Trekking on Störsvik & Kopparnäs Recreation Areas, Finland

November 2011

Continued series of walks in outdoors. Some weeks ago went to a coast on Siuntio and Inkoo municipals, about 50km west from Helsinki (Sjundeå and Ingå in Swedish, as they both are old, traditionally Swedish spoken municipals).

There were two Recreation areas and small Nature Reserves within them. The place in Siuntio was called Störsvik and the place in Inkoo was called Kopparnäs (see this map of the region).  Both areas belong to official Recreation Areas, owned by Uudenmaan Virkistysalueyhdistys Ry, a Society which owns many areas in Uusimaa Province (see this PDF brochure for all the places).

The area contained high rocks, old meadows, ruins of old buildings, beaches, small mires, different type of forest and a great scenery all the time to archipelago. There's one path which followed the coast line.

Didn't have much luck with weather, cloudy with relatively strong wind and about +5C temperature.

Started the hike from a new parking lot at Kola village. A new information poster welcomed visitors. Path was marked with white painted dots on trees. There hadn't been many hikers at Siuntio side as the path was grown closed in many places. Terrain was quite wet as water flowed many places towards the sea.

View from top of rocks on many places offered gorgeous scenery towards the archipelago. The path was nice to walk, just few meters from the water line.

Decided to continue until Rävberget, a high hill along the coast. All Kopparnäs places one can reach by car. You noticed that.  Hill had some bird watchers. Down from the hill on the water line had lots of people fishing, all hoping to catch some trout. Swans floated peacefully in some distance on the sea.

Hot tea from a thermo bottle, some sandwich, peanuts and stuff. Returned almost the same route, except at Störsvik crossed the forest to visit Kvarnträsk, a small lake within a Nature Reserve.

After leaving the lake I put my camera to bag, thinking there's nothing to shoot anymore. In the next minute, a great size of White Tail Deer jumped in front of me, about two meters, stared at me a while and then slowly and proudly walk off.  I struggled taking the camera from the bag which no luck, grrrr.

The place is worth visiting during Spring and especially in summer time.

Here's the hiked route:

With the following photos I try to explain what I saw there:

A starting point at Störsvik

Bending

Along the path in Störsvik

Along the path in Störsvik

A fisherman rushes to work

Captured a water line in long shutter speed

Snickars

Some old noble trees

Many of them

Old ruins at Kurubackudden

Shapes

A beach at Sandviken

Gurgling

Towards the sea

Ying Yang

Along the path in Kopparnäs

Rävberget

Getting colour

Wet

Lake Kvarnträsk

New fern, in November