A chilly ride along the Finland-Russia border
Mark Stratton explores the coldest corner of the Iron Curtain, a stunning wilderness with a fraught history and an uncertain future
‘If you see a bear, take a photo, keep still, and hope for the best,” says Riina Helppi-Kurki, smiling. Ursus arctos or Russian bears, I wonder? She has made my arrangements for four days of cycling along EuroVelo 13, dubbed the “Iron Curtain trail”. This pan-European route includes an 830mile stretch along Eastern Finland’s border with Russia amid Western Europe’s most extensive boreal forests.
I expected immersion in wild nature, and maybe the odd bear, but Finland’s announcement on Thursday of its intention to join Nato, ending decades of non-military alignment with Russia, now means that this cycle route runs along what is destined to become one of the world’s most scrutinised borders.
THE WILDEST CORNER OF EUROPE
A good place to start is Lappeenranta in South Karelia, part of south-east Finland’s Lakeland district. Just a two-hour train journey from Helsinki, Karelia has been historically divided between Finland and Russia. This city of 70,000 inhabitants sits alongside magnificent Saimaa – Finland’s largest lake, studded with thousands of islands. It has been a long, cold winter here and all cruises to mark Finnish Mother’s Day (May 8) have been cancelled when I visit because the boats are frozen in dock.
From Lappeenranta, I ride 19 miles eastwards to the Russian border and join the Iron Curtain trail via the Saimaa Canal towpath. This mid-19th-century waterway is shared between the two nations and is important for trade as it runs deep into Russian Karelia. Finland has a lease on it until 2063, which Russia
is now threatening to cancel. The towpath leads me to a sign reading: “St Petersburg 180km”, where I veer northwards and join the trail close to the Russian border. Things then start to get really wild.
On narrow lanes, I plunge headlong into the boreal forest, which covers 75 per cent of Finland. Cones of pines, spruces and larch crunch beneath my tyres and in the forest’s muffled silence, the birdsong intensifies to a crescendo, woodpeckers pulverising trees like jackhammers. Bears, wolves and moose inhabit these woods, but it is flurries of yellow brimstone butterflies, dancing as if stirred by Sibelius’s Karelian Suite, that cause me to screech to a stop.
A GLIMPSE ACROSS THE BORDER
In its foraging and hunting, folklore and summer houses, Finnish culture embraces trees – indeed, over half of all Finns live within 700ft of a forest. It is no surprise, therefore, to encounter redpainted farmsteads deep in the woods and little summer houses with saunas. One, on a tiny islet on Lake Nuijamaa, offers my first view across into Russia’s taiga. There are no fences, just an open border delineated by painted posts.
The farmsteads yield delicious produce that finds its way on to my breakfast plate throughout my journey. Spruce syrup, lingonberry preserve and Karelian pies – oval-shaped tarts of rye dough stuffed with rice porridge – are all regional specialities.
At times I am exploring centuries of shifting borders where ideologies and soldiers have clashed. Beyond Imatra, a sprawling town on the River Vuoksi, which Catherine the Great visited in 1772, the 17th-century Niska-Pietila border road once demarcated the Swedish and Russian Empires.
Beyond this, at Rautjarvi, Heikki Penttila has built lakeside chalets for guests. When I arrive, he is constructing a second sauna cabin from alder wood with his son and a Ukrainian employee, Alesia. A sauna is perfect for weary legs and best enjoyed with company, and the four of us sweat and sip beers until darkness falls.
“I built this lodge with Russian guests in mind in 2014 – and they invaded Crimea. Now, I start work on a second sauna and they invade Ukraine,” Penttila says with droll Finnish understatement. Even Alesia, whose father is fighting in the Donbas region, smiles.
The next day, I ride within 160ft of a border screened by a silver birch curtain. But I am focused skywards on the mass migration of barnacle geese arriving from the Arctic tundra to pitstop on Siikalahti’s damp meadows, joining lapwings with Tintin-style quiffs.
