• Address: Rauhaniementie 24, Tampere
• Sauna type: Mixed-gender (with swimwear)
• Heater type: Oil-burning
• Sauna fee (single): Adults €7, children €3.5. Discounted cards with ten or 30 visits also available.
• Drinks policy: Own alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks are allowed in the yard and dressing rooms. Sparkling water, soft drinks and mild beer can be purchased from the sauna attendant. Water is available from drinking fountains.
• Things to note: In the winter you can take a dip in the freezing water.
• Website: Check https://www.rauhaniemi.net/in-english/ for opening hours, up-to-date sauna fees and reductions.

Rauhaniemen kansankylpylä (Rauhaniemi “public bath”) was established as early as 1929, but it was first built as facilities for swimmers and had no sauna until 1957. Since then it has become a popular place to go for a swim in winter as well. Rauhaniemi is easily accessible from the city centre by bus or on foot. There’s a fair bit of parking space close to the sauna, as well.

The sauna fee is paid to the sauna attendant and you can also leave your valuables in a locker in his office. The changing room (at least the men’s) was quite small and I can imagine it’s cramped at peak hours. Apparently, there are extra changing rooms for when this happens, but they’re a bit further away from the saunas.

We visited Rauhaniemi on a Tuesday afternoon and were surprised at how many people there were. It was around 4 PM and there were already about 25 people there. There are two saunas in Rauhaniemi: a big and a small one. According to the sauna website, the big one can accommodate some 50 people, while there should be space for roughly 30 people in the small one.

We decided to try the big sauna first, which made sense because the showers are located next to it and the house rules state that showering is required before the sauna. The problem with the showers was that there were four stalls with only five showers in the whole place. This caused queues in the small shower room, although it wasn’t the busiest time to visit.

Both the big and small saunas have benches on three levels, allowing visitors to move to the lower level if it gets too hot. The heat in the big sauna was humid and mostly pleasant, but quite intense when water was thrown on the rocks. It might get too hot for sauna novices on the upper benches. In the small sauna, the heat was also humid but a bit milder, and people tended to throw less water there. A nice thing about both saunas is that they have small windows, and the ones in the big sauna have nice views of Lake Näsijärvi.

After trying out both saunas, enjoying a bit of sauna drink and cooling off, it was time to take a plunge in the freezing water. I’m not an experienced ice swimmer, so I usually just take a quick dip and get out. That’s enough to make me feel a rush of adrenaline and give me an energy boost. I’m not sure if there are actual health benefits to ice swimming, but it sure is fun when you have the warm sauna waiting for you after. Ice swimming also seemed to combat the drowsiness many people experience after sauna. Just make sure you take a while between going to the sauna and ice swimming, as the swings in blood pressure can make it very stressful for your heart.

The nice thing about Rauhaniemi is that there’s a heated walkway between the saunas, the changing rooms and all the way to the stairs of the ice hole. So even if you forget your flip flops or slides, you’ll manage without freezing your toes off.

In some, especially smaller, public saunas it’s common that people exchange a few words or even have long discussions. In Rauhaniemi, people mostly kept to themselves or talked to their friends, probably because there are so many visitors and people come and go all the time. I personally didn’t mind this because sometimes the small talk can get a bit tedious, but if you go in looking for a bit of socializing, this may not be the best sauna for it. Overall the atmosphere was friendly, though.

All in all, Rauhaniemi is definitely worth a visit if you don’t mind a crowd. The saunas provide nice heat even for the more experienced sauna-goers and the possibility to switch between the big and small sauna adds variety to the visit.