Skiing the Planet

Sunday, February 8, 2026

Lubja caves in Tallinn

Viimsi Koobas, or the caves of Viimsi, are a man-made set of tunnels on a cliff face rising near the Vimka - Viimsi Mäepark ski hill. There may be more than one tunnel and the tunnels are supposed to be longer, but I think they have been filled with sand or collapsed, as I was able to find only one about 13 meter long tunnel. Nice visit still, though.

Here is the information sign near the tunnels:

The coordinates to this place are N 59.517783 E 24.839870. It is the village of Lubja, in the region of Vimsi. Just outside city of Tallinn.

Also saw one very frosty bat... poor thing. I wonder if it is OK....

The end of the tunnel:

The entrance:

Side tunnel:

I also made a 3D scan of the tunnels with my iPhone's Lidar function, and then converted it to a cave map using the cave-outliner software (link). Below you can find the map and a screenshot of the 3D model. The model can be downloaded here (GLB) and rotated on your browser screen here.

See also my other article about the Tallinn visit (alt. link), and in particular the one about the Naage Koopad (alt. link) real caves!

This article has also been published at Planetcaver.net here. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, urban exploration stories from theurbanexplorer.net, and other underground stories from planetcaver.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot. Photos and text (c) 2026 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.

Naage Koopad, a beautiful Estonian cave with a surprise at the end

Purnu

Day trip to Prune ski hill (Hiihtokeskus Purnu), a medium-sized ski hill south of Jyväskylä. Wonderful winter day and light! Trees with snow cover were amazing. It was a great ski mountain too. This was my first trip with the fixed Volvo (article, alt. link), it faired well, no breakages. On the way back I stopped at the Vierumäki sports academy swimming hall, which was also a nice experience. I thought it would have been crowded on a weekend, but by seven pm it was more or less empty.

It was a cold day at the hill, around -13 degrees, though not much wind. I did a couple of runs and then warmed up for couple of minutes in the fireplace lean-to before continuing, very nice!

At the bottom they have a cafeteria and a rentals shop. The cafeteria has some snacks plus proper meals from a kitchen. By small ski resort standards it was remarkably spacious and nice. They also sell frozen high-quality meat, interestingly...

The vertical is 100 meters (300 feet), which is indeed good in southern-mid Finland. My local hills right in the south are in the 30-60 meter range, for instance. The longest run in Purnu is 750 meters. All the ski runs go over nice rolling hills. One of the slopes right next to the lift is dedicated to jumps and rails, but can also be skied. Two others were basic rounding-off-from-the-skiers-left slopes, both very nice for fast skiing. The "south" ski run on skier's right was not prepared. I found that a bit odd, and in general I've been running to this a lot recently in different ski resorts. The winter is one of the best ones in recent history, but yet the ski resorts can't prepare all the slopes? I think they should...

I remember Purnu from my childhood mostly from the arts center (Taidekeskus Purnu, Wikipedia). I had not been at the ski resort, however. This visit is my 350th ski resort, in around 70 or so countries.

More information about the Purnu ski hill can be found from their home page here. One hour lift ticket costs 27€ and a day ticket 40€. And more information about the swimming hall in Vierumäki can be found here. A swimming hall visit for adults is 12,50€.

Skiing:

Vierumäki:

Author:

Purnu lift ticket:

Purnu cafeteria:

My previous ski experience was earlier this week at the Flottsbrobacken in Sweden (article, alt.link).

This article has also been published here. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot. Or read all swimming stories at planetswimmer.com and sauna articles at saunablogger.cool. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2026 by Jari Arkko.

Elamus spa in Tallinn

The Elamus Spa (or Elamuste Keskus, in English the Experience Spa/Center) is a spa and recreation center in Tallinn. Their web site is here. I had been flying, skiing in two places, and caving in two more places (article, alt. link). I had a bit of time before the flight, so a shower, sauna, and swim seemed to be in order! I was a bit unsure where to do that, I had a community wonderful-looking 50-meter pool swimming hall or a commercial experience spa -- the Elamus -- to choose from, among others. I chose the latter.

I was happy I went, I did get the shower, sauna, and a swim. The saunas in particular were quite good. But I wasn't overly impressed, it was a crowded place. I could have chosen the adult rather than family side, not sure if the former would have been more spacious and quiet. But overall, I didn't get a luxury feeling, more like packed and crowded feeling. Everywhere was wet, and too many people, even in the restaurant that I was looking forward to getting a long-awaited first meal of the day from. But I didn't feel like eating here.