They are still honking away as I settle down for my third night by Lake Suur Rautjarvi, near Saari, in a cabin. The owner, Kari Kiiveri, arrives with a thick wedge of Mother’s Day cake. He says his family have lived around this lake since 1683 – at times Russian, or Swedish, but always Finnish at heart.
A TURBULENT PAST
Moscow warned Finland of “consequences” when it announced it was considering joining Nato. In the past, border relations were turbulent after Finland fought for independence from the Soviet Union in 1917. Further conflict followed. The Winter War of 1939 saw Finland defending itself against Soviet invasion and losing 10 per cent of its territory in Karelia; the 1941-44 Continuation War saw the Finns attempt to retake it.
Thereafter, Finland pursued appeasement and neutrality during the Cold War era, or “Finlandisation” as it became known. The cost of independence, however, was Soviet interference in its domestic and political affairs. But it maintained the status quo, until Russia’s invasion of Ukraine finally swayed public opinion, previously against joining Nato, to abandon neutrality.
Several excellent museums along the trail highlight Finland’s fraught relationship with Russia. Even if you have little interest in military history, Imatra’s Veterans Museum, inside the 1925 neoclassical Villa Piponius, hosts a treasure-trove of family heirlooms.
‘We’ve no problem with our neighbours. They want the same things in life, money and food’
Dapper 69-year-old Jarmo Ikavalko shows me around a collection of war memorabilia accumulated by his father, who fought in both the Winter and Continuation Wars.
Among the medals and tunics are some extraordinary items, not least photographs of Hitler in 1942 arriving outside Imatra to formalise an alliance with Finland to attack the Soviet Union. At one stage Jarmo winds up a 1940s mechanical air-raid siren. “Let’s hope we don’t hear this again,” he says.
Simo Hayha Museum at Miettila is a repurposed Russian garrison base dating from the 1880s. It is dedicated to a local lad who became a national hero as a sniper during the wars between 1939 and 1944. Volunteer Kari Partanen shows me the medals Hayha earned for skiing and shooting. He says the Finnish army are masters of fighting in snow and woodland and have nothing to fear. “We’ve no problem with our neighbours,” he says. “They want the same things in life, enough money to survive and food on the table.”
A NATION OF STOICS
Finland topped the World Happiness Report in 2022, yet its people have a reputation for being melancholic and taciturn. This is perhaps a little overstated, but they definitely possess sisu, a stoical
determination and pragmatism to prevail in difficult circumstances. Those I spoke to are calm about joining Nato and if small talk isn’t their thing, they are open to discussing the situation.
“I was against joining Nato but I’m now glad,” says Penttila during our sauna, displaying admirable sisu by wearing a woolly hat in 66C heat. “We have a strong army but must protect ourselves. I think the border will remain safe because there are hundreds of kilometres of forest we feel part of.”
The economic impact concerns Riina Helppi-Kurki, who promotes tourism to Saimaa. “Russian tourism was very important for Lappeenranta,” she says. “Russians come here to holiday and shop while we head over there to buy cheaper petrol and vodka. This has all stopped.” Likewise, Kari Kiiveri says he is losing business because 60 per cent of his guests were Russians, many on weekend breaks from St Petersburg.
NATURE HEALS
My final day involves cycling back to Simpele to catch a train to Helsinki. I hadn’t met a single other cyclist on the trail, although the summer season had barely begun. Perversely, all the jittery attention the border is currently attracting may shine a positive spotlight on this unique and adventure-filled region. With every day I spent immersed amid fragrant forests and shimmering lakes, any tension of geopolitical proximity simply ebbed away.
That is the philosophy of Anne Repo, with whom I end my stay at her B&B by the Kangaskoski rapids. Within just under half a mile of the border, her guesthouse is a converted border guard post, active between 1955 and 2008. She calls it her “nature healing powerhouse”. You can walk the sparkling salmon-rich river near her property, and she offers guests herbal or peat saunas to restore body and mind. “People come here to calm down and use nature to de-stress,” she says. I can certainly think of one man in desperate need of this to ensure beautiful South Karelia remains all quiet on the eastern front.