Yet Another Abandoned Ski Area

While looking for ski areas I could go ski at, I came across a nearby ski hill that I had not even heard about: Klaukkala's Tornikeskus, or Tower Hill. Unfortunately, they just closed permanently. That doesn't mean I couldn't go ski there, of course :-)

It has been a nice hill, still used for hike-up-stairs, hiking trails, and downhill bike riding. And there are a few resilient snowboarders practicing their jumps. The lifts are frozen in place, but still equipped with cables and bars. Here's hoping that someone will take over the business are re-open the area.

There wasn't much snow, however, so I opted for skiing down the least rocky part, the lift track. But it was icy, and there were a few rocks even on this path. Well, managed to get down nevertheless.

You can find Tornikeskus and Tornimäki at N 60.365439 E 24.758202.

The visit here reminded me also of what Tero and I found years ago in Chile, at Arenales.

This article has also been published at TGR. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot or TGR. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2021 by Jari Arkko.

Be the ski lift

 

Today’s exercise was to be the ski lift for sister’s twins as they tried out skiing for the first time on a small hill (not visiting a ski resort yet, this was a more relaxed setting). They made lot of progress, snowplough, turns, how to fall, etc. Fun day!

We were at the hill for the Tuusula sports center in Hyrylä. Nice place. Coordinates: N 60.38947 E 25.03185.

Also, an interesting thing happened. 27 year old Nordica boots gave away... bottom half of the boots disintegrated as the kids walked few meters to the car. Amazing, I usually like to keep my boots longer than this :-)

Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot or TGR. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2021 by Jari Arkko.

Volvo is shedding parts

... again. This time only the mirror, however. And it fell on soft snow on my own yard. Good.

I will have to re-glue it.

LiDAR 3D modelling caves and bunkers

I continued my earlier underground tests with iPhone 12 Pro's LiDAR sensor and software. This time I started testing the 3D modelling software. Can we produce an accurate 3D model of a cave using these sensors and software?

I was wondering if the new sensors are toys for caving, good for nothing? Revolution about to happen? Or something in between? Has anyone else looked at these? 

Here are some test shots from my initial trials. The first is from the Högberget cave in Kirkkonummi: a photo, a 3D model generated by the "Polycam" App. Well, it is a video of model spinning around, but one can also get the full model out in various formats. The second one is another Polycam 3D model from a post-WW2 era Soviet bunker blown up in Porkkala in 1956.

Early observations: pretty interesting stuff, in many ways spectacular results. But also difficult to go from "nice first video" to "complete result that I can use". Even if one tries hard there's bound to be holes in walls or missing parts. Could perhaps be improved with better software or user. Perhaps more fundamentally, the phone sensors have a range of only 5 meters, and I think maybe in practice less. That may of course be enough for the Finnish caves 🙂

I've seen some videos of 3D models and cave point clouds, done with more professional equipment of course. Where are we on that, what can that equipment do, how do the more consumer grade things compare? What would be the 3D equivalent of the Disto X, some years into the future?

I tested a few different applications, but the one that I like best so far is Polycam. You can get video review of the model out of the free version of the app, but the full version can export a dozen formats, from OBJ, PTS, PLY, DAE, USDZ, STL, etc.

Högberget model:

Bunker model:

Tunnel:

The author:

This article has also appeared in TGR. Read more urban exploration stories from theurbanexplorer.net, and other underground stories from planetcaver.net. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot or TGR. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2021 by Jari Arkko and Elena Arre. All rights reserved.

Looking for bunkers and all we found was SHIT

 

We drove in two cars to south end of the Porkkala peninsula -- 50 minutes away -- to explore three bunkers there. The best map that we have of the abandoned Soviet-era bunkers comes from Lynx, the local orienteering club. Unfortunately, this time their map oversold what was to be found at the location.

What we found was actually pretty basic old-style underground cellars, constructed from pieces of granite. And a round concrete container full of water or sewage... we did not taste it to make sure which one it was. The container may even be still in use for for the farmlands.

Just because something is underground doesn't make it a bunker. And just because something was in the Soviet-held area, doesn't mean it was built by them. And even if it was built by them, it doesn't make it a military installation -- many houses, roads, basements, and probably also shit containers were also built.

