Into the Arctic Wilderness

I have always loved the snow, even as a child. I would patiently wait by the window for the flakes to stick on the ground or briskly open my curtains in the hope of seeing white roof tops in the street where I lived. There is something magical about it, a pristine carpet that covers all that is usually seen day to day, making everything feel fresh and new.

I had been on a few skiing holidays before this trip, but nothing like being on an ‘Arctic Wilderness Expedition’, which was how this trip was described. It was planned to be approx. 100km cross country skiing in Finland and Norway, pulling all the kit we needed on pulks (sledges) for the week. I had skied before, but not cross country skiing...across a frozen arctic tundra!

On flying to Tromso in Norway, I met the team for the week. Let’s call them Guide, Ironman, Trusty Companion and Bambi. These names are given with nothing but friendly banter and respect, I absolutely loved getting to know each and every one of them. I am also pretty sure they would have an equally as funny names for me too! Some context for the names; Ironman, this is quite self-explanatory but he was super fit triathlete with lots of cross country skiing experience under his belt. He was warm-hearted and inspiring and I loved listening to his stories. Bambi, was new to any type of skiing and for this he had my upmost respect. He was quite accident prone, ending up with a black eye on the final day and limping with blisters. However, despite it all he made it to the end and always had a huge smile on his face. Trusty Companion felt like the rock of the group, not sure how he would feel about this but he felt like the Dad of the group. He always had an interesting story to tell, great banter and kept me going when I found it really tough. Our guide from ‘Sidetracked Adventures’ was brilliant, he was knowledgeable, calm and managed to keep us all on track. He used every moment he could as a teaching opportunity, sharing experiences from his wilderness adventures, which we all would quietly listen to of an evening. We spent the first night getting to know each other over a reindeer burger (don’t judge me!) and a beer, then organising kit in a luxurious cabin. I hardly slept, not sure if this was nerves, excitement or the snoring that rattled around the cabin!

Cabin on our first night

Day 1-

The first morning started off with a slight disaster, the ski boots I needed were not at the cabin in my size. It was a choice between squeezing my feet into a size too small or having boots three sizes too big! I sucked it up and opted for the bigger size with an extra pair of socks. We loaded the pulks and off we set with the sun shining and the wind low, slowly making our way out of Kilpisjarvi. With four pulks and five people, the plan was to rotate who was pulling them. I set off with one first, it felt heavy but manageable, although it was clear early on I was going to be moving a little slower than the others. After the first climb we stopped for lunch, digging a snow bench, which we all huddled together on, eating sandwiches and sipping soup. It was such a beautiful, wild landscape. Blue sky and crisp white snow all around, with the occasional tree that became less and less the further into the wilderness you looked.

Bambi and I alternated the pulk, which we had now aptly name ‘Princess’ (due to her just sitting there and being pulled along!) and 14km later we made it to our wilderness hut for the night. It was my idea of heaven! We lit the log burner, to warm us up, dry out our clothes and melt snow for drinking. We enjoyed a delicious meal cooked by the guide of salmon (best salmon I have ever eaten!), creamy pasta and green beans, whilst we shared stories around the table. Following this, it was time to prepare the food and water for the following day, melting snow for all our water bottles was quite a mammoth task and took most of the evening. The wilderness huts are fantastic, similar to a bothy in the UK. One side is open to allow skiers passing through to use them for free, this can be for the night or just a spot to warm up. The other side is locked and can be booked out by groups to use. Either side has everything that you could possibly need and, access to a TOILET! I have done many a ‘wild wee’ in my time, so I was pleasantly surprised by these toilets (disclaimer: not all would its not the Ritz or anything!). There was separated toilets for males and females in a hut a short walk away from the main hut, they even had polystyrene toilet seats so your bum didn’t get as cold, amazing!!

After battling with the wind after my final bathroom visit for the night (the aim was to not have to do that at 3am!), I snuggled into my bunk bed, belly full and feeling accomplished yet fatigued. I wrote in my journal about the adventures of the day and thought about what lay ahead. I was excited to see what tomorrow would bring, knowing there would be no log burner, no bunk bed but a mere tent in the snowy wilderness.

Wilderness hut and toilet hut!

Day 2

After a night full of a snoring chorus (if it wasn’t one team mate it was the other!!), we started our series of jobs, which we had yet to get into a slick routine. The pulks were packed and off we set which quite literally turned into the calm before the storm. The first 3km went by like a dream, pulling ‘Princess’ along felt like a breeze and we eased in and out of conversations with each other as a group and smaller groups. Ironman usually led the pack, with Trusty Companion by his side or mine and Guide and Bambi floating about between us all. It had planned to be a 16km (ish) day and the speed we were moving I naively thought “we will be there in no time!” little did I know how brutal the weather can be and how quickly it can change.

