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![](\"\/helen\/blog\/images\/2\/Soviet_sleeping_bag.jpg\")
![](\"\/helen\/blog\/images\/2\/Tent.jpg\")
<\/p>\nWe didn’t go hiking as a family when I was a child in Estonia, just day trips. I remember my father going away on long hikes in faraway places. I guess that was one of the few benefits of being part of the Soviet Union: travelling to the far ends of that empire, from Sakhalin in the Far East to the Crimea and the Caucasus mountains in the south. I remember looking forward to being old enough to join. Unfortunately I never got to that point.<\/p>\n
Our school class did at least two hikes together. One was to Piusa. I think we slept in the hay loft at a classmate’s grandparents’ farm. At Piusa I remember we wandered around in the sandstone caves – man-made, the result of digging for sand for glass-making. The caves are now mostly closed to the public because of safety concerns, otherwise I’d love to back and visit them again.<\/p>\n
The other hike was somewhere near Aegviidu, I believe. I remember forest lanes and not much else. That time we carried tents with us.<\/p>\n
It’s easy to take kids on a hike these days. Back then, equipment weighed a ton. Sleeping bags were rectangular and made of cotton – canvas on the outside, thinner cotton on the inside, some kind of wadding in between. The wadding was probably cotton as well. Cotton is heavy. One of our sleeping bags had a blue lining with a pattern of small white flowers. <\/p>\n
Tents were also made of heavy-duty canvas and had that classical ridge shape. They weren’t waterproof at all. For rain protection you covered the tent with a piece of heavy plastic, and you spread another piece of plastic under the tent. Nevertheless the tent usually leaked and grew mouldy with time.<\/p>\n
I had a bright green rucksack on those hikes. It was heavy, and definitely did not have a hip belt. I remember the buckles at the bottom ends of the shoulder straps digging into my hips.<\/p>\n
The photos are not mine, but what I see matches what I remember. Both are from sites selling old stuff. The bag is a sleeping bag, imagine it being about 40 cm long.
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Minu lapsep\u00f5lves me perega matkamas ei k\u00e4inud, tegime ainult l\u00fchemaid v\u00e4ljas\u00f5ite. M\u00e4letan, kuidas mu isa k\u00e4is pikkadel matkadel kaugetes kohtades. Eks see oli vist N\u00f5ukogude Liitu kuulumise \u00fcks v\u00e4hestest headest k\u00fclgedest: v\u00f5imalus reisida selle suurriigi kaugetesse nurkadesse, alates Sahhalinist Kaug-Idas kuni Krimmi ja Kaukasuseni l\u00f5unas. M\u00e4letan, kuidas ma ootasin, et saaksin ka piisavalt suureks, et mind kaasa v\u00f5etaks. Ei j\u00f5udnudki kunagi nii kaugele.<\/p>\n
Meie klass tegi koos v\u00e4hemalt kaks matka. \u00dcks viis Piusale. Magasime vist \u00fche klassikaaslase vanavanemate talus, heinalakas. Piusal uitasime ringi liivakivikoobastes – neis, mis sinna klaasit\u00f6\u00f6stuse jaoks liiva kaevandamisest on tekkinud. Koopad on n\u00fc\u00fcd avalikkusele enamalt jaolt suletud, muidu oleks tore sinna j\u00e4lle tagasi minna ja uuesti koobastes k\u00e4ia.<\/p>\n
Teine matk oli vist kusagil Aegviidu kandis. M\u00e4letan metsasihte ja muud eriti midagi. Tol korral tassisime telke kaasa.<\/p>\n
T\u00e4nap\u00e4eval on lihtne lastega matkale minna. Tol ajal kaalus kogu varustus v\u00e4ga palju. Magamiskotid olid nelinurksed ja puuvillast – v\u00e4ljaspool paksem kangas, seespool mustriline sits, nende vahel mingit sorti vatiin. Vatiin oli t\u00f5en\u00e4oliselt ka puuvillane. Puuvill on raske. \u00dchel meie magamiskottidest oli sinine vooder valge lillemustriga.<\/p>\n
Telgid olid samuti presendist ja olid seesugused traditsioonilise telgi kujuga. Veekindlad polnud nad \u00fcldse. Vihma eest kaitsti telk kilet\u00fckiga, ja teine kilet\u00fckk pandi telgi alla. Sellegipoolest lekkis telk alati ja kogus aegam\u00f6\u00f6da hallitust.<\/p>\n
Mul oli neil matkadel ereroheline seljakott. Kott oli raske, ja mingit puusav\u00f6\u00f6d k\u00fcll ei olnud. M\u00e4letan, kuidas \u00f5larihmade alumises otsas olevad pandlad mul puusakohas vastu keha vajutasid.<\/p>\n
Fotod pole minu tehtud, aga asjad n\u00e4evad v\u00e4lja umbes nii, nagu ma neid m\u00e4letan. M\u00f5lemad on vana kraami m\u00fc\u00fcgikohtadest. Paks vorstikujuline kott on magamiskott, umbes 40 cm pikk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We didn’t go hiking as a family when I was a child in Estonia, just day trips. I remember my father going away on long hikes in faraway places. I guess that was one of the few benefits of being part of the Soviet Union: travelling to the far ends of that empire, from Sakhalin […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[776],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-memories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13268"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13279,"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13268\/revisions\/13279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toomik.net\/helen\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}