About us
What is Vienan Portti?
The Rimpi house, also reffered to as the Gate to Viena (=Vienan Portti in Finnish) is part of three Viena Karelian (White Sea Karelia) villages that are located in Finland.
Here a traveller can stop to experience the spirit of the old times. In history, this place has also been a place to stop. For example a famous Finnish artist Akseli Gallen-Kallela visited here during his honeymoon trip. He noticed that Uljaska, an old wise man living in the house, looks exactly like Väinämöinen, the main character of Kalevala. He hired Uljaska to be a model for various paintings, including the famous Aino triptych. You will find more info about Uljaska when you scroll down.
Uljaska’s offsprings owned the house until the year 2000, when they sold it. In 2020 the family bought the house back for their company, Vienan Portti. The owners of the company are Pirjo, 4th generation offspring of Uljaska and Keijo, the nephew of Pirjo.
The house is slowly renowated. The spirit of the house doesn’t allow things to happen too fast. We respect everything old and we take these things into consideration while working on the house. The house is located in authentic lands of Kalevala, where respecting the nature and the spirits is very important.
Here you can rest and listen to old stories. We have also some books you can read to get an even deeper dive to the old times. We arrange different trips and experiences.
The Uljaska of Rimpi house – Eljas Ahtonen
The most famous inhabitant of the house is Eljas Ahtonen, who everyone was calling with the name Uljaska. He was born in the beginning of 1820’s in Lauvuskylä of Kuhmo. When Eljas was 6 years old, the family went to Russia for begging trip.
Eljas grew up in Russia. A story says that in 1830’s he was working as a guide for Elias Lönnrot, the person who collected poems for Finnish national epic – Kalevala.
Eljas found a wife from Russia, her name was Outi. Together they had a son who was named Vasselei. The family moved to Finland, to the Rimpi village. They had altogether six children.
A house swap
Next to Rimpi house is the house of Huosiusvaara. First Eljas and Outi were staying in Huosiusvaara house. The Rimpi house was owned by Andrei (Ontrei) Huovinen. Two men decides to swap the houses. A bottle of booze was paid to cover the difference in value, altough the story doesn’t tell which of the two man was giving the bottle. In the end it doesn’t matter because they drank it together.
This is how Eljas became the Uljaska of Rimpi house. Later he was known as a wizard – it is said that he had skills to heal people and to cast different spells. Uljaska was a kind man and he loved children. He never used his powers for a evil purpose.
At 1880 famous Finnish artist Akseli Gallen-Kallela visited the house on his combined honeymoon and work trip. He noticed that Uljaska looks exactly like he imagines Väinämöinen, the main character of Finnish national epic Kalevala.
Gallen-Kallela was traveling with his wife and his friend Luis Sparre. Luis was an earl and also an artist and together they were making a lot of sketches and paintings of Uljaska and the enviroment.
Many people have visited Uljaska to interview and photograph him. The story says that they tried to get him even to visit Paris, but he wasn’t interested. He visited Helsinki once, apparently to pose as Väinämöinen for artists.
Uljaska died during the first months of spring in 1918.
The time after Uljaska
The house was left to the grandchild of Uljaska, Johannes (Iivana) Ahtonen and his wife, Palaga. Palaga was the second wife of Iivana.His first wife, Mari died while giving birth.
The house was burned in the Winter war in 1939. The family escaped they were in such a hurry that they even dropped a baby from the sled, but luckily the baby had no harm. While the house burned, many sketches and one painting of Gallen-Kallela were destroyed.
At the end of the war the villagers started to return. Only one house, called Viettola was not burned and everyone stayed there until they managed to build more houses.
New house after the war
The new house was build in 1945 on top of the same stone basis as the old one. The house was made to look the same as the old house – the new one just didn’t have same kind of detailed decorations as the previous house.
The life was full of farming, hunting and fishing. People were also making tar and moonshine, that the border guards were buying. A story tells that the leader of the border guards were sent to Rimpi house to ”help with harvesting potatoes,” probably they were hoping to get some moonshine. Iivana was also doing business with horses; he was buying horses that were in bad shape, he trained and caressed them and then sold them with more expensive price in Kajaani.
The dearest horse of Iivana was called Ilo Poika. It was huge and strong horse that has been even photographed.
Iivana died on 1973. After his death the family sold the cows. There were also some unused tar barrels, because Iivana thought he could still make one more patch of tar. Someone stole these barrels and story tells that they are nowadays in Tampere, decorating some cafeteria.
Palaga had to move to the town of Kuhmo in 1980’s, because she was getting too old to live on the farm. She was visiting the old house only during the summertime. Palaga died on 1994 and after that the yard of the Rimpi house started to grow long hay.
In 2000 the house and the lands were sold for a forest investor. 20 years later the offsprings of Uljaska bought the house back.