The wind picked up and it was relentless. I consider myself to be pretty hardy but I could barely stand and was having to dig my poles deep into the snow to keep me upright. My head was down, bracing against the wind and I could hardly see the skis on my feet with the soft snow being kicked up and swirling around, everything was white. We made slow progress, sticking together as a group the best we could. Guide’s pulk broke at some point and we were all taking a battering until it was fixed and we could move forward once again. When the hut finally came into view, I felt relief. There was a huge snow bank to get up to the hut and with the wind, the soft snow and the weight of the pulks we were all heaps on the floor. Each time we made any progress, down we would roll with the pulks being overturned in the process. Something had to give, shouting instructions over the wind Guide got us to safely put our skis and poles near the hut and we were to come back to pull Princess and the other pulks together.

The hut was so close but it felt like a lifetime before we actually felt the warmth and security of inside it. When this moment finally came, we all looked completely and utterly bedraggled. I couldn’t remember the last time I had felt exhaustion like that, running on empty as we had had no way to stop for food or drink, the only option to keep going. The banter of the group was turned off for a while and we started doing the necessary jobs of lighting the fire, drying kit and melting snow.

Tonight was supposed to be a tent night, my first time in a tent in the snow. I listened to the wild howling around the hut and watched the snow swirling around from the window, honestly in that moment I could not think of anything worse than leaving that hut. Thankfully, my teammates made their feelings known and it was decided that we would stay put...phew! As we hadn’t booked the hut, its preferable for groups not to use the open side, however we were assured that the weather was bad enough to warrant us using it. This was also confirmed when a friendly, Finnish skier came in to warm up and announced “you are lucky, you get to experience the real arctic!” I did feel incredibly lucky to be here.

Inside the hut of an evening

Day 3

As we had got into more of a rhythm with our morning routine now, pulks loaded, we set off in calm weather. This time I had learnt from my mistakes and was mentally preparing myself for any eventuality. Trusty Companion had been struggling with a cold which was having an effect on his energy levels and I started to struggle little with the position of the straps of the pulk (flaring up an old hip injury). Throughout this section, the sun shone and wind stayed relatively calm and we had a downhill section to the hut we were planning for lunch. Usually, downhill is my thing. Downhill mountain biking-love it, downhill skiing- love it, downhill walking/running- love it, downhill cross-country skiing with a pesky pulk- give me uphill any day!! The bloody thing seemed to have mind of its own! Bambi and I spent equal amounts of time on our bums on this section, until Guide did a pulk swap and we realised Princess really was being a pesky princess!! Basking in the sunshine and sheltered from the wind we enjoyed lunch of soup and sandwiches. As a group, we decided to change the itinerary to setting up the tents fairly soon to allow us a ‘free ski’ day tomorrow. A day without Princess sounded idyllic and I knew with the lack of rotating of pulks between the team, this would be others thoughts too.

Setting up camp was quite a mission, we were looking for a flat spot but most importantly a place where we knew the tent pegs would stay in the ground. With the soft, powdery snow, it was hard to compact it enough to make the pegs stay put. We had to dig right down and rather than just tent pegs we had to use our ski poles placed horizontally into the snow and then packed it up around and on top. This was a long old process and we eventually split so some continued to dig and secure the tent and some of us were building a wall of snow around the tents in the hope it would prevent them from taking a battering. When the tents were up and the wall continued to be built, the nightly snow melting began (I really missed taps at this point!!). Finally, we all huddled on our snow bench eating a dehydrated meal, these were to be cold and fully cooked or warm and slightly crunchy – (I opted for warm and crunchy if you were wondering). We sat like sardines on the snow bench, laughing, swigging some spirit from a hipflask Bambi had brought and made a game out of running to the rock and back to keep warm. This was hilarious, as every few steps one of us took was like a game of roulette of either being on solid ground or being knee (or waist) deep in snow!

After an actual ‘wild wee’ (now that was cold!) I settled down into my tent, which I was sharing with Guide and Ironman. I was sandwiched in but toasty as can be, silently hoping that the tent pegs and ski poles stayed put for the night.

Our home for the night, with Saivaara to the right

Day 4

Minimal jobs were needed this morning as we were able to leave the tents and pulks behind, this meant that spirits were high within the group. Our aim was to get a birds eye view from Saivaara (413m), which filled me with excitement. Without Princess and the other pulks, we all moved much quicker, traversing the snowy hill, climbing higher and higher with views right down into the valley. It was breath-taking and reminded me why I love the powdery white stuff so much!

The ski down the other side was more like the downhill skiing I knew, without Princess bashing into me and overtaking me every five seconds, I was zig zagging down freely with Trusty Companion nearby. Ironman enjoyed it so much he did it twice! The beauty of cross country skiing is the ability to go up and down!

