Coffee and pie at Maija´s The town of Virolahti lies practically almost at the border, along the banks of a river who runs its waters from north to a long, narrow bay and finally to the Finnish Gulf. To get there from the sea you have to paddle 15 kms (9 1/2 miles) and partly through the border zone, which divides the mouth of the bay in two: the Finnish and the Russian side. A permission to enter the zone is needed: one can get it from the Hurppu Frontier Guard station, lying at the mouth of the bay, facing the official boat route to north and Virolahti. The officers at the station were friendly and curious about me, even though some clubs in Helsinki are arranging every summer expeditions to east, or from Virolahti to west, along the coast. Knowing the sea and local topography very well, they were offering me detailed information about water supplies and where to raise my tent. It had been quite easy to reach the mouth of the bay in two days, even if during the first day I had wind against my face and had to paddle around the town of Kotka and cross two very busy fairways, which all seemed to last forever. There just was not an easy way to go around one of the most rushed harbours in the whole country. The channels and fairways were wide and full of traffic: from traditional wooden boats to carriers and fast moving frontier guard and navy vessels. A huge cargo ship passing raised some large waves, which I would earnestly call i n t e r e s t i n g. Fortunately I was facing them and the wind - and lucky not to be anywhere in the neighbourhood of shallow waters which would have caused them to break. I paddled 24 kilometers to S/E to a group of beautiful islands called Ulko-Nuokko, at the edge of the open sea with a view from high cliffs towards the southern horizon. I did raise my tent and was able to spot from there the blue silhouettes belonging to some large islands (among them Suursaari, "Great Island") lying in the middle of Finnish Gulf, which had passed from the hands of Finnish government to the Russians during the WWII. The familiar sight of these "forbidden" islands is quite magical to the people living along the S/E coast, the tops of the huge cliffs being more than 100 meters high (over 300 ft). I do remember watching the silhouettes on a clear day from high towers of my hometown as a child. After the first 10 minutes of paddling on the second day at 6.30 am a sudden fog raised surprisingly fast from the continent. It took only some 5 minutes and I was not able to see anywhere, besides the rocks of the nearest island. Ahead was a fairway I was not familiar with, so I gave up paddling and landed to have a comfortable nap in my sleeping bag on the beach, the alarm of my wrist watch on the deck of my Nordkapp set to wake me up after 45 minutes. The fog gave up after an hour and I continued, doing some mental marks for possible camping sites for the returning trip. Fortunately there was not so much heavy traffic. Suddenly the waters seemed to be full of fish, few of them bouncing to air from the calm waters in front of me. I am not really a minimalist when it comes to expedition equipment and packing, so there must be still some salmon and pikes laughing heartily to me, because for this special expedition I had not taken my fishing rod along... The wind rose from the west and helped the travelling, though I was worried about the next day, when I should be returning. The forecast had been warning that it would not be so pleasant tomorrow, and most probably the wind would get worse. After getting the permission to enter the border zone I enjoyed the admirable sights (well, few houses, three smelly fish farms on the Finnish side and empty and unbuilt coast at the Russian side of the bay...) and paddled along the boat route towards north. The Hurppu Frontier Guard station is probably the most eastern point of the southern coast of Finland, but somehow all the kayakers reaching the border are continuing paddling up to Virolahti, just to be sure that they are going so far as they can. Maybe it is about showing guts and trying to achieve perfectionism: last summer a couple did cover the w h o l e coast of Finland in some 36 or 40 days, but the guys at the Hurppu station teased them to continue the trip up to Virolahti, just "because everyone else does". So did I, and promised the guards to get a beer at Virolahti, after spending the night in an island which is facing the mouth of the river and delta, just three kilometers out of town. Actually I was mentally exhausted, trying to get used to the idea that I had really made it - and there was still 200 kilometers/over 120 miles to get back! I did spend this evening of July 14th looking for hours for a suitable place for my tent: paddling in the middle of mud-smelling delta, amidst of bulrushes, too tired mentally to be able to make solid and straight decisions. I did 41 kilometers (25 miles) with three short breaks that day, but it surely felt like I had done 80. To be earnest: the border-zone and the bay were boring and a slight disappointments to me. I woke up next morning at 7 am near public beach and after morning coffee went and paddled to the center of Virolahti, which is divided by the river running below two small bridges. The river is narrow and idyllic, floating peacefully, guarded by banks full of alder, birch, small houses, mostly wooden and boats of various sizes. I saw only one powerboat lying there and felt very lucky, it had been so peaceful so far: two powerboats within two days. There are two small visitors´ berth, other