A Flow State [Episode 5 – Finland]

*We’re Traveling by Bike for ONE YEAR*

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(The events shown in this video happened during the month of July 2022).

Thanks to our trusted review team – you know who you are. And thanks to Adriana and Alain for the French subtitles. And a special thanks YOU – you also know who you are 😉

*[ A film by Henry Bech – All rights reserved ]*

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We are travelling by bike for one year and we start in the Arctic Circle in Norway. We marvel at the beauty of this country for 12 days and eventually change our plans and take a train to Sweden. In Sweden we meet a ton of people and feel a lot of love.

We end up slightly euphoric in a cabin in the middle of nowhere. John is a dedicated bikebiker. He has been biking in 21 countries on three different continents. He lives in Umeå that’s 61 kilometers from that wonderful cabin in the middle of nowhere. When we arrive to his place he is packing

Up one of his many bikes, preparing to go on a long bike journey here in Europe. And we are actually taking the nearly exactly same route. So I’m prone to bump into you a couple of times. Hope you do. I’m stubbornly old-fashioned and I’m using the maps.

Like, stuff one of these beautiful paper maps into the plastic bag and yeah it’s for me like the only way. John lives just 16 kilometers from our next stop the Vasa Line. That’s the ferry to Finland. Good luck on your journey. Thank you. You too. 20 days have passed

Since we arrived in Tromsø. We’ve been on the bikes for 14 of them. And by now it feels natural to get up in the morning eat breakfast and jump straight on the bikes. This is our fourth ferry ride so far. And we must say we quite enjoy the calm,

Moderate pace of the ferries. We toast Finland welcome on board, pet these goats who for some reason lives by this bar and take a moment to appreciate the state of our lives. We’re feeling good but a little tired. We’re tired because we did 360 kilometers in the last four days.

Refreshed by a couple of beers we drop by a local supermarket. And whoa these supermarkets, they’re so giant. It’s like going to IKEA only for food. Finland may be my favorite place for grocery shopping ever. Pro-tein’er Very cool, Finland. We actually got the idea of flying

The local flag back in Sweden, but we couldn’t find the Swedish flag. Here we find multiple options. We choose to go with the normal rectangular one on a stick. Our setup is very light already, but it still feels like we’re bringing more stuff than we actually need. So we spent the morning

Going through everything, so we can send the things we don’t need back to Denmark. A quick visit to the post office later, we start to pack up our now slightly lighter luggage. So we’re ready to start our journey across Finland early tomorrow morning. It’s a beautiful day.

As soon as we’re clear of Vaasa City we end up in a tailwind surrounded by fields and flowers on peaceful gravel roads. What a day! What a lovely day! Yeah, rain did seem to be inevitable today. After all, we have been escorted by grey clouds ever since we left Vaasa.

But at least the temperature is high enough that being wet doesn’t mean being cold. The Garmin (GPS) is set to the general direction of Tempra, 266 km away. Our plan is to just ride as far as we feel like and then find a guesthouse, a cabin or a

Place to camp whenever we are ready. How about now? We are ready now. So we jump into the map and we find this place. We are welcomed by this very nice lady who speaks perfect English. So she’s able to give us a story about this place.

It used to be the local village school. But when the population of the village declined and the school had to close, her and her family bought the place and turned it into this guesthouse. And I think they did a very good job maintaining this school vibe. This is the rule.

If we meet a cat and the cat is willing to socialize. It will get some pets. The weather is still a little sketchy, so we decide to do a short ride today. To the city of… sorry, Finland. Kauhajoki? I don’t know. Pronunciation. It’s so difficult. When we arrive

We treat ourselves to this giant pizza. And yeah Rome is almost 3,000 km away. We have 110 km tomorrow. Since we left the Arctic the weather forecasts have been reasonably precise. And tomorrow, it’s not only gonna be dry, it’s supposed to be sunny, low wind and blue sky. So we’re gonna do our

Longest ride so far. And this is gonna be the longest ride I have ever done in my entire life. So we’re gonna need carbs, gonna need some protein bars and… Yeah, a lot of good stuff. We’re going to a village called Ikaalinen, where we have booked what looks like a

Very cosy cabin on a campsite. Doing 110 km means we have to be smart about hydration and nutrition. So we stop every 45 minutes to eat and drink. We just arrived to this really, really nice wooden area. I think it’s my favorite road this far. Love the silence. So do I.

