Närpes (Finnish: Närpiö) is a town in Ostrobothnia, Finland.

Understand

Närpes is the Tomato Capital of Finland. In the greenhouses all around the local people grow the main harvest of Finnish tomatoes all year around. If you buy Finnish tomatoes in any supermarket in Finland, chances are they come from here. And people are proud of that fact. Otherwise this place is spread out over a large forest area and you need a car to get around.

The Finnish-speaking minority in Närpes is tiny, and little Finnish is spoken by the majority, so "survival sentences" in Finnish aren't worth the trouble. The town has its own, ancient Swedish dialect, so understanding the local lingo can be a real challenge, even for native Swedish-speakers, although most locals change to standard Swedish when talking to non-Ostrobothnians.

The flourishing agriculture has led to significant immigration from far away (including former Yugoslavia and Vietnam), and the town is an example of successful integration, with some 17% talking foreign languages as mother tongue.

Get in

By car

Coming from the north (Vaasa/Vasa) or south (Pori/Björneborg), take national road 8 (E8) and then transfer to route 673 and 676 to reach Närpes. Coming from the east, take route 67 instead of E8. There are also smaller coastal roads from Kristinestad (Skrattnäsvägen to Pjelax, then Kristinestadsvägen) and Vaasa (Strandvägen, road 673, via Malax and Korsnäs).

By bus

Buses from Vaasa and Pori stop in Närpes, as does the Flixbus service from Warsaw via Helsinki and Turku to Vaasa. Ingsva has some regional routes. The Onnibus service between Turku and Oulu stops at the highway crossroads (Närpiö th).

Get around

A car is really needed to get around the distances.

Matkahuolto and Opas.matka.fi include some bus services to the countryside. The service line offers dial-a-ride service.

By taxi

• Ingsva Taxi, ☏ +358 400-261-058. (updated Jun 2022)

See

Öjskogsparken in Närpes

• The old church has one unique thing: over 150 small log houses, which were built as stables so local people travelling all the way to Sunday church could keep them safe.
• Öjskogsparken, Kyrkvägen 23, ☏ +358 40-505-5377. Open air museum area with over 20 historical houses to discover allowing a great insight into 19th-century countryside life. Step inside a traditional country shop, learn about wedding traditions and don't miss the pharmacy museum. (updated May 2017)

Do

The Tomato Carnival in 1993

• The Tomato Carnival (Tomatkarnevalen) is held every year in July.

Buy

Tomatoes and cucumbers. There is other industry too, but you don't want to pack a bed or a lorry trailer as souvenir, and the furs are mostly sewn elsewhere.

Check for yourself though.

Respect

Don't go into animal rights. Fur farming is big, and also your views on chicken raising and the like might be better not shared with the locals.

There was a scandal surfaced in 2022 about abuse of immigrant labour, in court as of 2023. Tread lightly. While it concerned several businesses, the overwhelming majority of immigrants have been well integrated.

Go next

To Kaskinen (Kaskö), an idyllic harbour town, an enclave of Närpes and the smallest town of Finland; a fusion was discussed in 2019 but turned down by the voters in Kaskö.

Routes through Närpes

Oulu ← Vaasa ←

N  S

→ Kristinestad → Pori