The saunas were wonderful though, and there were many different ones. Kudos for that. There were even sauna rituals, with the staff providing scents, towel routines, etc. I didn't have time for that though.

The adult side of the spa, Spa21+, looks at least on their website very nice. That would have cost a bit extra, the tickets for that are 54€ while for the regular spa only 36€. But even that is a bit much.

Water vapor from the spa building:

Tallinna Lennujaam

Had a chance to fly to Tallinn for a day trip (skiing, caving, and a spa; see article or alt. link). It was an early flight on a slow Sunday morning; wonderful airport, spectacular sunrise, and overall smooth experience. Except maybe waiting few minutes for my rental cars, there was no waiting or long walks or any of the other complexities usually involved with international travel.

On the way back I had a chance to experience the Airport LHV Lounge that Finnair uses. Since I was at the airport only around 9pm, most of the food service was already taken away, but there was still some sandwiches and snacks. Overall a nice experience.

While at the lounge, I realized that I was missing something: I didn't have my backpack, with money, credit cards, passport... fortunately I had just left it at security and it was still there when I returned. Phew. And I never, never lose anything while traveling. Probably caused by having too many things to carry on my person, I didn't have any checked luggage except for the skis, so had a few small bags for the helmet, boots, etc. And therefore the backpack was forgotten. Sigh. But all good in the end anyway.

At the airport, there's something that I hadn't seen elsewhere: an openly usable gym:

The official web page of the airport is here.

The sunrise:

Lounge:

Finnair:

This article has also been published in Planetflier.com here. For more flying stories, check out the Planetflier.com website! And of course the Planetcaver, and Planetskier blogs for other stories in Blogspot! Photos, videos and text (c) 2026 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.

Day trip to Tallinn: snow, caves, and water

I'm collecting things. Or rather experiences. Or visits to places. Ski resorts, swimming halls, caves... preferably as many as possible. Could I do a one day trip to Tallinn for some of the closest ski hills, caves, and spas that I had not yet visited? How many could I do in one day?

The plan was to fly early in the morning to Tallinn, rent a car, and tour at least two ski hills -- there's two right in Tallinn -- and then see if I can find the two caves that are also in the city. And then finish with a visit to a swimming hall or a spa.

I managed to do all this, two ski hills, one man-made tunnel, one cave, and one spa. I had chosen the final destinations during the day as it progressed. At one point I considered aiming for a third ski hill, but that would have endangered the cave visit and definitely made a spa visit not possible.

The places I visited were:

This article has also been published here. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot. Read all swimming stories at planetswimmer.com and sauna articles at saunablogger.cool. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2026 by Jari Arkko.

Flottsbrobacken

Quick stop at Flottsbro ski hill south of Stockholm before heading to the airport and back home. End of a busy week with demos etc. in Kista. Nice ski moment, but a bit bittersweet as I kept remembering a recently lost local friend who I knew also loved to ski …

More information from Flottsbro can be found from their home page. There's a nice rentals/cafeteria building at the bottom. A two-story building, with the restaurant, lockers, bathrooms and a terrace in the second floor. Quite nice by ski resort standards. I didn't try the restaurant but looked good. Adult lift tickets are 240 SEK for three hours and 340 for a full day.

There's an extensive training program organized by the Huddinge Skidklubb.

I had originally thought I'd do an Uber excursion to one of the not-yet-visited ski hills near Stockholm. But after several people recommended Flottsbro, I decided to rent a car instead for the day, and use it to get to the airport also at end. Flottsbro was in the other side of Stockholm, so with the taxi rides, and leaving luggage at the hotel would have been expensive and consume too much time.

I rented a car from Kista near my office and dropped it off at the airport. Oddly, the service (MABI) that I used wouldn't have one-way rentals on their website, but when I called them they said they can change my reservation. Yet, when I booked the 50€ "secret car" deal, they later emailed me that I won't be able to do the one-way rental on that deal, but they would have me a good fixed price anyway. That "good fixed price" turned out to be 150€... and on my credit card bill there's now 289€ of withdrawals from them. Perhaps some are reservations that will be credited later, but ... sigh. I think I will avoid this service provider in the future. Be careful out there.

Photos:

Piste map is here (taken from their website).

Restaurant:

This article has also been published here. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2026 by Jari Arkko. The piste map is by Flottsbro.