We are almost in Ikaalinen. Yay! I made it and I felt good almost the entire time. Except for the last 10, maybe km, it was a little tough on the bum. For 50 euros we get this cosy little cabin. Right by the lake, surrounded by trees and animals. We really couldn’t have

Imagined a better day. Seven and a half hours on the road. Alone on gravel roads in deep forests, it’s almost the whole way. Now all left to do is to enjoy that special feeling you get, when your body is naturally tired and your mind is full of impressions.

And the only thing you need to do… is to sit down and relax, eat some food, probably a lot of cake and enjoy the rest of the day. We absorb the peace and tranquility of this beautiful place, knowing that tomorrow we will arrive in the third biggest city in Finland.

Wow! Wow, wow! There are so many rolling hills here. Every time you go down, you start going up again. Almost 600 meters of incline That’s not nothing. But luckily, we know the perfect cure against burned-out lakes. Two beers later, we are ready to explore Tempra, the Manchester of Finland. The what?

Uhm. The Manchester of the north. Why Manchester? Something about industrial significance, I think. Don’t they call it the sauna capital of the world? I don’t know. Do they? Yeah. Everybody has a sauna here. Okay. We spent two days here in the sauna capital of the world, relaxing and loading up on energy.

And also, we are staying on the lookout for Warmshowers hosts. There aren’t that many here in Finland, but we write to the ones living between here and Helsinki. Hopefully, someone will accept us. Pekka lives 50 kilometers outside of Tempara. And he owns this organic farm. We are welcomed by our host,

Who turns out to be a very nice guy. And these two cute dogs. This is Pirkko and this cute little puppy. I think she’s named Irmeli. This crazy tank of a dog, she goes through maybe six or seven stuffed animals while we’re here. Come here, watch over there.

I think little baby dog here is teething. She is literally biting everything that comes close. There’s also a couple of cats here. The guy has moved to high ground to observe the dogs at a safe distance. Pekka asks us if we want to see the museum in the backyard.

You have a museum in the backyard? Welcome. It’s huge. Yes, it’s huge. Hello, is this the 1800s? It must be. And yes, this place actually is a museum. Pekka’s family have lived here for six generations, dating back to 1825. The first edition. So what, the horses drank them? Yeah.

Later, Pekka and his girlfriend Hanna cooks a delicious dinner. We eat together and spend the evening talking about everything and anything. Look at this. Yeah, this is really, really… Coffee. Back on the gravel roads, we’re greeted by a sky slightly darker than average. The rain seems to be

Patiently waiting for us out there. We’ll see. Helsinki is around 150 kilometers away and we plan to spend three days getting there. We are in Iittala and turns out the porcelain called Iittala is made in Iittala. Science have showed that the best fuel for biking is coffee and cake.

So we have no other choice than to go to this place that we — accidentally Searched up on Google. The cake here. I’m not exaggerating when I say that. It could be the best ever. We end the day at Juha’s place. We’ve booked a room in his house on Airbnb.

But Juha is so kind and welcoming that he might as well have been been a Warmshowers host. He gives us a tour of his pretty impressive property. And we spend a good deal of time learning about Finland and what it means to be Finnish. And honestly, the more we learn about our

Nordic brothers and sisters the more we like them. 450 km and a light year of good experiences are behind us. And now, Helsinki is just one ride away. Against all odds, we have successfully managed to dodge the rain for the past three days. But before we can do the final jump to

The capital, we need to deal with a small energy crisis. Sometimes I just lose all energy. And I need something to eat now. We have reached the outskirts of Helsinki and we have maybe 6 or 7 km to the city center where we’re going to live.

And then we get this final surprise. It comes out of nowhere and it’s so extreme that all we can actually do is laugh about it. Hi, this is Didi from the future. I want to tell you that it will take a while for you to truly appreciate how much you love Finland.

So take an extra look around and make a mental note that says “big love”. And don’t drink more beer. I had a headache tomorrow. So the new plan is? That we don’t have a plan. It’s been a hell of a windy day. And on the other side of the river

It’s going to be Russia.