Saunas were invented in Finland and are a very important part of the culture here. There are only around 5 million people in the entire country (there are around 20 million just in the state of Florida where we just moved from). We have heard that there are over 2 million saunas here in Finland. That’s a lot of saunas for only 5 million people! And I know what you are wondering…  and the answer is YES, they do go naked here in their saunas!!  We have also heard that sometimes after a sauna they also go jump in a hole in the ice into the freezing water of a lake or ocean…  and yes, still naked!!  Yikes!  I wouldn’t mind trying this, but only if I had a wetsuit on!

When we were looking for an apartment here, we were very surprised that pretty much all of them included a sauna. When we came to look at our apartment, I remember us looking at the sauna and thinking that it could be another bedroom or a walk-in-closet! The apartments are much more expensive here and a lot smaller, so we were thinking of other uses for the space at first!

Well, we moved into our place about 2 weeks ago, and decided to give this sauna thing a try.  We were also battling a cold that we picked up from our London trip and thought that maybe the sauna would help a little.   Our first evening trying it out ended up with me at one point coughing like crazy and having to run out of it!!!  I think we were way too excited about pouring the water from our wooden spoon and bucket into the sauna heater with the rocks!   All that steam just about killed me!! Lol

We have used our sauna about 5 times so far and have learned not to pour so much water into it anymore and are beginning to love the experience now!  I am starting to wonder how we ever lived without one!!  No wonder Finland has saunas everywhere. The Finns love their saunas, am I am finally understanding why.  You feel so relaxed after the sauna, and are able to go right to bed afterwards and sleep like a baby.  This is great for me since I have always been a night owl and now I am finally able to get to bed earlier!

Here are a few photos from our sauna:

Our sauna heater with the cool rocks… still not too sure if we are using this thing correctly.

Eucalyptus mix that we used while we were battling our colds and our wooden spoon and bucket.

Starting to heat up the sauna… this is our temperature gauge.

Our sauna has two platforms to lay on and a moveable bench on the floor.

I’m sure this Florida girl we will be hibernating in our sauna this winter! I’m not going to want to leave the apartment once it starts snowing here, but at least I will have our sauna to thaw out in! 🙂