Nyrölä is a small village about 30 km / half an hour drive from Jyväskylä. And in Nyrölä there’s a nice nature path with laavu on shore of a lake and in a small island in that lake.

The path and laavus are open for anyone to use and they are maintained by the village association and active volunteers and they provide free firewood for the visitors. One can support the cause by donating money to the bank account of the village association: Nyrölän Kyläyhdistys ry (FI63 5221 7050 0163 58), add a message stating “polttopuut” for a reference, meaning “firewood”.

With my my tarp, hammock and some food with me off I went and drove there to cook some bacon on an open fire and to sleep a night in the forest.

The first “half” of the path, when one walks clockwise direction around, is a nice forest path that goes on to a small forest ridge and then down to the laavu and swamp. The other half that I walked back the next day, is mainly a forest road that they use to service the laavu and bring firewood in.

The path is about 3 km long all together and near the swap area there’s a laavu and a fire-pit on land. To get to the island during open waters (ie. not in winter) there’s a small rope raft ferry thing.

Nyrölä’s laavus and the nature path are quite popular day trip destination, but during the evening and night one usually gets the whole place to them self. The arrival time to the location was around 22:00 and there was no other people around.

Even thou the last part on the land in on a swamp and the island is a bit wet and swampy, there are some “pitkospuut”, wooden paths set on the swamp and on the island, so one won’t get their feet wet.

Just after the arrival and laying my gear around and getting the fire started I thought I’d take a swim but it started to rain. Quick rescue operation to save my gear and food from getting wet I sat in the shelter and just watched the rain.

It was a proper summer shower and it even rained some small hails.

But after some 15 – 30 minutes later the late night sun started to show up again.

Pic above is taken about 22:40 in the evening…

While waiting the rain to pass by I kept the fire going and later rigged my tarp over the benches and partly over the fire place to keep me dry, as it rained some more during the evening hours later.

The island laavu has two shelters to sleep on the floor and a “kitchen” type shelter with some tables and more benches. As I was out with my hammock I rigged it under the kitchen shelter thing to sleep in.

I also rigged the tarp in front of the shelter to give me a bit of a protection from the wind that was blowing from the lake when I went to sleep.

The night was beautiful after some rain and the sunrise was quite warm. Even thou the sun rises early in the summer in here I slept well and long in to the morning hours.

In the morning, maybe around 09 or so, the first day trip visitors arrived to the laavu and I made a new friend who eagerly wanted to share my breakfast with it…

After the breakfast it was time to pack up and walk back to the car and drive back to the city again…