Me and my wife have been married now half a year. It was time to take tour with motorcycle just the two of us. We had 5 days to do this trip and I chose western Finland.
Day 1 (May 9)
We started before the midday and I was very excited about finally going on a tour with my new bike “Optimus”:
After filling the tank it felt very nice and relaxing to ride the bike! The first leg was 120 kilometers and the the first stop was at Koski (english: Rapids) and there is also quite nice rapids there (Rapids at Rapids…)
Then we stopped at the grocery store in Oripää to buy some sausages. Next stop & break was at “Kekkosplassi”. It is very nice area with a big fireplaces to grill some food, we had sausages, sandwiches and also something to drink.
Then in Säkylä we checked Katismaa and Eenokki (harbour and beach) but these were just very short stops. Finally in Kauttua Ironworks area we stopped for awhile to examine the area. Like all old ironworks areas this has also many very nice old buildings and rapids with some small dams and old bridges.
This was the first time when we noticed that it was quite hot! Weather forecast had promised very nice and warm weather for us… and it was Summer coming already before the middle of May! It was too hot to walk with all riding gear.
The last leg was about 60 kilometers and we arrived to Nakkila where we were supposed to stay for the first night. After we took all the luggage away from the bike we still checked the dam and powerplant of Harjavalta and the medieval Church or Ulvila.
The route for the day 1 was like this:
motocaching
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This time I will make update in Finnish.
Aika-ajo.com on suomalainen nettisivusto joka on koonnut muutaman aktiivisen nettikirjoittajan ajatuksia yhteen. Sitä voisi hyvinkin kutsua aikakausilehdeksi jota julkaistaan netissä. Aiheita ovat urheilu, liikkuminen sekä moottoroidut vehkeet.
Nyt Aika-ajo on kirjoittanut motokätköilystä eli motocaching.net sivustosta. Kirjoitus on melko neutraali eikä hehkuta ylisanoilla eri ominaisuuksia mutta kertoo toki kaiken tarpeellisen siitä miten sivusto syntyi ja miten se on kehittynyt/ kasvanut alkuaikojen jälkeen. Itselläni on ollut isohko osa tämän palvelun kehittymisessä.
Tästä pääset lukemaan jutun.
Tältä näyttää motocahing.net sivuston etusivu englannin kielellä.
This is how motocaching.net frontpage looks like.
FInally I had a chance to take a weekend tour!! I started on Friday 27th of May and I choose the route and the direction where I had motocaching spots as many as possible to find!
This was my route on Friday. The first motocache I marked as “found it” was from Urjala to Huittinen, it’s a panoramic route in a typical Finnish countryside landscape.
This is called “Road of the Magic Night”
Later I stopped in a cafeteria with a beautiful location beside the lake and a bridge.
Sadly this Otamus Cafe wasn’t open so it was no snacks for me! Quite soon after this cafeteria it was one of the twisty roads that I had been waiting! But (WTF!?) it started raining! I had to put on my rainsuit to avoid getting wet and I didn’t really enjoy the corners… Ok, few kilometers in tho north part the road was dry again.
Friday I added 7 new caches to my list. Last one was the cafe beside the militarybase Niinisalo, It’s called a Sotilaskoti in Finnish and I think the English word is naafi(?)
These cafes are usually quite cheap comparing to ordinary ones.
The route for the second day (Saturday 28th) was like this. Again I was choosing roads and spots I could mark as found in motocaching.net. The first one was very old road from the middle ages called “Kyrönkankaantie” (Cache only in finnish). The first time it is mentioned was in 1556, but today it is only rarely used road in the middle of the forest. It would be great ride for a endurobike!!
At 02:00 I choose the wrong road and at 02:30 I stop to wonder why the GPS shows that I’m somewhere in the middle of nowhere??!! And I make the U-turn!
The second spot was a tower in the top of the mountain in the national park (Lauhanvuori national park). I have a physical fear of heights (not mental), if I go to a high place I haven’t been before I start to feel it on my stomach and in my feet. When I was younger I’ve even passed out few times. In this tower I had some trouble to stay on my feet but after a couple of minutes it was ok. I think the tower is over 20m high!
