←

GoZa Mite

Tag: National Park

  • Trip to Lake Päijänne

    gozamite

    This was the only overnight motorcycle trip I made with my wife this summer!
    We were riding from our hometown in south-west Finland to Sysmä. It’s a small city on the eastside of lake Päijänne.
    On friday we ride to Sysmä like this:

    To Sysmä 250km

    In the beginning I was riding on the big road all the way to Hyvinkää. But from there I chose the smaller roads. We made first stop at Saloinen village.

    Old shop in Saloinen
    Saloinen center
    Lake Saloistenjärvi
    My bike

    We continued riding but soon it was time to stop for awhile and admire the sunset at Pulkkilanharju.

    At this point I was regretting that I didn’t take the drone with me! The sunset was so incredibly nice!!
    We slept in a small cabin in Sysmä Camping area and we ate breakfast in the hotel that was only few hundred meters away.
    It was still very early when we were already walking in Päijänne National Park and checking the viewing tower of Päijätsalo.

    After we left the National Park area the weather started to be much brighter! It was nice idea to stop at Vääksy Canal.

    Vääksy Canal has only 1 block and the surface height difference is 1,2 meters between Vesijärvi & Päijänne.
    The block is located under the (old) mainroad of the village!

    Bridge coming down

    This was my first time in Vääksy Canal -what a lovely place to spend even longer time!!
    We still made short stop at Hämeenkoski…

    And in Ylimmäistentie (to put on rainsuits because it was about to start raining!)

    Here you can see how the rainclouds are coming from the right (from the west)
    Saturday ride back home was about 290km’s

  • Repovesi National Park

    gozamite

    This National Park is pretty close to Helsinki -only about 180 kilometers to Lapinsalmi parking area. This National park is mostly about lakes, hills and cliffs -the “official webpage” says like this: “Repovesi’s rugged forests are dotted with blue lakes and ponds. The park offers accessible adventures for everyone. Its hills and cliffs challenge keen hikers and climbers.” (Link)
    Me and my wife visited here few days ago. We were lucky to have very nice and sunny weather and not too many people in the park!

    • Beautiful forest and path
    • Lakes with clear water
    • Almost blue sky
    • Not so easy path!
    • Katajavuori (juniper mountain) is about 40 meters above lake
    • Reflection
    • Finnish forest
    • Finnish lake
    • Lake with views
    • Almost all the time you’ll have a lake beside you
    • The fireplace with the dinnertable

    We enjoyed our walk in the beautiful and peaceful forest! And of course we had some food with us and we made fire.

    Corn and banana!
    Ahh, sorry! It wasn’t banana -it was Bratwurst sausage!
    And for the dessert we got some ice cream… Or actually hail! It wasn’t very warm weather.

    The information about the possibility to walk around “the main route” wasn’t very clear! We saw 1 or 2 info board about the ferry not being in use in the winter time. But I was thinking “It’s not winter any more!”

    Ketunlossi (Fox ferry)

    This is self service manual ferry, you have to pull yourself to the other side. But it was NOT in use yet. So we had to walk back the same route we did so far… But it wasn’t so terrible because we got to see this another time:

    • Lapinsalmi
    • New bridge
    • Hanging bridge
    .

    This bridge was opened in november 2019. There was old bridge but it was collapsed in the summer 2018. This new Lapinsalmi bridge is very beautiful!