We skied back along the tree line until our little blue tents came into view, just as the wind began to pick up, which of course was in a different direction to the previous evening. Cue: building another wall. Trusty Companion went on snow melting duty, Guide and I built the wall whilst our other team mates went on their own separate excursions...the less said about this the better! By the time the wall was built, everyone was back at camp safely and I knew I was cold. My feet had got wet at some point during the day so I ate my warm but crunchy dinner and went straight to bed. Tucked up in my sleeping bag is where I stayed until the morning.

After the wall number 2 build…

Day 5

Surprisingly, that was the best night sleep I had had! The wind dropped right down and the snoring subsided and everything was so quiet and still.

Pack down was an enormous task, it took us over an hour to dig the tents out due to the temperature dropping right down and all the pegs and poles being frozen into the compacted snow. One way to warm you up in the morning!!

When everything was packed securely into Princess and the other pulks, the familiar weighing down started off quite comforting...this didn’t last long. My thoughts were filled with drying my size 10 boots by a blazing log burner and eating a warm and less crunchy meal. It quickly dawned on me that the last bit of the route from the few days before had all been downhill, did I really prefer going up hill on cross country skis?!

By this point, if we wanted to keep a decent pace I had to stick with Princess. Bambi had developed some serious blisters and was struggling. It was time to dig in, I had to play a few mental games but after 4.5km of climbing and very minimal stopping (there was a risk of me sliding backwards if I stopped!) the route levelled out and Trusty Companion and I were side by side. Today was 10km, 330m of ascent pulling 30-40kg on the pulk or so I am told, I like to tell myself its closer to 40kg!.

On getting into the hut, we settled into the evening jobs. Trusty Companion melting snow, Guide making dinner and I was on washing up duty. This night was my favourite night so far, we ate delicious food and laughed a lot at each other’s stories. We briefly talked about the huge day we had ahead tomorrow, but in that moment I decided that that was a ‘future Harri problem’ and just enjoyed the moment I was in. It would all soon be over and I wasn’t sure I was ready for that!

Princess and fellow pulk

Day 6

We enjoyed a hearty breakfast of sausages and pancakes, which was a welcome change to porridge. We were all eating as much as we could as each bit of food eaten made Princess and the other pulks that little bit lighter! Everyone seemed super focused today, game faces on ready for what lay ahead, which was 22km...our biggest day yet. I felt nervous in all honesty, I knew I was going to have to pull Princess for the duration and little doubts kept creeping in about my ability.

I decided to just focus on getting to lunch time (basically how I live day to day anyway!), which, all being well would be about the half way point. Ironman and Trusty Companion steamed on ahead with Bambi, Guide and me bringing up the rear. It was heads down, brace against the wind and put one ski in front of the other. It was too windy to have any sort of conversation and I went into a bit of a zone. Without realising I had pulled away from Guide and Bambi and when I looked up I was in ‘no mans land’ between the two groups, just me, Princess and my thoughts. I thought about waiting for Guide and Bambi but when you stood still for too long everything just got cold and it was hard to get going again. So ensuring I was at a distance that I could still be seen, I carried on to the hut alone.

When I arrived at the hut, Ironman and Trusty Companion were already there and were resurrecting the fire from a previous visitor. I felt really flat, the lowest I had felt the whole trip. I had a word with myself internally (anyone else do that?!) and forced down some food. By this point I was truly sick of rye bread with cheese and soup and I told myself it was just fuel, to make it through the next section.

I prised myself out of the hut, the weather had got a little worse now and we all stayed together as a group. Due to the stop starting I was starting to get cold and we kept having complete white outs which was really disorientating. These white outs, made it hard to gauge speed, distance and time. I realised that when I am usually walking in the mountains, I fix my gaze on a point and move towards it, which was impossible in these conditions. As if sensing the internal battle I was having, Trusty Companion stayed by my side and quietly counted down the kilometres from his Garmin.

We hardly stopped on the next section, the closer to civilisation we got the calmer the weather became. The final 3km went by in a blur, I could not wait to get to Kilpisjarvi but also did not want this adventure to end.

The relief on getting to the town was immense, I was so proud of myself. We started to lift Princess and the other pulks across the snow free road when Trusty Companion turned and looked at me... “this yours?” he gestured towards Princess, “Yes” I said, “I think you may have picked up the wrong sledge this morning!” was his reply. I was confused, surely I knew Princess by now?! Sensing my confusion, he said “this one is heavier than the others!” with a smirk on his face!

In clean dry clothes we settled into the warming atmosphere of the restaurant. I ordered pizza, chips, a pint of beer and a pint of coke and devoured it. I had loved this trip but my god was I glad to see the back of Princess and those size 10 boots...best part was I was the only one going away without any blisters!!

Me and Princess