Tuesday, August 30, 2011

Overnighter with the kids

The kids wanted to go to Mathildedal for an overnighter again, which suited me fine. I didn't want to go with them in the worst bug season and it then took this long to find a suitable weekend. Mathildedal is about one hour from Turku by car, unnecessarily much in my opinion, but the area is great. Compared to the areas north of Turku, there are a lot more lakes, which I happen to like.

The weather forecast promised good weather and one of the warmest nights of the summer. We packed the backpacks, got in the car and started walking about 18:30 in the evening.



The preferred camping spot was not much over two kilometers from the car, but when going out with the kids the distance is secondary. And the progress is far from linear...








There are obviously not enough stones in the lake.














The wild rosemary is starting to get some color.


The bog bilberries were unusually sweet and tasty. Usually they just have a diluted blueberry taste, but this time they tasted great.




Nearing the tent spot. I had actually planned to seek out a place north of Matildanjärvi, since I assumed that the best spot at Puolakanjärvi would be occupied, but we met a couple of day hikers who told us nobody was there.




We had some fishing gear with us, but since the kids do not yet handle the gear independently we did not do much fishing. I had my hands full with putting up the tent, doing some photography and preparing the food.




It was a beautiful evening.






Pancakes, a most noble outdoor food.




After the sunset a surprisingly large number of mosquitoes appeared. It was a lot worse than in Lapland three weeks earlier. The kids went into the tent while I took some more pictures, testing my new camera.






We went to sleep sometime between ten and eleven in the evening and slept until seven in the morning. The night was warm and I just had a thin silk liner instead of a sleeping bag. The kids slept well in their fleece blankets.






The morning wasn't entirely bad.


I don't see much enthusiasm over the porridge.


Exploring the surroundings unnecessarily close to the water while I took down the tent and packed the backpack.




Heading back.


Taking pictures of cranberries.






More berries.




A short break with müsli bars.


White Waterlily (Nymphaea alba).


It is still at least a month until the cranberries are ripe, even though some have a nice color already.


The fall is coming.


A small island in Matildanjärvi.


Almost there.


We arrived at the car just as it started to rain. The outing was great and the kids have been asking (numerous times) when we will go again.

10 comments:

  1. I see a kind of 'new camera effect' here. :) Some of the best photos I have seen from you, no doubt about that!

    ReplyDelete
  2. You chose a good weekend, the weather was terrific here in southern Finland! It seems you had a nice trip (the pancakes look delicious!).

    Very good pictures.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I must agree with the other commenters, the new camera seems to be working out quite well. The foliage close-ups and water shots especially, are quite stunning.

    ReplyDelete
  4. It's a great area, went there for the first time this summer with my kids. We just day hiked, having camped the night before at a site down in Hanko, but next time we will back pack!

    ReplyDelete
  5. That's wonderful pictures.
    You're doing your new camera proud, methinks.

    Must be fun to be out the with the kids too. Sort of see mother nature through their eyes. That's probably quite different than an adults view.

    Say, how do you do with pitching the inner nest on your Shangi-La 5? I never seem to be able to pitch it without the upper part of the nest touching the silnylon outer, and from your pic's you seem to have pitched the whole system much better. I'm a bit concerned about water/condensation starting to drip from that touching area.

    / Karl

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanks for the comments.

    I've never noticed that the nest would unnecessarily close to the outer tent and I don't do anything special as far as I know. I just try to get a nice taut pitch. The tent seems to handle condensation better than any tent I've had, probably because of the chimney effect.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Hmmm, do you use the same ground pegs for the nest as you do for the tent? This is how I've pitched it, and when I do that, the nest ground peg loops seem awfully short (i.e. they get really, really tight). Maybe I have to/should have separate ground pegs for the nest?
    / Karl

    ReplyDelete
  8. Beautiful photos, looks like a great family trip!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Thanks!

    Karl, you are right that the nest ground peg loops are very short. By shortening the fly sheet ground peg loops as much as possible it fits, but it does seem somewhat suboptimal.

    ReplyDelete