Finland – Land of the Midnight Sun

The primary reason to visit Finland was to renew family ties. I do not speak Finnish but, since my last visit in 1972, the younger generation grew up with more English than the generation before. We could communicate and it was wonderful! We met in a group, shook the family skeletons, solved mysteries, and shared stories while reviewing the family tree dating back to 1726. We found new mysteries too.

My destination was northern Finland in the area around Oulu. Oulu, like Groningen, ranks among one of the happiest cities in Europe. I took the Public Express bus to Bremen, flew Ryanair to Tampere, stayed overnight and took a morning train to Kokkola first.

The countryside around my family’s birthplace is rich in dairy farms, forest and lakes. It is flat and low, often peaty, and with few hills. The landscape is dominated by tall straight pines with bark having a reddish glow that appears to be from a sunset, adding to the surreal aspect of visiting Finland in summer: when we are up so high in the world it does not get dark.

On our way to Kaustinen around midnight, my cousin Mirja stopped the car when three moose stepped onto the highway, a mother with two calves. They looked at us and I was able to snap an unfocused picture before they disappeared into the forest. There are also bears in the area.

In Finland, many roadsides were lined with lupines. The country houses we drove by were surrounded by lilacs. The Finns in Canada grew lilacs too, perhaps as a memory of home. The Finnish neighbourhood in Thunder Bay was filled with the intoxicating smell of lilacs in June.

Finland has an amazing number of blueberries and much of the forest floor was blanketed in them as far as I could see. Besides small farms, birch groves, pines, bogs full of cotton grass and flowers, lilacs and blueberry plants formed the essence of this part of Finland in June.

Finnish people’s homes almost invariably contain a sauna, no matter where they are in the world, which is not always easy thanks to local by-laws and sceptical insurance companies worried about fire claims. The preferred sauna is in a separate building near a cabin by the lake where family and friends socialize and enjoy their leisure. It will be heated with wood and have a water tank to heat lake water for washing up. A city sauna will be electric and have a shower. Finland has some public saunas which happily provide a Finnish sauna experience so you can go even if you don’t know someone with private sauna, and there is a much rarer smoke sauna for the public in Kuopio.

My cousin’s family has an outdoor sauna beside a lake and a smoke sauna, a rustic dark haven from the stresses of the outside world. The smoke sauna takes longer to prepare so we opted for the wood-fired one. Though the lake water was still cold in June, it felt comfortable after the sauna. After one last dip in the lake we relaxed in the cabin with a small fire in a soapstone fireplace to take away the chill.

After a light supper at the cabin we went home, driving through the forest, along the quiet highway, and up the long driveway to my cousin’s house at the top of a rise, surrounded by fields. It was an older Finnish house that smells like wood and is made of wood, ceiling to floor. A typical house has no basement and has generously sized front and back porches.

On Finnish summer nights, a blanketing mist might cover the fields as daylight dims slightly and the sun barely dips below the horizon. The night remains bright and it’s not easy to guess the time. For midnight sun, I took the train north to the Arctic Circle which is near Rovaniemi.

The Rovaniemi city bus goes to the Arctic Circle at Santa Claus Village because that is where Santa Claus lives and he gets many visitors. The post office there will collect cards and gifts at all times of year and send them to your loved ones in time for Christmas! The Village has attractive shops and dining and an adventure park is nearby. The Lapland-made gifts available included jewelry of silver and gold, caribou bone, leather slippers, colourful hats and mittens, and Lapland mugs made of wood.

In Rovaniemi, a highly regarded museum, Arktikum, has a spectacular view of the sky from inside, perhaps to take advantage of the chance to view northern lights in winter. Their temporary exhibit was We Were Friends, a story about Finnish and German friendship as they lived and worked together in Rovaniemi during World War 2. I mused on how the alliance touched our own family stories: my father was in the Canadian army during World War 2 but the army, aware he was Finnish, wouldn’t leave him alone about it and kept asking if he was a spy. The questions finally stopped after he answered, “If I was, do you think I’d tell you?”

After seeing the museum exhibits I walked to the train station for the trip to Ylivieska. Here I must sing the praise of Finnish trains – reserved seating, plug-in’s for devices, Wifi that really works, a restaurant car serving snacks, drinks and REAL MEALS like a plate of Swedish meatballs with potato and salad, and their easy ticket system includes a paperless option for your phone or iPod. You can book the train in Finnish, Swedish, English or Russian.

Finland is magical in midsummer and in winter has many nights of northern lights. If you want to stay in a glass igloo to enjoy the northern lights from the warmth and comfort of your bed, you can do it in Finland. Maybe a winter visit is next!