Wikipedia’s English article about Inkoo is rather short, finnish version contains much more information. Here are some highlights, and I probably will update English page in Wikipedia some day.

There’s evidence that area of modern Inkoo was inhabited already 4000 years ago. Beautiful Inkoo archipelago didn’t yet exist – sea level was 15-20 meters higher back then. First permanent residents however settled in Inkoo only in the Middle Ages – the parish was first mentioned in the papers in 1335. However the church of Inkoo was built already in XIII century. Inkoo’s church is dedicated to St.Nicholas, the patron saint of sailors, also known as Joulupukki, or Father Christmas.

There are two theories about the origin of the name Ingå/Inkoo. The first one says that since the local river was so small, people were calling it “ingen å” (not a river at all), the other one says that a guy named Inge named the river after himself – “Inges å” (Inge’s river).

The part of the road close to Helsinki is named Länsiväylä (Western Highway) and is one of the busiest roads in Finland. It is famous for its morning and evening traffic jams. Next year an expansion project starts that will convert the part of the road from Kivenlahti to Kirkkonummi to a 4-lane road. So driving from Inkoo to Helsinki will take even less time in 2010, when the project is complete.

01 Sep 07 update: the news just came – government dropped this project funding from 2008 budget, so it is postponed

According to local regulations there’s a right to appeal all decisions of construction comission. They publish the latest decisions on the web-site. And like in “Hitchhiker’s guide to the Galaxy” Vogon captain has said: “all the planning charts and demolition orders have been on display at your local planning department on Alpha Centauri for 50 of your Earth Years, so you’ve had plenty of time to lodge a formal complaint and it’s far too late to start making a fuss about it now!” The cries of protest continue from the screaming multitudes on Earth, “What do you mean you’ve never been to Alpha Centauri! Oh for heavens sake mankind, it’s only four light years away you know. I’m sorry, but if you can’t be bothered to take an interest in local affairs that’s your own lookout!”.

We started looking for good plots of land already in 2006. Land in capital area costs a lot of money. Access to water can easily double the price. Websites that host land for sale ads like Oikotie and Etuovi topped the list as our most visited sites for a few months.In Finland land can be bought from private owners, but also municipalities sell a certain number of plots of land each year. In places where demand for the land is high, municipalities usually sell to a highest bidder, while in some other places there’s a fixed price and those who come first can get it.In spring 2007 we stumbled upon an announcement by municipality of Ingå (or Inkoo).

Ingå is a small place some 60 kilometers to the west from Helsinki along the seashore. Like most of the towns in Finland it has two names – Finnish and Swedish. But since majority of the population there is Swedish-speaking, Swedish name comes first.

One of the weekends we drove down to Ingå to take a look around and see where the plots of land actually are. Ingå proved to be a lovely small town and plots were in a really good location. But drive from Helsinki took about 50 minutes, and that raised our concerns. We decided that it is too far away from civilisation. Both of us coming from huge megapolises, we thought that it would be a drastic change if we were to move to Ingå. And so we have rejected the idea of buying a plot of land there.