There are numerous laavus in Finland. It’s quite easy to build and offers a nice place to cook food and some shelter to sleep in. Many laavus in Finland are up-kept by locals or the town or even the Metsähallitus.

This time I looked some maps and picked two laavus near the city of Jyväskylä and drove over to those locations to see what they had to offer.

The first location was the Nälkömäki laavu in Saukkola.

A small road uphill.

Still ok to drive.

Old farm – a suitable place to leave the car. Did drive further but there was no decent place for parking so decided to walk from here.

More of the old farm.

Road towards the not-so-good road that I didn’t want to drive.

Just before the last turn.

And yes. Into there I didn’t want to go by car anymore as I don’t have any decent 4×4 with a decent clearance underneath.

Still wet and muddy, some bigger rocks. Later found out that maybe a year ago someone had driven a 4×4 Land Rover all the way up to the laavu. But no way doable with my car sadly.

Also a motocross bike or some dirt bike would have done the trick like shown in here.

The last turn, last uphill, almost there.

Not completely abandoned site as some others have climbed up here also.

More snow, less snow, some snow, no snow. Spring time is like this in Finland. But it’s getting there and almost all the snow is gone already in these parts of the country.

Almost there. Many young trees here, mainly birch.

Almost there, just around the corner…

And there it is. The laavu I was looking for.

Small, old, maybe not so well kept anymore?

Even a fire place made from an old oil drum.

This place seems like it was a nice place, maybe 20 yrs ago or so. The laavu sits at the top of a hill and looks like the trees around the laavu have been cut down some years ago. Then this place might have had a nice view over the surrounding forest but now there’s not much to see around. And sadly I don’t have a drone to take a peak above the young trees surrounding this place.

Names and writings on the inside of the doors…

…people have this thing that they need to mark their achievements and territory and one sees this happening in everywhere. There’s also often a guest book in many laavus for people to write some greetings for fellow travelers and campers.

The name sign.

The place from the outside.

And from the inside.

Did not spent that much time in this location, as the fire place wasn’t that good and there were no fire wood. They did have some tools to chop or cut the wood but one is not allowed by law to fell a tree in another person’s (or the goverment’s / Metsähallitus’) forest so no campfire or warmth in here.

Walked the distance back to my vehicle and proceeded towards the next location –> pt. 2/2.