the last days, i’ve been travelling back south, arriving at helsinki airport tomorrow to fly back to zürich. when i started driving south in lapland, it was still ruska time:

(these shots are from the first time i the clouds broke open and let sunlight through on my way south, after having seen a dense cloud cover for the last whatever many days.) the farther south i got, the less colorful the landscape got. but then, there were other interesting things to see.

vikajärvi.

on my way north, i drove directly from kemijärvi to sodankylä, hence missing vikajärvi, the town i stayed in for 10 days last year in march. but on my way back south, with my first stop-over being kemi, the best way was going straight through vikajärvi. i couldn’t resist to get a better view of some places during fall:

compare the first photo to this one, and the place where i shot the last two photos is depicted here. everything looks quite different, eh?

kemi.

my first stop-over was kemi, finland’s northernmost city at a coast to an ocean. (it is located at the bothnian bay.) here are a few impressions from a stroll to the old harbor:

lumijoki: bay of bothnia.

continuing the next day to vaasa, i did a stop in varjakka near lumijoki to get another, more beachy view on the bothnian bay:

unfortunately, the weather got bad around that point, as on the way to varjakka and back there were a lot of nice views…

(lumijoki lies in pohjois-pohjanmaa, which roughly translates to northern northland. considering that there is a lot more north of it, the name is quite a fail :) )

öja.

somewhere before vaasa, i took a small detour and visited the island öja. unfortunatley, the weather was still not very exciting…

from vaasa i continued further south to turku.

turun linna.

when arriving in turku, i was too early to check in into my hotel, so i drove in the direction of the harbor to see some sea. but then i saw turku’s castle and decided to take a closer look at it. the castle was built over 700 years ago and is still mostly intact. one can nowadays walk through a maze of rooms and enjoy many great views, on both medieval and renaissance parts, and there is also a prehistoric exhibition running. it’s definitely a great place to visit! here are some impressions:

turun tuomiokirkko and surroundings.

after dropping my stuff off at the hotel and refreshing myself, i went to see the tuomiokirkko and its surroundings. here are some impressions:

while staying in ivalo, i did a daytrip to kirkenes in norway, and dipped my feet into the barents sea. it was pretty cold, and didn’t got any warmer while staying in it a bit longer. i’d still jump in if i would have taken my swimming gear with me… this is a thing you don’t do that often. as before in ivalo, it was cloudy. and rained a bit. but nonetheless, it was beautiful. lappland is just beautiful. the barents sea reminds me a lot of the north sea. which reminds me that i haven’t been there for quite some time.

the last five days i’ve been spending at lake inari, near to ivalo, as you might have already seen. unfortunately, it was cloudy most of the time. but most of the time it was dry, and never too cold. (i never wore a jacket.) the area is just beautiful, especially if it is so colorful during ruska.

if you’re interested in staying there, here is the mökki’s booking page. this one has tap water, though it contains a lot of iron and many people do not like the taste. (i didn’t mind it too much, though.) the sauna is wood-driven, as in the first mökki.

today, i drove from anttola/mikkeli up to kuusamo. the views i got reminded me a lot of the yukon. this time of autumn where everything is so colorful is called ruska; i hope i’ll also experience that while staying near to ivalo.

this night there is a solar storm going on (as one can watch right now here), resulting in probable aurora sightenings. unfortunatley, there are clouds on the sky… but maybe i’m more lucky during the next days?

here are a few more impressions from the next day, when i continued to ivalo: