Walking yesterday 13.2. through Helsinki-Helsingfors old history. In 1550 the town was established here where the Vantaa – Vanda River reaches the sea. Today, the Old Town Bay area is a popular starting point for hiking and cross country skiing in the large and close by green areas.
Well, I should say fishing as well. In fact it is so popular that one has to buy a special license for the bay area and an even more special one for the rapids. On the other side of the small island in the middle there is a waterfall – man-made of course – and the old power station from the last years of the 19th century.
The people in some of the pictures were fishing out on the ice where low temperatures during the last weeks and days have made this quite safe. The water is much less salty than the oceans and therefore freezes during cold winters.
A lot of voluntary work is being done in the Finnish capital to restore healthy trout populations both in this river and in the many creeks in other parts of the metropolitan area. In my own village Pitäjänmäki – Sockenbacka much has been achieved, and we are now pushing for the city to remove some last obstacles for fish to swim up river for spawning, or their love encounters…
There is still much snow here and outside the city centre the ground is covered by shining white layers. So why is the ice so brown on some of these riverfront pictures? The colour comes with the running water, picked up from the ground it runs through, but the water itself is nowadays quite clean. Not drinkable, but you can take a swim there. And I suppose cook some coffee…
Nice weather to go out it was when the -15C or so has given in a bit and it was just a few degrees under zero.
