Väärinmaja, a village in the municipality of Ruovesi, is located by Lake Näsijärvi in Central Finland. The name of our village, Väärinmaja, is peculiar. The first part of the name refers to something being wrong, while the end of the name means ´a cottage´. There are various stories of the name, but no one knows the truth. Perhaps the name is from the time before the area was colonized. Maybe the early hunters and fishermen had seen a good place to their cottage in the wilderness.When the cottage was ready they noticed it was on the other place than the original plan. Who knows!
Nowadays the main thing wrong with Väärinmaja are the long distances. The village remains a good place for hunting and fishing. However, modern times have brought new challenges.
By car, Väärinmaja can be reached by taking road number 9 from Tampere to Orivesi. Then turn left to road 58 and after a few kilometres left again to road 66 towards Virrat and Ruovesi. At Ruhala, turn right to road 344 towards Vilppula. After 7 km you have reached the “centre” of Väärinmaja. Please, click here for a sijainti showing the end of the route.
Our village is a peaceful place to live. We have a school with clever and active pupils. They study here for the first six years and then continue in the centre of Ruovesi to finish comprehensive scool. Many of them also take the matriculation exam.
Young people in Väärinmaja are interested in various sports, especially icehockey, Finnish baseball, crosscountry skiing and motor sports as well as music. Väärinmaja has produced a number of remarkable members of Finnish society. Let´s hope that some of toaday´s young people will do the same.
The landscape in Väärinmaja is rather hilly, but we also have flat fields, which are bottoms of ancient lakes. The lakes used to provide important natural transport routes. If a young man couldn´t find a wife in the neighbourhood, he could try his his luck in other villages with his matchmaker. They roweded in the summer and took a sleigh in the winter. As a result, many of the inhabitants of the village are related to each other.
These days we have proper roads and modern ways of communication. Very few people make their living from agriculture, while forestry and entrepreneurship are more important employers.
Winter is a quiet time in our village, but the populatio doubles during the white nights in the summertime as our summer residents spend time at their summer cottages in Väärinmaja.
Welcome to Väärinmaja!