Mention ‘Finland’ to most people and they think of lakes and forests, the Arctic and Saunas. They probably even imagine that after a steamy, hot sauna (pronounced ‘sow-na’ up there, incidentally), a beating with birch twigs and a dash to jump in a near-frozen lake, the natives must be particularly hardy. They certainly seem to live longer than most other Europeans. In part that may be because they take exercise quite seriously and eat healthily.

Because of the extreme heat in most of Europe last summer, I was looking forward to visiting Finland as, for the first time in two months, it would be an opportunity to experience the cooler sort of climate I had grown up with in Ireland. Better pack a pullover or two, I thought. Evenings can be very cold in summer up towards the Arctic Circle. Surprise number one: Finland was having a heat wave! Even in the part I was going to, Savonlinna, more than 200 miles north-east of Helsinki, close to the Russian border, indeed at times in the past Savonlinna was the Russian border, the temperature was well over 25 degrees. So, as most other people there seemed to think swimming was a good idea, it would have been churlish not to have joined them.

The purpose of the visit was to attend the much-acclaimed opera festival which takes place in the city for a month in July each year. It is held in the courtyard of the impressive castle of Olavinlinna, built in 1475 to keep out Russians and other aggressive forces, and occupying an entire island, reached from the mainland by a drawbridge.

The festival features leading international directors such as Sir Peter Hall, Jonathan Miller and Elijah Moshinsky as well as singers who are no less well-known. Needless-to-say, the standard was extremely high with each performance sold-out many months in advance. The city and its lakeside surroundings are delightful. Thanks to the compactness of the place, the city has only 28,000 people, it is possible to walk to each destination and, of course, it is surrounded by forests and water.

Did you know that 20 per cent of the entire Finnish population (more than one million people) own forestal land which in aggregate amounts to 75 per cent of the entire country? And it’s a big country, the seventh largest in Europe, measuring 720 miles in length by some 330 miles at its widest.

Everybody encountered speaks English, together with Finnish and Swedish and, sometimes, German and Russian as well. Under the treaty that granted Finland her independence from Sweden in 1917, as long as six per cent of the entire population of Finland were Swedes, the Swedish language had to rank equally with Finnish. Over the intervening period of 86 years, the number of Swedes has declined to about seven per cent so the Finns were delighted to be able to tell me that it would not be long now before Swedish can be dropped from road signs, restaurant menus, public notices and the like.

The English that these Finns speak is close to fluent, gramatically-correct and (dare I say) better than you will hear spoken on the streets of England nowadays. This is a reflection of the very high standard of Finnish education with more than 30 per cent of the population receiving tertiary education.

Although the entire country consists of 70 per cent forests and 10 per cent lakeland, the Savonlinna region is 40 per cent water so that boat transport has become just as important as road transport. Travelling one day by steamer, getting on at a boat stop just as one would at a bus stop, and stopping at jetties and landing stages along the way, with people getting on and off, I noticed little groups of children swimming in the lakes and waving to us as we went past. We waved back.

On the shore in deckchairs were the parents, outside their wooden cabins, reading their newspapers and having coffee for it was breakfast-time. They lowered their papers and waved too.

Apart from the chugging of our boat and similar sorts of sound from other river craft, everything was so quiet.

Turning to a lady next to me, I said that presumably behind the houses of the waving people and the trees were roads, car parks and supermarkets. The lady’s smile disappeared in a flash. ‘Of course not,’ she said. ‘All the land you can see is island.’

I then asked silly question number two. ‘In that case, how do they get to their holiday homes with all their belongings, shopping, etcetera?’ She looked at me with even greater horror than before. Clearly she was speaking to an idiot of a sort she had not encountered previously. ‘They get here by boat,’ she said slowly and might have added ‘silly’. ‘One in two Finns owns a boat. I have one and my husband has another.’ She began to smile again. ‘And I never allow him to use mine,’ she added, carefully noting my amazement. Now that was something I’d never known before despite previous visits to the country. It explains a lot about the Finnish temperament: how from April to September they like to get away from the urban hustle and bustle so they can enjoy their own place and space in the countryside among other activitives picking mushrooms and berries. The Finns are big on berries.

I did know that apples don’t grow very well there because at what should be the peak of the apple season, September, the weather is already too cold for growing and ripening.

What they lack in fully-grown hard fruit, the Finns more than make up for with soft fruit which they grow and eat in vast quantities. There are fruit stalls at the harbour in Helsinki and in every market in the country which sell only berries. All the well-known sorts are there as well as their own speciality, the cloudberry which looks like an amber coloured raspberry. They are used to make liqueur, liqueur chocolate and chocolate and although considered a local delicacy, I must say I found them rather over-rated.

Now the strawberries are something special! In fact the best I have ever tasted. Large, dark red and amazingly sweet. They cost £3 a kilo and one could justify going to Finland for those alone.

A friend who is a wine expert later explained the strawberry phenomenon. Of any particular variety of grape, she explained, the best of that type are to be found at the northernmost extremity where that grape will grow. Finland is the northernmost place where strawberries and other soft fruit will grow, so the quality will be the best. For the same reason, the best European apples are to be found in England and not in France or Germany. (Obviously the roles are reversed in the southern hemisphere).

The Finns tend to eat mixed berries on their own or with their breakfast muesli and yoghurt as well. Fish is also very popular, particularly salmon, trout, herrings in various forms and the other species caught in their rivers or in the Baltic Sea.

Driving around the north of the country, I was surprised to see signs warning motorists of the danger of encounters with elk on the roads. It seems that as winter sets in, the elk move southwards and sometimes wander on to the roads or motorways. On such occasions motor cars usually come out of such engagements rather badly. That is not to say that the Finns eat elk because they get killed on the motorways, but they do appear regularly on menus, along with bear, reindeer and other wildlife.

Apart from the city of Savonlinna where a car is not necessary, it is essential to hire one to reach the other places of interest in the region. But at least the traffic is light so that driving remains a pleasure on good roads.

‘Must see’ attractions include the world’s largest wooden church at Kerimaki, built in 1847 and capable of seating 3,000 worshippers. The Retretti Art Centre in Punkaharju is the largest centre of its kind in the Nordic countries with more than 5,000 square metres of exhibition space of which some 3,000 are underground in caverns. Also in Punkaharju is Lusto, the national museum of forestry and forest culture. Quite fascinating. Close to Savonlinna are a number of islands all linked by bridges so you can go on your own nature trail and encounter the colonies of red squirrels, now sadly in decline in most of Europe.

Provided you travel between May and October (otherwise the area is likely to be snow-covered) you are assured of a good holiday among pleasant and civilised people.

Savonlinna can be reached by air from Helsinki in 50 minutes or by coach in five hours with frequent services in both directions.

If you are interested in the opera for a week at the beginning of August, Latvian National Opera are performing Un Ballo in Maschera and Rubinstein’s The Demon. Up-to-date information can be obtained on the festival website: www.operafestival.fi.

If they have some returns and if they don’t have another heatwave, a visit would make quite a difference in so many respects from summer in Malta!