The Finnish sauna saved me. That is the only honest way to begin.
Years ago I ran away from Paris to throw myself into a riding holiday in Finnish Lapland, eleven days on horseback on the Bear Trail. There I discovered the real Finnish sauna and what it is actually for. It took very little to go from the shock of the first evening to a daily ritual that, quite literally, let me climb back into the saddle morning after morning, aching muscles and all. This is my complete guide to it, and it is part of what I love about the north.
What a Finnish sauna is not
Like most non-Finns, I arrived with a completely distorted idea of the sauna, shaped by spas and gyms. Back then, to me, a sauna was the little wood-panelled room I enjoyed after a workout: soft lighting, background music, pine scent, towels, a chromotherapy shower just outside.
Describe that to a Finn and they will gently tell you it is a globalised, beauty-salon sauna. That is all. The real thing is something else entirely.
And, to clear up the other misconception: it has nothing to do with sex. I do not know whether the myth comes from old films or the loose talk of past tourists, but I can assure you that, private home saunas aside, sex in any form is simply not part of it. The Scandinavian relationship with the body and with nudity is entirely unmalicious, and once you feel that for yourself, the awkwardness evaporates.
Things worth knowing
The etymology of sauna is not entirely clear, but my guide told me it originally meant something like a winter dwelling or shelter. Until the end of the 19th century it was also, remarkably, the place where women gave birth: the very high temperatures kept it hygienic, making it safer and cleaner than a bed at home.
Finland has roughly one sauna for every two inhabitants: an electric one in almost every house, flat and office, and wood-fired ones scattered along the coast, on the lakes (floating saunas), in the countryside and the national parks. In Lapland they are fairy-tale wooden huts or tipi-style tents, left open for you to use and enjoy, on the sacred condition that you leave them clean and tidy for whoever comes next.
It is a genuine ritual, for the body, which is purified and relaxed, for the mind, and above all, social. It is said that Finnish executives strike their most important deals in the sauna. And this is the one real difference from its spiritual cousin at the other end of the world, the Japanese onsen: both are naked, communal rituals of hot water and deep calm, but where the Finns chat, laugh and negotiate, the onsen is a place of near-sacred silence. If you know one, the other will feel like a mirror image, and I would send anyone who loves the sauna straight on to discover the onsen, and the reverse.
The temperature is traditionally between 80 and 100°C, around 100 in a proper wood-fired sauna, with humidity below about 30%, which makes a full session comparable to moderate physical exercise.
Benefits, and sensible precautions
This is an essential experience for understanding Finnish culture. It should, though, be avoided if your doctor has told you so, if you have open wounds, a serious heart condition, a feverish flu, or if you are pregnant, and it is not for newborns, though fine for children from around two.
Beyond the deep relaxation, the sauna genuinely seems to be good for the heart. The Finnish cardiologist Jari Laukkanen has studied it for decades, following thousands of people over twenty years. His team found that, compared with using a sauna once a week, using it four to seven times a week was associated with roughly half the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease, with a clear dose-response pattern, and later work extended the finding to women as well as men. It is worth being honest that this is observational research, an association rather than proof of cause, and the authors say so themselves, but it is a striking and much-replicated result. It also eases respiratory complaints and congestion, and it is exactly what loosened my battered muscles enough to keep riding.
(The original version of this post repeated a claim about the sauna and cellulite. I have never been able to stand that one up, so I am letting it go.)
How to behave in a sauna
Shower first. In town saunas, you will find showers and soap right outside; out in the wild, as on my first go, you will find buckets and ladles to wash with, or, in the most basic set-ups, an icy pond or river to jump into.
You go in naked. High heat and fabric do not mix, so for hygiene and comfort you enter with nothing on. Swimsuits are tolerated in modern resorts and places used to foreign guests, but that is not the authentic experience, and separate men’s and women’s saunas are a concession to tourism rather than the tradition. In public saunas, they provide or rent a pefletti, a small cloth to sit on; otherwise, use a plain, undyed cotton towel. If being a naked foreigner unnerves you, you can ask whether covering with a towel is acceptable; it usually is. I never asked, partly because years of hammams had cured me of any shyness, but mostly because I wanted that holiday to be as authentic and disconnected from my ordinary life as possible.
Drink plenty, since you will sweat a great deal, and here is the surprise: the traditional drinks are not still water but beer and cider, both of which I thoroughly enjoyed. Around Kuusamo, I was even handed sausages grilled straight on the sauna stove, where I learned the single most useful phrase in my Finnish vocabulary: anna minulle makkara kiitos, “pass me the sausage, please”.
In and out, three times. A Finnish sauna means roughly three 15-minute sessions, each broken by an ice-cold shower, a plunge into a lake, or a roll in the snow. That first quarter of an hour is hard to sit through, and the freezing water is a genuine shock, my very first plunge, shoved from behind because I would not jump, honestly felt as though it might kill me, the cold was paralysing and painful. And yet within a few days I loved it: staying in the water with the locals, laughing, swimming.
The steam is real, not a special effect. It rises when you ladle water onto the red-hot stones (kivet) above the stove, from the bucket (ämpäri), which you always leave full, using the ladle (kauha). It raises the temperature and the whole experience.
The birch. Everything smells of birch, whose leafy branches are bound into little bundles called vasta and used to beat one another gently, stimulating the circulation and softening the skin. It felt very strange the first time, and I kept asking myself whether it actually did anything. In hindsight, I would say yes.
And the obvious thing that is always worth saying anyway: leave your glasses, watch, bracelets and any jewellery outside. Metal in there burns.
If you share my dream of a simple DIY sauna, it can be done, and I fully intend to build one in my garden one day.
Further reading
- The BMC Medicine study on sauna use and cardiovascular mortality in men and women: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s12916-018-1198-0
- Visit Finland on sauna culture: https://www.visitfinland.com/en/articles/finnish-sauna-culture/
FAQ
A traditional Finnish sauna is a wood-lined room, often wood-fired, heated to around 80 to 100°C with low humidity, used as a ritual of cleansing, relaxation and socialising rather than a beauty treatment. Finland has roughly one sauna for every two people. You enter naked, alternate hot sessions with cold plunges into water or snow, and, in the authentic version, treat it as a communal and even social occasion.
The temperature is traditionally between 80 and 100°C, reaching around 100 in a wood-fired sauna, with humidity below about 30%. A typical session is about 15 minutes, repeated three times, with each session broken by a cold shower, a plunge into a lake, or a roll in the snow. You can and should step out whenever you need to; there is no obligation to endure the full time.
Traditionally, yes. High heat and fabric do not mix well, so for hygiene and comfort you go in naked, sitting on a small cloth (pefletti) or a plain cotton towel. Swimsuits are tolerated in modern resorts and places used to foreign guests, but that is not the authentic experience. If you feel uncomfortable, you can usually ask to cover yourself with a towel.
It appears to be, beyond its clear relaxing effect. A long-running Finnish study led by cardiologist Jari Laukkanen found that frequent sauna use, four to seven times a week, was associated with roughly half the risk of dying from cardiovascular disease compared with once a week. This is observational research rather than proof of cause, but the finding is strong and much replicated. Saunas should be avoided by those with certain heart conditions, during pregnancy, or when advised by a doctor.
Both are naked, communal rituals centred on heat and deep relaxation, but a sauna is a hot, dry (or steam) wooden room where Finns chat, laugh and socialise, while a Japanese onsen is a volcanic hot spring bathed in near-sacred silence. The sauna alternates heat with icy plunges; the onsen is about soaking in mineral water. Onsen also have strict rules around tattoos, which saunas do not.