equipped with a refuse bin and a freshwater tap. It seemed that I was the only wisitor that particular day, so I proudly parked my kayak in the middle of the berth, and left the other one downstream for minor explorers. Walked around, got some supplies (candy bars, bananas and duct tape for emergency repairs) and drank two divine cups of coffee at the local bar, Maija´s, which was full of pensionairers chatting peacefully. The coffee tastes sooooo goooood when someone else makes it, after few days of washing coffee pot, cup, plate and spoon with cool salt water. No beer this time. When I finally left the town at noon the expected (more than10 m/sec, 21 knots) wind had risen and I was facing it blowing from south along the bay with almost full force, plus waves packed to the delta. Not fun: I had a good reason to believe that the situation outside the bay would be worse, because paddling to west the waves would hit directly the side of my kayak. Besides getting wet I felt concerned about my safety, paddling alone among shallows and possible breaking waves, force of the wind rising, so I finally decided to paddle the remaining kilometres to the camping site next to the Hurppu station, raise my tent there and check the weather again tomorrow. Next day I decided to have a full day´s break, which seems to have been a fortunate decision: I think we lost one kayaker at the open sea amidst the gusty winds of that day. I heard he was doing a solo expedition and planning to visit some lighthouses at the outer S/W waters. The kayak was found floating at sea and if I do recall it correctly, I got the depressing news from my FM radio few days later. The wind rose to 13 m/sec, which gives some height to the waves here, especially at the western and S/W waters, where the northern and southern winds have hundreds of miles free space to blow and the waves to reach their full power. I did spend that day having a sauna at the camping site, chatting with a former frontier-guard officer who kept the place, listening the weather forecast several times, and checking the sights from a bird-watching tower . The sea was foaming and at the Russian side of the border there was rain and depressing murky black clouds. I did visit and inform the officers at the Hurppu station that my leave would postpone for a day. I left the Virolahti area on next day, June 17th at 6 am. It was still blowing from south and the waves were irritating two-footers, but the wind was supposed to wear itself down during the morning hours. After three hours of safe kayaking behind islands I decided to have a full break: lunch, a nap and maybe some FM radio listening. I did sleep really well - I woke and found out that the wind had almost died and I had actually slept two hours... Yup. The early bird really catches the worm... After some continuous paddling I did again put my feet to the shores of Ulko-Nuokko, raised my tent to a new place, and went out for a peaceful paddling at the sunset time. A familiar looking boat passed me in a channel. Though I was not able to see the face of the skipper I was sure it was a friend of my sister - a guy doing some tourist boating during the summer season. His boat has a fully licenced bar (yes!) so I did start to paddle furiously, chasing him 45 minutes in the channels of the Nuokko islands. Every time I got a sighting of his boat and tried to guess on which side of some nameless miserable island he would pop up again I did choose the wrong side. Finally I saw him leaving the islands at the distance of at least 5 kilometres. No beer at that time... The weather forecast was promising hard winds for the next day, so I did woke up again early and entered the waters of Kotka with the wind behind me before noon. At some shallow waters before a channel and a fairway I did notice five flags, telling me that supposedly there were three nets in water. Now, five flags do also mean that there is supposed to be a sixth flag. Where is it? Where is the e n d of the third net? An essential question, when following seas are driving you towards the nets, some shallows and breaking waves. I felt really alarmed, trying to choose my route through the nets - there was no turning back - until I did see the missing flag. I had chosen correct route between the nets, guessing by the size and colour of the flags which of them would belong to the same net. The missing sixth had such a short pole (maybe two feet) that it remained unnoticed until I was quite near. It was just hiding behind the crests when I was scanning the area. That was really an alarming discovery, because the flag was bright red and relatively large. So many things can remain unnoticed when kayaking in rough waters - whatever their colour is... No fun. The winds got harder and harder so I had to stay with my parents again and have a two day´s break. Quite irritating. I felt that a break lasting more than a day was ruining the natural rhythm of my paddling: early rising at 5 or 6 am, a good break of two hours at noon, including short nap and camping before 6 pm when there was sunlight left plus time to explore my camping island for more than five hours. I was getting anxious. Cheers, Ari Saarto "Home of the Traditional & Famous Scandinavian Skinny-dipping [TM]" Finland - Europe GSM +358 - 50 - 526 5892 fax. +358 - 3 - 828 2815 e-mail: asaarto_at_lpt.fi *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.gasp-seakayak.net/paddlewise/ ***************************************************************************
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