from theatre to restaurants and a hotel. Nice surroundings that led to small gravel roads and a short stint on the main road, which I exited as soon as possible. I took me to Kirkniemi manor, which is not open to the public since I met a sturdy steel gate after passing through the area from “the backdoor”. I had to do a little hike a bike in the forest to get around the gate and fence.

LOHJANSAARI

On the way to the big tree the side of the road was littered with ads for a cafe. They had posted a sign every kilometer with the distance left to their establishment, so I gave in and did the extra 3 km beyond the tree to get something to eat. Martinpiha was actually quite nice and I finally got some proper food.

the oak of Paavola

There are good sign posts pointing to the the trail that leads to the tree from the parking lot of an old school. It’s about a ten minute walk on rocky and muddy trail, so it’s best to leave the bike behind. With a girth of 472cm the tree is a giant at least in Finnish standards. Worth a visit if you happen to be in the area. After lounging around for a while and 100km of roads, gravel and hills behind me, I started to plan my next move. Nuuksio National Park would be some 60 km to the East, so I decided to go there and see if I make it before dark.

night shift

From Lohjansaari it is a straightforward road ride towards the park. It was getting a bit dark once I got there so turned on the lights and bombed the routes there for an hour before arriving to Haukkalampi for the night with about 160 km done for the day.

into the wild

Found a cheap copy of the Christopher McCandless bus on the way :) The book that tells the story is a good read.

Nuuksio

The park is a nice place to visit with various campsites and fire places. Cycling is allowed on some of the routes. There are some really steep and rocky hills that need a bit of pushing but generally it is all rideable.