Looking for the Urtvuori cave

 

I spent at least an hour trying to find the cave, despite a tag on the Google Maps from someone, as well as coordinates from the book of Finnish caves. It turned out that the cave can be entered from the middle of the sloping rock face, in the cracks that have opened in it. But what a wonderful cave there was!

The cave has a real cave-like entrance, passing to the crack from the beginning and under a rock. The cave then makes a turn to a perpendicular crack, forming a four-meter high main hall. There's a small branch to the left at the end of the hall, but it quickly narrows too much. But the main hall crack makes a small sidestep and continues. I think it would be possible to slip through the sidestep, even if there's a large rock to climb over, a small drop, and a very tight passage through the sidestep. But then the crack widens to a whopping 45 centimetres, and continues for ... who knows how long, at least four meters according to the laser. Maybe more, if it turns. 

Since I was alone, I chose not to attempt the sidestep. I didn't feel entirely sure that I would not be stuck or that I'd be able pass back from the other side. Better safe than sorry, but we should definitely re-visit this cave some day with more people!

There were also two side caves, one roof cave and a smaller crack cave at the bottom of the cliff, in maybe 30 degree sideways lean along the length of the crack,

The main cave is at N 60.317849 E 23.905987. The leaning crack cave is at N 60.318237 E 23.905218, and the roof cave at N 60.317518 E 23.905998.

I have also drawn a simple cave map of the main cave and the leaning crack cave.

The main cave, starting from the entrance:

Main hall:

And what is this white stuff?

The unexplored, intriguing part (in addition to the opening shot above):

The leaning crack cave:

The roof cave:

See more caving stories at Planetcaver.net, and all Planetskier and Planetcaver stories at Blogspot and TGR! See also my cave map that runs the Psgeo software that has now been open sourced! This article and photos are (c) 2020 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.

Nice basement

 

The book Finnish Caves (Suomen Luolat) lists several caves in Perniö. I had already been in the 'Hiidenkellari' (Devil's basement), but since I needed to drive through Perniö today on my visit to Tero's summer cottage, I wanted to visit more of the caves. I chose 'Antinmäen Hohteen kellari ja paja' (The basement and workshop at the Antinmäki shine).

It took a while to find the cave, given that the coordinates in the book were not exact. And I was in a hurry. But after some criss-crossing of the cliff, I finally found an inviting, dark hole. A nice, straight tunnel with low ceiling at the beginning but higher in the end. I'm glad I stopped by.

I also draw a very rough map of the cave, here.

See more caving stories at Planetcaver.net, and all Planetskier and Planetcaver stories at Blogspot and TGR! See also my cave map that runs the Psgeo software that has now been open sourced! This article and photos are (c) 2020 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.

Ramunder's stone

 

Right in the middle of Tammisaari there's a classic "stone table", Ramunderinkiven onkalo (The Hole of the Ramunder's stone). Stone tables are stone formations where a rock sits on other stones. Ramunder is the strong man of old tales, and the story is that he threw a large boulder to crush some giants, giants that are now the stones holding up the boulder.

There's also an old story about Carl Sköld, a villain that hid his treasures under the stone.

But these are old stories, I happened to run into some inexplicable conspiracy theories on the Internets about how it must have been some ancient civilisations that set up these stones, and that the arrangement is set to depict broody hens caring for their eggs.

Back in reality, stone tables are boulders that happen to have landed on top of other rocks after glaciers, earthquakes, collapsed cliffs, etc. moved them.

The stone is listed in the Raasepori sightseeing page, as well as in the book Suomen Luolat (Finnish Caves).

I also draw a rough sketch for a map of the "cave", here.

See more caving stories at Planetcaver.net, and all Planetskier and Planetcaver stories at Blogspot and TGR! See also my cave map that runs the Psgeo software that has now been open sourced! This article and photos are (c) 2020 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.

Refreshing October sea swim

I had a nice, refreshing dip in the sea, mid-October. Twelve degrees. Cold, but if you compare it to the usual summer sea water temperatures, not that much lower yet...

It was also fun to have a sauna evening with friends (pretty rare in 2020, at least for me). 

For more sauna and swimming stories, check out planetswimmer.com and saunablogger.cool websites! And of course the Planetcaver, and Planetskier blogs for other stories in Blogspot and TGR! The photos and text (c) 2020 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.