Deserted Finland

A Midsummer Adventure Part IX

First views from the second floor.

The traditional greetings.

More machinery.

The beautiful evening light.

Workbenches.

Everything in the mill seemed mechanical.

This is childish.

The oh so traditional can of pickled cucumber found in almost every single abandoned building I’ve visited.

The mill machinery has been built in 1949 in Poland. This means that the mill is also probably from 1949.

More mysterious machinery.

Actually a whole row of it.

Finding my way higher up.

A view from the window. The windows have been torn loose and thrown on the roof of the ground floor.

More grain.

And more pipes.

More machinery labels. This one is domestic production.

I wonder what these do.

The millstone is probably attached to this axle.

The building was fairly primitively constructed.

A Midsummer Adventure Part VIII

It was now the morning of Midsummer eve. I had caught a train to a city where I once lived for one summer, and met a group of friends at the railway station. The plan was simple. We would spend midsummer eve at the summer cottage of my friend’s grandparents doing the traditional things: eating, going to sauna and perhaps lighting a small bonfire. The following day I could borrow the second car of my friend’s parents and could go exploring my way in the region.

When we were returning from the cottage, we already found the first location.

Back when I lived in the region in 2010, this mill was still operating. Apparently it closed in the 2010’s.

All open doors. And a lot of grain.

A messy photo which I didn’t delete for some reason.

Interesting machinery.

The place was in a surprisingly worn out condition despite having closed just a few years earlier.

It was also in a pretty original shape.

Most of the building’s windows had been smashed including those on the inside.

The office door.

Barley flour labels. I’ve removed the name of the location.

The small office room.

A telephone book from 1998.

Everything here looked pretty old fashioned.

There was grain all over the floor.

There wasn’t much to see downstairs. The logical step would be to go up at this point.

The final unexplored corner downstairs.

A scale.

So, up we go.

A boat was stored in the back yard.

A view towards the ground floor we just finished exploring.

A Midsummer Adventure Part VII

The final location of the day was yet another familiar one. It was the block of flats I first discovered in 2021.

Three years had passed since those photographs, but nothing much had happened. Only all the windows and doors had been covered with plywood and large advertising banners placed on the ground floor facades.

I wasn’t expecting anything, but one of the doors to the stairways was open. It was however still early in the evening, and there were a lot of people downtown. We couldn’t get in unnoticed, so we walked back to my friend’s place.

I got up at 6am the following morning. I was sure, that the city would be empty at that point and I could sneak in unnoticed. When I got to the house, it was all a disappointment: the door, that was open the previous evening, had been shut overnight. No luck here.

I boarded a train and headed eastwards. I was to spend the midsummer at a friend’s place, whose parents had promised, that I could borrow their second car to visit locations in the area. This was a dead end, but the Midsummer Adventure was far from over.

A Midsummer Adventure Part VI

While heading towards the home of my friend, we suddenly spotted something, which definitely looked abandoned.

You can’t really be mistaken because of the boarded windows.

Let’s see, if there’s a way in.

Nope, no way in. So what is this place?

It’s a former farm house built in 1927. At some point it was converted to be used by mental health services. Use ended in 2019 and the city wanted to demolish it and replace it with more modern housing. As it turned out, that it is the last farm house left in the city, they are now reconsidering.

This place was waiting. And we still had one location to go before finally heading to my friend’s place to sleep.

A Midsummer Adventure Part V

Here I am approaching another railside discovery. It was another old house, which I had spotted through train windows.

And a rather beautiful one, too. Although the place did seem abandoned, the front door was closed and there seemed something off with the place. We didn’t proceed further.

It was already getting late, we had walked for almost 20 kilometers and were getting extremely tired. It was time to start heading towards my friend’s home.

A Midsummer Adventure Part IV

The following location was a bit outside town. It was a small one family home located next to a railroad track. I had spotted it through train windows while passing, and believed, that I had managed to map it correctly.

And it sure did look like it. The place had been abandoned for ages. It looked a bit run down already in Google Street View Photos from 2009.

Moving closer. The house actually seems to be in a pretty good condition.

That’s not a proper way to board a window.

The door was open. Bingo!

The location seems to have been on sale. Judging by this sign, quite a long time ago. I haven’t bothered removing the name of the city here. You can soon see why.

And that was because there was pretty much nothing to sell anymore. The ceiling had come down, the floor had failed. It was clear from this sight, that the building would collapse completely any coming winter.

An interesting place to store a dress like that – in the corner of the kitchen.

That does not look healthy.

There was another room. But the place was so badly damaged it wasn’t worth going any further.

A magazine from 2006. Perhaps that is a hint of the date of abandonment.

A Midsummer Adventure Part III

Here we have another new location. This one was built in the 1920’s as a furniture factory. After that use the buildings served as town offices, a textile factory, a car inspection company, a vocational school, a library and the local voluntary fire brigade.

The use of the buildings ended in 2014. After that a new plan to demolish them and build new apartments emerged.

This building has served as a garage.

And this here is the main building on the lot.

The strange brick facade and an outdated security camera. They are of no use in guarding this lot. But there was also no entry.

A Midsummer Adventure Part II

Right next to the previous factory was another one. This one was closed in 2022, when the malt factory in the area moved to a new location outside town. The company still has some activity on the lot, though.

Photographed here are massive silos built in the 1960’s.

The area is currently being replanned. Most of the buildings will probably be demolished.

Another building in the area. The old silos are from the 1930’s and 1950’s.

The old malt factory lurks at the back. It is probably from the 1960’s.

The courtyard side of the newer silos.

And this is probably the old yeast factory from the 1920’s.

No entry this time. But at least I’ve documented the area because most of it will be demolished in the future.

A Midsummer Adventure Part I

As I no longer had a summer car, I bought train tickets, which covered my entire holiday. The Finnish national railroad company started selling them some years ago and they covered a fixed amount of time during which you could book a ticket on any train. Well, I bought two of them to cover my entire holiday.

It was midsummer eve. I contacted a friend, who lived in a city with several promising locations. We met at the train station and embarked on a long walk.

The first location was a former plywood mill opened in 1920 and closed in 2010. The area was now being rezoned, and I had no hopes of getting in, but I wanted to give it a try.