long-o-tron · 2006-01-08 17:38
I’d forgotten to walk, distracted by winter and, until now, constrained by Helsinki. Whenever I had been walking in the summer, I was never very fulfilled. I tried beating the bounds of Katajanoka and Kruununhaka, Hietaniemi, Töölö, but none felt far enough or complete enough.
I had stupidly dismissed Central Park – first of all not understanding quite where it was, then that it was hard to get to (actually, the opposite was true; hard to get away from). It’s like the Lea Valley Park, if it bisected London all the way to the Barbican. Helsinki scale to London scale: 10 kilometres to 26 miles. Forest in the centre of the city, then the suburbs. Roads cross and crossed, train tracks above, perpendicular.
Today seemed a good day. I’d found a map of Central Park whilst tidying, there was great weather (-5, sunny), I wanted to test the winteriness of my new winter jacket, get my snow legs back and check out the possibilities of cross-country skiing. And, to walk.
I hadn’t planned to walk all the way, to the edge of the city. I had no sense of scale, and time, and my initial designated finishing point appeared within 45 minutes. Always a lodge within distance, walkers tempted further by coffee and a bun.
Initial disorientation eased as the flow of the park, marks and signs became apparent. Always enough people to feel safe, not enough to slow progress (until, near the north, you get thrown into a car park, filled with standard Sunday families driving to the ski and sledding hill).
Once at the Vantaa River, the end of the park and city limits, the difficulty was getting away. The first bus stop was office hours only, so then a walk through industrial estates and suburbs, half-remembered from a quickly seen map, walking towards and then parallel to the sound of fast cars. Eventually a bus stop, in the right direction, and a bus. Bus scale to walking scale: 10 minutes to 3 hours.
One thought for the lazyweb, for someone quicker to code: I want a Richard Long-o-tron, allowing quick addition of text to a picture, a record of a walk. Add in more text effects and you’ll have a Hamish Fulton-o-tron too.