My friends, Martti and Kaarina, as is common for many Finnish families, own a summer cottage on a lake shore. When I first visited their site a few decades ago, the only building standing was a rough-hewn log cabin, its left side walled off and made into an authentic smoke sauna, the type most prized by Finns (read it here), and a type becoming increasingly rare. One weekend Martti drove me to his cottage and eased me into the complicated joys of heating up, and sweltering in, his smoke sauna.

Regular readers of this blog may recall that Martti, the Finnish professor and my collaborator from time to time, launched us onto other noteworthy trips. He and I once traveled by bus to Leningrad, where we sampled Russian culture and absorbed the smothering effects of Communistic rule (read it here, and here). On another occasion, Martti drove us to Lapland where we rounded up reindeer in the middle of a night ablaze with light from a sun refusing to go away (read it here).

Idyllic setting

Martti’s summer cabin stood in an idyllic setting, a few yards from the shore of huge Lake Suvasvesi (a body of crystal clear water covering 90 square miles). Extending back from the shore was a stately forest of tall trees. Martti, Kaarina, and their son Juhana, had constructed the entire cabin from old discarded logs. I considered it to be a jewel, especially the sauna side of it that contained an ample stone fire pit with wooden benches in front of it.

It started to rain lightly as I inspected the place. Martti, well prepared as always, pulled out rain gear and handed me a bright yellow outfit. At that moment, nature emerged at its finest. Imagine the whisper of tiny falling drops blending with hushed bird talk and rhythmic waves lapping along the shore. I stood enthralled, I think with my mouth open, but Martti prodded me into action.

Work required

Firing up a smoke sauna, I quickly learned, requires real work, and a ton of patience. We began the chore by gathering kindling wood, a pleasant task, before getting more physical and swinging axes to split logs, many, many logs, mostly birch as I recall. We whacked away for maybe half an hour, time enough to build up a good pile of fuel.

Next we layered the kindling and a generous amount split wood into the fire pit and Martti set a match to it. Soon flames leaped, heat became intense, we closed the small entrance, and smoke poured out a gap in a wall near the roof (there was no chimney). I thought for a time that the entire structure might begin to flame. (Smoke saunas, I later learned, have been known to burn down.).

By that time I was ready to sample the sauna, but Martti said more time was needed. The fire burned on, we added more fuel, the stones got hotter, as did the walls. Still it wasn’t ready according to Martti’s practiced eye. In fact, it would take a few more hours of refueling and heating. By then the walls themselves were burning hot to the touch, and they, and everything else inside the sauna, were covered with a thin layer of soot.

After our last refueling, Martti indicated it was time to allow the fire to burn down and the smoke to clear. To commemorate that moment, we set up a tripod and took a photo.

While waiting for the sauna to clear of smoke, Martti pulled from a cooler two bottles of number IV beers, the strongest of Finnish brews. We popped off the caps and leisurely drank the chilled liquid as the sauna readied itself for us. The rain stopped. Our surrounding world was quiet and at peace. Life had never been better.

Finally the moment came. Feeling mellow and a bit tired from our hours of effort, not to mention the beer, I was keen for the experience. We disrobed and took in towels to sit on, along with rags to wipe soot from the bench. The heat was INTENSE, and it soon got hotter as Martti ladled water from a pail onto hot rocks and released a blast of steam that came at us like a blowtorch. The steam caught in my throat, a sensation of heat unlike any I had felt before. Sweat was dripping. I felt an urge to run for the door. But in its own way, the heat became relaxing.

Fuzzy details

Memory fails me here. Certain details are fuzzy. I cannot remember where the hot rocks were, the ones Martti ladled water on to increase the sauna’s heat, but a hazy, unreliable image suggests they were in a metal container on the floor. Nor do I remember how long each of our sessions in the smoke sauna lasted, or what we did during each break, our first one coming after about 10 minutes inside.

But I do see snatches of our gaps as we cooled between bouts with the sauna’s heat. In at least one interval (actually, I think it was two), we sat outside where the above photo had been taken and downed another number IV, for extra fortitude you might say. And of course, we needed to lower our body temperatures after we had been properly baked. I remember that specific scene extremely well.

Cold lake

Before our sauna was ready, Martti had stuck a thermometer into the clear water of Lake Suvasvesi and showed me the water temperature was 5^° Celsius (41^° Fahrenheit), a liquid refuge promising to be a chilling change from the sauna’s blast of its air heated to at least 85^° Celsius (185^° Fahrenheit), and probably more.

After we came out of the sauna for the last time, Martti tramped off to the lake shore, me following. I watched him move bravely into the icy water. He was up to mid-waist and splashing water on his shoulders when my foot first touched the water. I don’t know what it was, maybe my muscles being cooked to medium rare, or the number IV beers, or maybe just the thrill of adventure, but something caused me to rush into the water in one swoosh and splash past Martti, free-styling my way to almost the end of his pier before stopping and treading water as I caught my breath. Was I cold? Yes. But it didn’t matter. I felt great!

Martti seemed to approve of my lengthy dip. We waded out, grabbed towels, dried off, and enjoyed another beer while sitting naked on the ledge outside of the cooling sauna, each of us properly mellowed to the extreme, each of us filled with joy.