Sininen tie: 550 kilometres straight across the country
The Blue Road is an international tourist route that runs about 1,800 kilometres from Mo i Rana on the Norwegian coast, through Umeå in Sweden, across the Gulf of Bothnia by ferry to Vaasa, and east across Finland to the Russian border at Niirala.
The Finnish leg is 550 kilometres and crosses five regions. What makes it worth driving is that it goes the wrong way. Almost every Finnish road of consequence runs north–south, toward or away from Helsinki. This one runs west to east across the grain of the country, through the parts of Ostrobothnia and Central Finland that main roads normally bypass.
The route, in order
Vaasa → Mustasaari → Laihia → Isokyrö → Ylistaro → Lapua → Alajärvi → Kyyjärvi → Karstula → Kivijärvi → Kannonkoski → Viitasaari → Keitele → Pielavesi → Siilinjärvi → Kuopio → Tuusniemi → Outokumpu → Liperi → Joensuu → Tohmajärvi → Niirala.
Four road numbers cover the whole thing: vt 18 from Vaasa to Ylistaro, vt 16 from Ylistaro to Kyyjärvi (106 km), road 77 from Kyyjärvi to Siilinjärvi (182 km — road 77 is nicknamed Sininen tie in its own right), and vt 9 from Siilinjärvi to the border.
Older guides describe the route as starting on vt 16 at Vaasa. That was true until 2005, when the Vaasa–Ylistaro stretch was renumbered vt 18. It is the same road.
Stop 1 — Vaasa
Where the road enters Finland, off the ferry from Umeå. Wasaline runs the crossing year-round, two to four departures a day depending on season, two and a half to three and a half hours, cars carried. Timetables are published well ahead.
The reason to stop rather than drive straight out is the Kvarken Archipelago — Finland’s only natural UNESCO World Heritage Site. The land here is still rising out of the sea after the last ice age, fast enough that the coastline visibly changes within a human lifetime.
