Welcome to Slouppi's topo database. The climbing locations are sorted
by geographical areas. Start by selecting preferred province or area
from the list or from the map. If you already know what to seek for,
you can also use SEARCH TOOL and 'Quick topo search' on the right. If you do not find
desired info, try searching wih 'Other topo sources'.
The topo collection within Slouppi is not complete and we gladly receive topos or links to topo pages to be published. For more complete presentation covering almost every location in Finland, please refer to topo book by SKIL. You'll find the book from all well equipped climbing shops.
On these pages, french grading is used for bolted or partially bolted routes. Natural lines are graded with Finnish scale and Fontainebleau scale is used for boulders.
= bolted route
= natural route
= boulder
Note: Due to scaling reasons, some topos might not show accurate on screen. They will however print out well with a decent printer.
Finland is relatively flat country. Steep cliffs suitable for
climbing are rare, although it can be optimistically assumed that
the best cliffs are still to be found. Stone species is mostly
granite which means that cracks are common. Other species
like gabro, rapakivi, diorite, gneiss and sandstone are
found in some areas. No limestone cliffs are known to exist.
There are also some areas where the rock is known to contain very
special formations, not seen in ordinary granite. Good examples
of this are bouldering areas at Rovaniemi and Tussinkallio
at Korso. Pockets are the characteristic hold-type in these areas.
Due to the geology of Finnish
rock there are not many "easy routes" (below UK VS, French 4+, US
5.7) but all the climbing is on crags as opposed to mountain-cliffs.
Only handful of routes nationwide are longer than one rope length,
and most are considerably less than this length. Intrestingly
there are also few large overhangs to be found on Finnish cliffs
- althought this does not mean that the smaller ones that do exist
have oblinging holds!
Since granite is the major rock type in Finland, climbing was
for a long time mostly traditional type crack climbing with leader-placed
gear. In 1998 Falkberget started a new era of sport climbing in
Finland as the first cliff with routes of all grades bolted. The
history of sport climbing of course started earlier, at in the
turn of nineties. A pioneer was Henrik Suihkonen who established
sport routes on Nummi cliff, still the hardest sports crag in
Finland.
Bouldering has been practised in Finland since 1950's but a real boom was
seen when Vaasa bouldering was discovered in 2000. After this new places
have been discovered all around the country. Sometimes you will find only
one really good boulder in the middle of woods but luckily some bigger
concentrations exist too. Local boulderers are the best source of
information as topos and guides lag behind the development.
(Text: Rami Haakana-Toby Archer-Samuli Lehtonen)
