In da woods

Yesterday I felt pretty good after a week indoors so I decided to take a walk. I’ve been feeling a bit nauseous in my head probably because of the hospital medications still so I haven’t done any long walks.

I’ve lived around here about 5 km radius all my life except first 6 years when we lived in the city centre and yet there’s still places I haven’t been to so I decided to tackle one such place and headed to nearby sandpits.

The sandpits were created in the 60’s when the big building fever hit and sand was needed for concrete for the blocks of flats. Those apartment houses were later inhabited by country people moving to city workers and the suburb was one of the most seedy in whole Helsinki and still the people there are suffering of more unemployment and less education than other areas.

But back to the sandpits. When I was a kid the sandpits were a no-go, they were full of dirty water, kids had drowned there and they were full of old cars and other junk until in the 90’s they were just used as a park but still not a very favorable place to go to. In 2018 both Helsinki and Vantaa decided to do something since the area is on both cities concern and the residents wanted more possibilities to outdoor activities there. The water was tested and the pits were cleaned of decades of junk thrown there and now there are three small ponds for people to swim and enjoy beach with firepits and one pond is reserved for dogs to swim. They are very popular on hot summer days and since you can’t park your car there people walk or bike which makes it safer.

On the other side of the ponds is a small forest and swamp which is a conservation area and I walked through it and enjoyed the firs and pines and moss. I was quite alone even though one of the busiest highways is  just about 500 metres away, you can hear it very well and there’s also the candy factory where I emerged from the woods.

After breathing the forest air deeply I walked home, all in all I walked about 5km and an hour and when I got to our street Sirius was on our neighbour’s roof and I asked her to come home with me and she did.

The last pic is from this morning as a blue tit was teasing her and she dropped one of the flowers from the windowsill.