After the ambulance left...

We switched on all our lights, rode slowly through the dark and stopped at the first camping and grilling place we could find - crashing quite a cosy party that was going on there. We were tired, cold, hungry, oh, and depressed.

In other circumstances the roads and the camping would have been perfect. We'll try again next year, right?...

Porkkala baby yeah!

So here goes for the details of the Saturday 1st October edition of the Sub24:

• Where: Porkkala
• How far is that? Well this you can decide. Lee and I will be meeting at Kauklahti train station at 16:30. From there it's a little over 30 km to the camping spot. For those who feel that's a little too far, meet us at Jorvas train station from where it's 20 km away. Zuzanna will be waiting there and arriving on the U-Train that pulls in at 17:13. 
• What do I need? The usual.
• Will I regret it? No.

Any questions? Please do tell in the comments section or on the Facebook page.

Saturday 1st Ocotber and Pikkujoulu

Hi guys,


Well the Sub24 season is drawing to a close now as the cold weather approaches our shores. But we would like to go out with a bang with the October edition! A few differences first of all:

• This time, it's going to be the first Saturday of the month, hence October 1st.
• We want to ride a little further than usual, and mainly on paved road. We're thinking of heading Kirkkonummi way. Any ideas where we could camp/ grill over there?
• And in order to beat the night, and since we are leaving on a Saturday, we will leave at the earlier time of 4pm.

So where should we meet? Bemböle, as usual? Or maybe Kauklahti train station? The latter has the advantage of being on the right side of Kirkkonummi and people who don't want to push themselves too much could get themselves there by train.

On a different note, Lee and I were thinking it would be nice to have a Sub24 Pikkujoulu for the regulars but also for anyone who wants to come and meet us to see that we are, in fact, quite nice people! The date we had pinpointed was Saturday 22nd Ocotber. Suggestions so far have included renting a sauna in town or even a mökki in the vicinity. We'd share the costs so either way it's unlikely to end up as much more than 25€/participant. 

Would you attend? Do you have any suggestions? Please answer the poll on the right hand panel so we can get an idea of interest. And comments would be greatly welcomed.

Charles

Sub35?

What a stupid idea!

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Just came back from the September edition of the Sub24. Here's what we can report.

The Good

• The turn-out. Six of us rode there together and two people joined later. Strong work!

• Three new faces:

Dima

Noora

Tim, on his fixie!

• The forest, as enjoyable as ever on a Friday night

• Saucisson

The Bad

• The weather on our way out, although it wasn't as bad as expected.

•  The smokiness of the lovely little grilling hut we found!

 

• Fashion sense of Xavier (aka "The Boy")

The Ugly

• Florian and Dima

• Charles eating smores

• ...and finally the nasty surprise when literally hundreds of school-kids invaded our forest in the morning

Thanks to everyone for coming and see you in October where we may break with routine and have it on the first Saturday of the month as a one off. Watch this space...

  

Here we go again!

Next sub 24: Friday 2nd September

Last time we had 8 riders. Let's beat our record! I can see already 5 people have voted that they are coming on the poll, which is promising.

So if you've never been with us, here's the gist: Bring yourself and your bicycle to the Shell station in Bemböle on Friday 2nd September at 17:30. If that's too early for you, just contact us (in the comments section, or on Twitter, or on Facebook, so no excuse!) and we'll make sure we wait for you.

What you need:

• A tent
  
• Sleeping bag and mat
• Food to grill
• Drinks (alcoholic or not, that's up to you)
• A willingness to share your food, drinks and life story
• Sub24 tradition encourages you to bring one "luxury item" to share. A bottle of something special, a local delicacy (the stranger, the better), or anything that you'd not usually expect to find on a camping trip.

And here's what you don't need: Coffee pot and coffee (and milk and sugar), loaf of bread and some jam, first aid kit, a lock for all bikes, matches and a night cap for eveyone...

Further packing tips and ideas can be found on this blog post.

This time we've decided to leave our destination open. This way it can be discussed with all participants at the Shell station on the day. We can go as far as people want, but also want to encourage anyone to come so if you're feeling a little nervous, we can easily redirect to a closer camping spot. Ideas so far: Nuuksio, Kaitalampi (via Velskolantie) or Pirttimäki (maybe this type we can actually end up on the lake we were aiming for last time!).

So tell your friends, get yourself motivated, confirm your presence in the poll (on the right-hand side of this blog) and see you in a week or so!

Breaking boundaries

When Lee and I first decided to start this sub24 tradition, we had been hoping that the idea would catch on and so we were delighted to leave from our usual Bemböle meeting point with 8 riders! Oh was that 7? No Lee in sight, where could the co-founder be? It turned out his trusty Crescent had decided to get the mother of all punctures merely 200 meters from the Shell station and so he had to go home and pick up his mountain bike instead. Little did he know then how useful that would turn out to be...

Kunnarlantie 

We actually caused traffic to have to seriously slow down to overtake all 8 of us. Bike power! 

Turning off the road at Pirttimäki 

"Here, turn! Turn!" 

Simo's already had enough ;-) 

Florian "The Beast"

At the water filling station, a kind soul accepted to take a picture of the whole group. 

Florian, Nico, and Charles' helmet 

Simo seems to have recovered now! 

"Are you sure we're going the right way Lee?"

We were not and so thanks to some creative map-reading led by Florian, we redirected to a smaller lake that involved pushing the bikes on the narrowest of trails. Xavier amazed us by actually riding long portions of it on his 23mm wheeled racing bike, Charles discovered the limitations of pulling a trailer, but in the end we all got our just reward with a lovely camping site and the warmest of waters to go and jump into at the end.

So many of us that all our tents didn't even fit on a picture! 

A common Sub24 sight!

For those that stayed up for the after-party, a rather uncommon site was seem in the sky - northern lights! You're not supposed to see them in the summer, right? Well, we did. Anyone get a good photo?! If you did, please do email us at sub24helsinki@gmail.com so we can put it up.

The morning after the night before. If only we were all in good enough condition to appreciate the beauty. And the ride home.

Thanks to Lee, Charles, Zuzanna, Xavier, Jussi, Simo, Florian and Nico for making this a memorable sub24 and we hope to see you again on the first Friday of September.