Jarmo and I are marking these in our maps to make sure we don't attempt to visit them again. My map for urban exploration can be found here. Note that the location of these particular three items (basement 1, basement 2, ruins, container) have been slightly obfuscated, as there is no need for anyone to access them, being possibly private origin and ownership. The map shows an indicator when an item on the map is obfuscated.

Basement 1:

Basement 2:

Ruins:

Shit container:

Read more urban exploration stories from theurbanexplorer.net, and other underground stories from planetcaver.net. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot or TGR. Photos and text (c) 2021 by Jari Arkko and Jarmo Ruuth. All rights reserved.

Högberget in LiDAR

 

We visited the Högberget cave today, to test drive the LiDAR sensor in the iPhone that got today. Pretty interesting!

Here's the video of walking through the small but spectacular cave, using the iPhone 12 Pro LiDAR sensor for recording the video:

This article has also appeared at TGR. 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! Text, photos, and video (c) 2021 by Jari Arkko and Jarmo Ruuth. All rights reserved.

Espoonkartano tree skiing

Covid. Lines everywhere. Commercial skiing... maybe not for us this year. Fortunately, Jarmo knew a place where we could get some forest skiing in. And even the sun was shining!

Gotta love Espoo:

This article has also been published at TGR. Read the full Planetskier series at planetskier.net, or all blog articles from Blogspot or TGR. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2021 by Jari Arkko and Jarmo Ruuth.

Christmas Caving

Christmas seems like a good time to spend on improving your cave lights. Or, "improving" as it may be in my case. But I really like to the colours of the new lights :-) 

I also took the opportunity for some pre-Christmas eating caving, in anticipation of a tight crawl. My home town Kauniainen has a few small holes, but no real proper cave, not even a boulder cave that you can crawl through. Except one... maybe. It turned out that I wasn't actually able to crawl through, although it would have been possible, I think, without the fleece, with a few kilos less, and maybe also someone to call the fire brigade if I get stuck.

(Although I've always wondered what the firemen would do? Spray lubricant?)

Caving lights in use:

This cave will go some day. Maybe in the summer with a t-shirt. In the meantime, I made a simple map:

The full map is in PDF here. I named the cave as Lohkarepuristimen luola, or the Boulder Squeeze Cave. The coordinates are N 60.213026 E 24.691544.

Here are the entrances:

A big fallen tree marks the place:

Christmas foods followed. Here's the dessert:

 

This article has also appeared at TGR. 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.

Switzerland. In Hyvinkää.

 

Reckless travel to Switzerland during the rising wave of the pandemic? Well, the name of the place is Switzerland. Hyvinkää's Switzerland.

But what a wonderful experience! While the temperatures in southern Finland are mild, around 0 degrees, the blasting snow guns created a local snow storm. I have never had so much fun while covered in layer of ice :-)

And the colours of evening-lit ski slopes, particularly in bad weather (whether man made or natural). So wonderful! I like the sunshine as much as the next guy...  but the evenings bring out the interesting colours.

They had two ski runs and lifts open, as well as the beginner's magic carpet lift.

Concerned about the infection? I think the place is pretty safe. The ticket sales are through a window, outside. The hill is not crowded, and people seem to leave plenty of space between each other even in the few people that are waiting for their turn on the ski lifts. And the lifts are single-person lifts. All good. Go get some exercise, everyone! It is good for you. It certainly is for me, I have been sitting inside for far too long. The year, basically :-)

I have a long history with the hill in Hyvinkää, although the hill has moved in the meantime (!). Read more about this from a previous blog article.

The Hyvinkää ski hill is one of the few open ski resorts near the capital region. The Vihti Ski Center is also open. I will also try that in the next couple of days. I have fond memories of last spring in Vihti...  they had closed, but the snow lasted for months, and we kept hiking up and skiing until May.

Kid slope:

The author:

Weird beer bottle installation in the forest outside the slope:

This article has also appeared in TGR. See more Planetskier stories from TGR, Blogspot, and Planetskier.net. Photos, videos, and text (c) 2020 by Jari Arkko. All rights reserved.

Sauna at the duck

 

Tero and I stayed at the "Duck" (Ankka), a cabin near Ruka. We had driven up with Tero's car to avoid having to use flights or get too exposed to viruses.

A primary criteria for me in choosing hotels and cabins is of course that there's a sauna!

The Duck was not new, but a reasonable and nice place to stay at. There was also a small sauna.

The cabin:

Reindeer on the road:

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.