The night train carriages Finland doesn't want you to know about... Helsinki - Tornio/Lapland review

Fun Fact: The word "Kolari" means either "car crash" or "snowpusher", depending on the context. The former gives a hilarious twist at the car loading station where the signage says "Kolariin menevät autot" or "Cars heading to car crash"

I did the journey to Kolari once in December about 20 years ago spontaneously simply because there were no hotel rooms available in Helsinki. I imagined Kolari would be a big town but it was nothing but the end of the line and there was no return train for days. Ended up with a 4 hour bus journey to Rovaniemi where I spent 3 days. All unplanned. Great journey and the bus travelling on ice packed roads was something else! Thank you for bringing back the memories.

For those wondering, the red wagon attached along with the Dr16 locomotives at 8:17 is a generator car used to give electrical power to the passenger cabins.

Haha, extremely 1970's color scheme in the cabin. Brown and orange, I love it!

Can’t wait for Haparanda 🇸🇪 - Tornio 🇫🇮 - Kemi trains to be resumed. Fingers crossed for December 2024.

11:37 Not just any sleeper compartment - but one designated for pets. Notice the vinyl sign on the door and the courteously provided water bowl + bottle of water on the floor for your dog.

That art deco station in Helsinki is magnificent. Finland is a great country. I've only visited once briefly, but I intend to stay for longer next time.

Ahhh the good old blue carriages. These are the most comfortable carriages ever - but I'm talking about the seaters (which you'll find only on museum trains these days)! Those seats may not have power sockets and such but boy are they comfortable - I've spent half of my life traveling on them! Hell, the first time I did the night trains up to Kolari and Kemijärvi I slept on those seats just fine (well I was somewhat younger back then too)! Anyway for these blue sleepers they are comfortable enough, but that orange color just gets me every time. Easyjet, anyone? Anyway they have one major flaw which is the lack of air-conditioning. For April (and well most of the year in Finland!) it's not exactly a problem, but on those rare hot summer days they can be quite hellish. Back in June 2022 I was coming home from Kolari during a 30+ degree heat wave and those cabins were like ovens! People were actually sleeping on the floor and corridors of the carriages to try to escape the heat! To add insult to injury it was too hot even for our pair of diesel locomotives so they actually broke down somewhere halfway between Kolari and Tornio and it took several hours to get a replacement loco from Kemi, and the rest of the journey until Oulu was super slow as the single locomotive had serious issues with the long and heavy train... not a very comfortable journey let me tell you that! But apart from that they're a nice blast from the past. Good for you to catch one!

For some reason the old blue sleeping cars are still much better than the new double-deckers. As you said, they are quiet, but also cosy – the new double-deckers are excellent on paper, but they have some shortcomings: they are sterile white like a hospital room, the sound insulation is horrible (you can hear the mandatory door beeps on the stations through the walls and even someone in the neighbouring cabin farting), and there are bright LED lights (including the digital clock) that are very nasty when you want to catch sleep. I recommend anyone who takes the double-decker to bring some duct tape or blu-tac as well as earplugs, then they are bearable

Gotta love the 70's orange for the sink cabinet, that colour was common in UK carriages of the 70's but always dissappeared in later renovations.

I made my last trip to Kemi in a sleeper wagon in Feb 1973. That was an adventure as the wagon was very old-fashioned, maybe from the 1930's or so. I met interesting people who I will never forget.

After re-watching this, I realized you might be the first non Finnish person to mention the car carrying wagons. Everyone else just wonder why the night trains stop so soon after Pasila. All normal night trains stop at Pasila autojunaasema (Pasila car train station) and some winter/Christmas time extra night trains even start their journey from it, hence the nearly 450 meter long platform. 😉 There are currently two types of car carrying wagons. The fully enclosed ones are type Gd (formerly Hccmqqr) and the open top ones are type Gfot.

Love that you can bring the car on the train! I would love that in Sweden too! That’s the reason I’m driving now, need a car at the destination and it’s more expensive to rent than to drive all the way.

Thank you for the nostalgic trip! In the 80's I travelled with my Mom from Southern Finland to her home in Tornio. If I remember right, we had to switch train in Kemi, but not sure. The old rails kept clonking, and it was so exciting to sleep in the train. Flashbacks from the smell and sound of the train! 😅

I remember the time when all the VR sleeper cars were these old ones. Did a lot of work travel by then and it was always a gamble how the other persons in the cabin looked, smelled and sounded like. Back then the government only reserved one bed for the trips, so the cabin was filled up by strangers. You having the whole cabin for yourself was a luxury, but you missed the real experience. 😅

Fun fact, the Tornio line has not been used since 1967 (had to actually check), and is planned to be reopened "soon". I am glad they haven't scrapped all of the old carts so they can actually go to that line until they will electrify the whole route.

9:00 Wood is big business in Finland, for those who don't know. More than 73% of Finland is covered in forest.

A Finn here. This was a very nice and informative video! Personally I don't use trains very much here in Finland because I travel with my motorhome. Afrer 12:43 you crossed the Kemijoki which is the longest river in Finland, about 550 kilometers. For them who wonder that "VR" logo everywhere in the trains, it comes from "Valtion Rautatiet" which is Finnish for "State Railways". Welcome to Finland everyone and enjoy our railways and country :)

I did the journey in the opposite direction in the summer of 1972 after walkkng from Haparanda. No sleeping car but I got a good night's sleep jammed between two national servicemen going home to Helsinki on leave.

Thank you for the nostalgic journey ❤. When I was young (20-25 years ago) I often travelled from my home town Rovaniemi to Southern Finland on these carriages but even more often on the blue day carriages that they used before the IC trains and then alongside them as a cheeper option. I miss them because those velvety old seats were so much more comfortable to sleep on than the modern seats that are harder and you could also open the windows in the summer which worked more reliably than the aircon in IC carriages. Back then the student discount was 50% and you could buy a ticket without an asigned seat. It was 5€ cheaper, a good deal as you could get a beer from the restaurant car with that money 😆. Usually there were only couple of other crazy people travelling all night in the day carriages but if you were unlucky and the train was full, then you'd have to sit in the restaurant car or on the floor next to the doors. I even slept in the freezing cold freight car a couple of times (it used to be between the sleeping cars and the day cars). Back then the night trains were known to be a bit of a party trains and I have some great memories drinking with strangers and smoking in the tiny booth that smelled worse an ashtray if that's even possible 🤣.