At Sea Again...

My daughter gave a a small plastic dinosaur, to keep me safe... I got a rare opportunity to enjoy a sauna for two nights though I slept in my tent (night temps at lowest -3 Celsius, swimming water chilly +5 Celsius). First frost, and full moon! Pure magic!

FINALLY

... I got some holidays and I got time for paddling. I'm sorry folks, posting to this web site is sometimes painful: the images pile up and I have too much to do (again) in too little time. I got nominated this January as the chairman of the board of the Union of Artist Photographers, Finland, and I am therefore also a board member of the Artists' Association of Finland. My daughter also takes quite lot of my time, so occasionally, I am full of anxiety and got a strong need to go out to the sea.

The great expedition of this year (cell phone images)

Two weeks at sea, 352 kilometres and terrible heat wave.

Chilly Spring at Sea

Oh boy, was it good to be camping and paddling, even if my drysuit shoes were frozen on last Saturday morning! Six days at sea, with few good books and good camping gear... lots of migrating birds (falcons, ducks, grey herons) and three eagles! I did test my drysuit, just to be sure about it after several years hard use. I did find one minor scratch. Ahh... the shades? I get terrible migraines from the spring sun. All photographs in co-operation with Alli 'Auntie' Lind.

At the Baltic Sea...

Finally, my first r e a l holidays after one and half years of taking care of our little family with Riitta!

I felt stiff, sometimes a bit unsecure at the open waters -and I have to admit that I spent few first days sleeping my tiredness off... no early wake-ups and long days. So did 'Auntie' Alli, my long-time paddling buddy. For me, whose longest expedition was 700 kilometres before Lumi was born, 350 kilometres and two weeks was extraordinarily lazy time. Vilma 'the Body', my other good friend paddled half of the trip with us. Her nickname comes from her obscure habit of participating body-pump excercise at local gyms...

We arrived Kaunissaari harbour accidentally at the very same day, when they had a local celebration, and turned back to west. Fortunately, weather was fine so we had lots of opportunities to admire the huge Suursaari at the horizon. Unfortunately it has been part of Russia since 1945.