Where to Stay in Loimaa, Varsinais-Suomi

Loimaa is known as a farming town of inland Varsinais-Suomi, grown up around the Loimaan rautatieasema on the grain plain of south-western Finland. The town is the home of the Suomen maatalousmuseo Sarka, the national agriculture museum that tells the story of Finnish farming. Fields run to the horizon here.

The Kanta-Loimaan kirkko marks the old parish centre, while the Alastaron moottorirata, a racing circuit out in the countryside, draws a louder crowd to this corner of Varsinais-Suomi.

The Loimaan rautatieasema is the landmark that built the town, the heritage station whose water tower, the Loimaan rautatieaseman vesitorni, still stands on the line through Varsinais-Suomi. Nearby, the Suomen maatalousmuseo Sarka keeps the national story of Finnish farming. Trains and fields made this place.

The Kanta-Loimaan kirkko marks the old parish, the Alastaron moottorirata roars out on the plain, and the sculpture park of the Alpo Jaakolan patsaspuisto and the old Huovintie road round out the heritage of this part of south-western Finland.

Loimaa's history begins on the land. Long before the town, the grain plain of inland Varsinais-Suomi carried old farming parishes, the Kanta-Loimaan kirkko at the centre of the oldest of them and the medieval Huovintie crossing the district. Farming came first.

Manor estates such as the Haaroisten kartano worked the fertile soil of this part of south-western Finland through the centuries. The railway then made the modern town. When the line was built across the plain, a new centre grew around the Loimaan rautatieasema, with its water tower, freight sheds and stationmaster's house, and the market town that became Loimaa was chartered in 1921.

Trade and farming met at the rails. The national agriculture museum, the Suomen maatalousmuseo Sarka, settled here in keeping with the district's calling, the Loimaan Kaupunginkirkko rose as the town church, and the later merging of the country parishes of Alastaro, Mellilä and Metsämaa drew the surrounding villages and their churches into one wide municipality of Varsinais-Suomi.

Loimaa lies on the broad grain plain of inland Varsinais-Suomi, in south-western Finland. The town centre gathers by the railway and the Loimaan rautatieasema, fields and farmland spreading out flat on every side toward the merged country districts of Alastaro, Mellilä and Metsämaa. The plain runs wide and open here.

Woods and farm villages such as Virttaa break the fields across the broad municipality, the old Huovintie road crossing the low country of this part of south-western Finland.

Loimaa has a cool inland climate, its seasons set by the open grain plain of Varsinais-Suomi. Winters are cold and snowy, frost settling over the fields and the merged country districts of Alastaro and Mellilä from early in the season until the slow spring thaw across the plain. Summers are mild and bright.

The long northern daylight ripens the grain and warms the farmland through the short growing season around Loimaa, the months that draw racing and visitors to this part of south-western Finland before the cold returns.

Loimaa sits on the railway across the grain plain of Varsinais-Suomi, and the train is a classic way in. Services stop at the heritage Loimaan rautatieasema in the centre, the station that built the town, with trains running the line through south-western Finland. The rails still carry travellers here.

Roads and buses also reach the town, linking Loimaa to the larger cities of Varsinais-Suomi, and visitors from farther off come through those cities before the last stretch onto the plain.