My neighbour offered a belated birthday trip to a public sauna with him, and in this balmy weather, who could turn that down? It has been raining and just above freezing today, and after working for a bit in the garden to get ready for spring, a sauna sounded great.
I haven't been to a public sauna for a year or two I think and while we were talking I realised that I might have only gone to them in the winter, or close to winter, but I would like to try in summer also. This particular one has been operating as a public sauna for just shy of a hundred years, but it isn't the oldest public sauna in the city. In fact, it is just a youngster, as the oldest public sauna in Finland is also in this city and has been operating for 120 years.
As this is a mixed sauna, everyone is wearing swimwear, though some others have either separated times for same-sex groups, or two different saunas where people are naked. But, there is a very large age range of patrons that use them where for instance there were late teens all the way through to people in their eighties enjoying the heat. And these are big saunas, that sit somewhere around fifty or sixty people at a time. Though as you can see from the pictures, people are coming from and going to the lake, or sitting out having a drink all the time, so at any one moment there might be a hundred people visiting. There is also a smaller, slightly cooler sauna out of shot, that sits about twenty.
Also as you can see, people are swimming in the lake, which they keep open through the winter by using pumps that keep the water moving. The ice would otherwise close up in a couple hours. And normally when I have been, the air temperature is much colder than the water temperature, but today it was a couple degrees above zero, and the water was at 1.1°C (34°F ), making it seem a bit colder than usual. I only dip in after the sauna for ten seconds or so, but the feeling when exiting is like having mild electricity through the limbs. It feels really, really good. And no, people don't have heart attacks doing this, unless they are already about to have a heart attack.
If you have the chance, go.
While we were sitting in there, I was wondering how unique this kind of thing is, where you have a group of strangers, hot and sweaty, sitting in close proximity to each other. And while you might think it is nice and quiet, it is often louder than a nightclub as people are talking to each other, but with everyone so close, the level keeps going up to be heard. But it isn't an unpleasant experience, just something to get use to. Same with people who decide to throw water too often onto the stove, because these saunas can get hot, very fast. Next time, I will be sure to take a sauna hat of some kind, or a beanie, to protect my ears. We normally don't think too much about the feeling in our ears, but in here when the steam descends, your ears will let you know they are there.
I skipped the gym for this.
However, since I can go to the gym often enough, I chose the experience instead. And it is nice to sit around with a mate and just talk about various life things. There was no discussion about the news or politics or war, and instead through the several rounds of sauna to lake and back again, I just asked about his kids and talked about renovation ideas they have planned. Nothing in particular.
And as we say every time:
We should do it more often.
Taraz
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The sauna can kind of count as a gym right XD
I've been in a sauna all of once but it was as a teenager and my friend and I had no idea what we were doing and had no idea we weren't supposed to be fully dressed in there so we made it comfortably warm and wondered what all the fuss was XD
The outlaws have been for one of the naked ones which freaked my mother in law in particular out as she is extremely oldschool extremely modest and I think she cowarded out of the dip and I can't remember if father in law tried but their host (an old friend of theirs from there) definitely did.
So when's your next catchup with your friend? :)
Sweaty, but not sure if it counts :D
Fully dressed? Don't you find it funny that so many English speaking countries have an issue with nudity? Especially in Australia where people don't mind mooning. :D
It is his birthday in a couple weeks, so we are planning to have a group gathering and a few drinks. :)
Sweating burns energy right XD
Asian countries seem to have the same issues. In the highly specific case of me and my friend we just literally had no idea that's what you were meant to do XD We weren't even planning on going to a gym and definitely were not dressed for it, we were kind of dressed for a neat casual dinner as our families were having dinner in some tiny resort/hotel/thing and there was a very small "gym" (basically about the size of an average family room in a medium-large 3-4 bed detached house) that had a single sauna inside. We were bored while the adults were yapping and found our way in there and played with the gym equipment for a while (which involved seeing how "hard" we could make the treadmill and exercise bike before it became impossible and also how much weight we could lift, totally safe stuff like that) and then found the sauna.
Ahh good, you'll be doing this more often in no time :D
I used to go to the public sauna in Kharkiv and all of them were men only and everyone was naked. We didn't have a fancy lake to dip into, but we usually did have a small cold pool, so I totally recall the tingling sensation after the dip.
In America they have sauna in most gyms, but they usually don't run them hot enough with maximum temperatures between 180 and 200. Also people in gyms would complain if you put any water on the rocks. So I would sneak in a water bottle and in rare occasions when nobody was there I would add some. Later I bought and installed a sauna in my extra building on the lake...
Do women ever go? There are various "sauna cultures" in Finland where for instance, my wife would never go with her dad (now that she is grown), but my ex is from an area where everyone goes together. Most friend groups don't mind mixing for a sauna.
A sauna without steam would be a mild torture I think. It is the same in Australia where they don't really know how to use one. Turkish baths are nice too.
This is great. We have one at home (wood-fired) but we don't use it often, because it is a bit poorly built and doesn't heat and circulate the air properly. It is okay for me, but not up to my wife's standards :D
I had one of these saunas but without infra-red (older model) with a heater from Finland :)
In Ukraine women would also go to a sauna, but they had their own public saunas. There never was any mixing in the nude saunas :)
You have infra-red too? I am not sure about it. Some love it, but for me it isn't quite "right" :D
One of my cloest friends has a sauna on her land, it is amazing. I also had friend in Ireland that have a mobile sauna and I loved using it when they parked up by the sea. So that we could jump into the Atlantic Ocean after wards. I highly recommend them.
Amazing that you have a choice of saunas.
Happy belated birthday.
That sounds awesome. They have sauna boats here, where they float around the lake, and you can rent mobile ones. However the one that takes the cake, is some of my friends who put one in an old car one summer and were driving around with a burning stove in the front seat, and a chimney out the top. The police took them off the road of course :D
You always manage to put into words those doubts that many of us prefer to ignore for the sake of convenience. I like how you connect everyday life with much bigger questions about where we are headed. Being honest about your own uncertainties unequivocally invites us to sit down and meditate on our own.
I agree with you that real value lies in consistency and not in immediate results, even though it is sometimes difficult to maintain that focus.
And there is a very particular beauty in the way you observe simple things. We forget that life happens precisely in those details you share, such as waiting for spring or your little daughter's small steps. Today I remembered my daughter Sofía in a photograph I posted, as it is #tbt Thursday. Blessings.
I hope so, because it also helps me to get them out of my head.
How much does Matthew know about Sofia?
Matthew knows absolutely everything about his sister Sofia's story. When he was between 4 and 5 years old, he had an imaginary friend named Sofia.
Probably a good way for a kid to deal with it.
In which city is this in? Why do I think it's Tampere? I actually did not internalize that you are in/from Finland. I have been looking for people from Finland in Hive for a long time now. Great, and I have been following you since Somee - days, I think.
Because it is officially the sauna capital of the world! :D
Tervetuloa :)
Hahah, yeah, of course! And thanks! ✨
Or should I say, Moro
No totta perkeleessä! 😂
This Sauna option is not in.here and I never been to any, but after reading the post it seems to be a good place to socialise and experince the chit-chat of real world.
I think you'd enjoy it. Quite a few foreigners get into it.
Sounds like it was a good time. I think I would be quite uncomfortable in a place like that, but I might try it once just to say I did it.
You'd love it. No one need talk, or look at each other if they don't want it :)
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