Sunday trip to Lemmenlaakso

One dont always need to travel far and away to reach nice nature locations in Finland. For example today we drove about 25 minutes from home to experience an awesome walk in beautiful nature and some fresh air. We had heard about Lemmenlaakso area a few times before, and knew that it is a different kind of river valley than the most in Southern Finland. This nature reserve area itself aint huge, some 94 hectares, but it contains some old forests and groves not to mention river Kerava running through the forests. There are marked paths connecting two parking lots, one in the South and one in the North, the distance between these is about 2.5 km. It is a nice walk to make a round trip, one way following the river and coming back in the forests. Today the weather was nice -5 C, and it was snowing a bit, so the perfect conditions for a walk. I think that we saw less than 15 people during 2 hour 15 minutes we were out.

Need to get back

Especially in the spring or summer time there should be lots of birds and many different plants. The real speciality of the place is a kingfisher, which has been nesting in the river bed for a few years. It is very seldom seen there, and it would be a privilege to spot it with camera. The other rare species living in Lemmenlaakso area is a flying squirrel which is pretty much a nocturnal animal. I found out that they could be spotted the best (with the huge amount of luck!)  in the spring time when they are dating with others, and are more active in daylight, too.