28-Jul-2001 -- "Be adventurous" is the challenge stated at the end of the
step-by-step instructions on How to Find a Confluence.
For us, the most adventurous and challenging element of
this visit was how to get our 8-week old baby to the spot.
According to the Finish GT-4 road map (scale 1:200.000)
which we used to get in the general vicinity, we could get
as close as 300m to the confluence on a smaller road about
2 km WNW from Ruovesi, and luckily the confluence would not
be located in a lake.
Forests dominate the Finnish
landscape, covering more than 70% of the country, and
really, after parking the car, we found ourselves in the
middle of a 80-year old Norway Spruce dominated forest -
according to my Garmin GPS 12 only 230 m from the
confluence.
Immediately attacked by numerous mosquitoes, the baby
carried in a belt by my wife and our two daughters protected
by their jackets despite 23 degr. centigrade in the air,
we started zeroing in on the confluence.
After only 50 m
in the older forest, we had to make our way through a quite
dense 20-year old plantation of Scotch Pine with heavy
underbrush. On the last 120 m to the confluence, the forest
became even younger and easier to walk in and finally I
realized that the confluence would be located almost in the
middle of a 5-6 ha big recently re-forested site.
The young trees (mainly Scotch Pine and Norway Spruce)
were only 5 years old and not very tall. My GPS received
10 satellites in the orbit and with no obstacles all the
way to the horizon I had perfect conditions to zero in with
highest possible accuracy (EPE 4 m).
First thing I did was
setting up a flag with latitude and longitude to mark the
confluence. I also attached a paper on the flag with a
screenshot of the confluence web-site and with the European
map showing all the successful confluences.
After shooting the pictures we left the confluence after
30 min. On our way back home we took a refreshing bath in
the lake close to Ruovesi village. We really had fun and a
great day. Maybe this was also the youngest person to visit a confluence so far!