Home to around 177,000 inhabitants, the Salpausselkä UNESCO Global Geopark is located in southern Finland, in the southernmost part of the Finnish Lakeland, covering an area of 4,506 km². Around 21% of the geopark is covered by water and over half by forests. The hundreds of lakes in the geopark are a central feature of the landscape, along with the long, distinct Salpausselkä rid...
Celebrating Earth HeritageGeology of the area consists of four distinct elements: the Palaeoproterozoic granitic bedrock, the Ediacaran sandstone remnant of Lauhanvuori, the Palaeozoic to Quaternary multi-layered sediment cover and the Holocene peatlands. These elements tell the story of development of the landscape from an Alpine type mountain range 1900 million years ago to the flat, mire- cov...
Celebrating earth heritageSaimaa is the largest lake in Finland and the 4th largest in Europe. Saimaa Geopark tells the geological story of Saimaa: an expansive lake area with fragmented and ancient bedrock reshaped during the ice age. Uneven uplift and tilting has shaped its shoreline, outlet channels and directions of water flow. Over the many phases of its history, the Saimaa area has developed...
Celebrating Earth HeritageRokua UNESCO Global Geopark is situated in Northern Finland, about 200 km south of the Arctic Circle between the cities of Oulu and Kajaani.The UNESCO Global Geopark geosites tell the story of the gradual development of the terrain from below a kilometer-thick ice mass to the deep bottom of the ancient Baltic Sea and further via an island and shore stage to become the pre...