There was one road in the national park that I took. This was fun!! (And pitty I didn’t have my KTM!)
In the routemap it shows that I’m making U-turn at the end of this road, but since there are no traffic signs I just ride through to the bigger road (at 11:00 in the video)
Little bit later I took another tower, this was not as high and it was new. But when I climbed to the top I could feel the tower moving!! That didn’t feel ok at all!! They built it too light!
Then there was few rural roads, one of them had so big stones in it and I really didn’t like it at all!! (With my KTM Enduro it would’ve been ok!). Then I arrived in Karijoki, there’s a very old cave called “susiluola” (Wolf cave), it is the only place in northern Europe
where they’ve found some evidence of humans living before the ice-age! Although the evidence is not certified to be as old as they say (120 000 years old)! Here’s some info in english.
It was a disappointment that you coudn’t visit inside the cave!
Just few kilometers from the cave there’s a skiing center where you can ride your bike to the top of the mountain -and there’s a great view!
Not far away from here is the city called Kristiinankaupunki, I’ve actually never been here before and there’s one strange alley… It’s very narrow and it is still a 2-way street! This is the most narrow 2-way street in Finland!
The name of the road is “Kissanpiiskaajankuja” (Catwhippersalley… Yes, a guy who’s whipping the cat!!)
From Kristiinankaupunki I was riding straight south following the coastline. The road to Siipyy, Merikarvia and Ahlainen is not extremely good… but it’s not boring either.
This is the belltower in Siipyy.
Late afternoon I was finally arriving Tahkoluoto and Reposaari. These are outer islands but possible to reach by road. I was lucky to have a beautiful sunny weather while riding the road to these islands. I found the beautiful restaurant on the south-end of Reposaari called “Merimesta”. I choose to eat the buffet even it was not cheap (27€) but it was all worth it!!
Finally spent the night in Pori and woke up next morning in cloudy west-coast city.
Sunday (Third day) route was like this, still choose the roads following the coastline. Visited the harbour in Luvia, I had never actually been there before. Usually there’s a new sailboat in the pier called “Ihana” (Wonderful) and I was so early in the morning it was not out in the sea and I was able to see it!
I rode to Vuojärvi Mansion -that is a very big and beautiful old mansion in the westcoast!
Stopped in Rauma to check the old town and it still is so beautiful and amazing area!
Then slowly I arrived to Turku and I checked few places before I chose the highway to Helsinki and the way home. It was pitty that Sunday was cloudy… I even had some drops of water in the morning but I didn’t get wet.
Here’s one picture from Turku… One of the most famous buildings in Finland:
Turku Castle!
This last day I had the longest route but it was the shortest day… And it’s because I choose the highway Turku-Helsinki, almost 170 kilometers of 120km/h speed. I was home at 4pm.
Now I’m waiting my next trip which is starting on 26th of June. That will be 3 weeks in Europe and maybe more than 7000 kilometers!!!
There are many different kind of internet pages where you can find nice roads for motorcycling. But to find also the nice locations, sights, attractions, restaurants and cafeterias suitable for motorcycling then it’s going to be difficult and you’ll have to browse many pages and domains! Until now!
https://www.motocaching.net/ is a domain where you can find them all!!! At the moment it’s only in Finnish but let’s hope it will be released also in English soon. Page started in april 2014 and now in october there are more than 200 caches to be found and more than 1500 caches that has been marked as “found” by different riders!
Idea is simple. It’s quite the same than geocaching but it’s transformed to fit for us motorcycle-riders. You can check new routes, sights or restaurants/ cafeterias from the map (or many other ways to find these caches). And if you find something interesting then you ride there, maybe you’ll have to solve a simple task or question so that you can mark this cache as “found” and then you ride to the next one.
There’s already some caches that are not in Finland and hopefully after the page is published in English there’s going to be many new riders from other countries too.
This is definetely much more fun than a normal “finding new places or routes from the map and then ride…” This is totally new way of riding!
(This motocaching was noticed already in august in Finnish motonews: http://www.motouutiset.fi/fi/moottoripyorat/matkalla/937/Motok%C3%A4tk%C3%B6ily-avartaa-moottoripy%C3%B6r%C3%A4ily%C3%A4-harrasteena.htm)
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