Kiven kivi? Looking for the rock that inspired Aleksis Kivi

Kiven kivi? Today's trip to look for cave underneath the large boulder in Nurmijärvi that may have inspired Aleksis Kivi in the writing of a the first significant Finnish language novel, "Seitsemän veljestä" (seven brothers). And there was a nice, 10m meter cave under the rock.

What a wonderful cave, not long, but perfect triangle, bright colours, smooth surfaces, and flat dirt floor... as Tuomo Kesäläinen writes in the book Uudenmaan Luolat: "a textbook example of a beautiful boulder cave".

This is an excellent cave to take kids and non-cavers to, btw. Easy to go through, dry, safe to approach, not much walking required, no fall danger (unless one climbs to the top of the stone), barely requires crawling, ... all good. Much recommended trip with kids.

I also mapped out the cave underneath. Here's the map:

A high-res version of the map can be also found in JPG and PDF formats. And the original iDraw file is here.

The coordinates are N 60.478192 E 24.760996, in Nurmijärvi. There's a designated parking spot at the beginning of the Kullantöyrääntie (honey's embankment road!).

I continued to after this to visit to my mom's place... and then somewhere for a sauna and a swim. More on the latter here.

Video:

Here's the view from the top:

More photos from under the rock:

The place is well documented and marked. There's even a parking spot next to the site on the road.

This article is also available at TGR. Tämä blogi löytyy myös suomeksi Relaasta. And many more caving articles are available at planetcaver.net. Photos, maps, and videos (c) 2018 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved. The song "To the Top" is by The Silent Partner, and is freely usable from the YouTube music library.