Arctic Storm Adventure

Hello again Reader,

As promised, I’m here to give you an account of my little arctic fishing trip. Without further preamble I’ll start immediately with the beginning of the journey. (Also, I’m listening to the Heavy Weather album by Weather Report while writing. You will see why this is funny).

18/3/2026

On the morning of the eighteenth, I did my normal shebang of breakfast and writing, and around eleven my friend, came to pick me up, and off we went toward Kilpisjärvi, which is far up in the “arm” of Finland. Note: the reason why it is called the “arm” is because the shape of Finland, for those of you not in the know, is that of a woman. We made a pitstop in Haaparanda Sweden, ate lunch and got some extra stuff for our trip, then continued up with only one piss brake, arriving at our one-night lodging around 20:00. Lodgings were like a hostel: separate rooms with shared kitchen and bathroom spaces. Our room was the size of a cupboard with one bunkbed that groaned and creaked like crazy when my friend rolled around in his sleep, waking me up quite rudely during the night.

19/3/2026

The next day the Sun shone and weather was perfect. We got our shared sled in order, strapped on our skis and did the first climb. Leaving from Kilpisjärvi you need to go one kilometer uphill until you get to semi-level ground. It was hell… we’d forgotten to wax our skis, so the entire way snow stuck to the bottoms, and we were almost spent with the effort of cresting that long and steep uphill. It took us around an hour to get up, so we stopped at an open lean-to (Fin: laavu) to drink some coffee, make some water from snow, and wax our fucking skis.

While there, I kept looking at Cahkaljavri and the sky to the northwest. My father had warned that the weather was going to be rough based on the forecasts, but even as I looked at the dark clouds coming in, I was skeptical. With our skis waxed things looked good. Our next stop would be Termisjärvi fifteen kilometers east, where we planned to fish for the night then continue the next day. The weather had other plans…

We started off across the frozen lake and the wind followed. It built up and up and blew snow more and more with each passing minute, until we couldn’t see shit except for the skidoo track markings, (about 2 meter poles with red wooden X’s atop), which luckily led directly to the hut we were going to stay at.

Our home for two nights

Another uphill later, we were in a white snowscape with a 15-20 meter/second tailwind with only the next three marked poles visible at worst, five at best. And I shit-you-not, I lost all sense of time. I could only focus on the poles appearing from ahead then disappearing as I passed them, over and over again. White on white. The sky was so occluded that we couldn’t even see the sun. The monotony was broken by passing skidoos, a pair of which were border-patrol, who were looking for an old man who’d gone missing.

Our start was both ominous and dangerous. Four-five ours later, with only five minute water breaks in between here and there, we arrived at the Terminsjärvi hut. 

Within a lady named Liisa, who had also skied about ten kilometers in the blizzard, had already arrived and warmed the cabin up. We exchanged some words, ate, got ready for bed and waited out the blizzard we’d survived within the safety of four walls and comfy sleeping bags.

20/3/2026

View when the weather cleared

I woke up aching. My shoulders were tight, by back and hips hurt, and I was hungry as hell. The blizzard was still raging, its intensity waxing and waning, but never really clearing throughout the morning and day. Between hazardous outhouse trips and lunch breaks we had many visitors, mostly skidoo people and one iron lady, (70 of age, doing daytrips from Kilpisjärvi to whatever hut she fancied, so about 20-30km a day). During this time my friend had a hard time accepting that we weren’t going anywhere that day, especially when we heard the weather reports from the visitors taking breaks. 

Late afternoon, however, the sky cleared. Still windy, we went out onto the ice and tried to get some fishing done on our fishing trip. We both lost our foam sitting mats to the wind, and after an hour, seeing more dark clouds crest over the looming fells, we gathered our gear and went back to weather out the coming blizzard, which would come to an end come the next morning.

21/3/2026

On the morning of the 21^st all three of us decided to continue. Liisa returned to Kilpisjärvi, while my friend and I continued east, from which we’d turn northeast, then north and crest a fell, then travel across a dell toward the next hut at Kuornarjoki. About a 15km trek. Crossing the rest of the lake we outskied a blizzard that blew through the valley at the bottom of which Termisjärvi is, following us like some massive white wall. We made it in time to the root of the fell, and after a little uphill skiing we had a lunch break to prepare for a long, steady uphill climb.

The weather was perfect. And I mean perfect. During our ascent, not one gust of wind over 1 m/s or a drop of rain or snow bothered us. Once atop we noticed, however, what else, a dark cloud coming from the west over a peak. We wished DEARLY that we would be spared another blizzard, seeing as we were off-trail, and there was no other traffic apart from us or any markings to speak of. If a blizzard did hit, we couldn’t go back downhill, because the slope was littered with boulders and trees, and would be a hazard to navigate without visibility. We pushed on.

Ten minutes later a blizzard howled down the fell’s slope, trapping us in our spot with zero visibility. We had no choice but to stand with our backs to the wind and wait, hope and pray for it to blow over. It did, but not long after another followed. During the second blizzard my friend pulled out the pack of cigarillos he’d bought, and we both smoked one, laughing that, “if this keeps going on until night we might die.” We had a tent, of course, but again, the weather wasn’t ideal for pitching one.

Once more luck was on our side and the blizzard passed in about twenty minutes, leaving us free to continue. Unbeknownst to me, my friend was developing a stress fracture in his foot and thus was quite cranky the final stretch before the hut, where two French ladies were already lodging. They noticed my friend’s foot and how he hobbled about once we got settled and offered him an anti-inflammatory to use the next day. Just two “mild” 100mg tablets. Said they were long lasting and only one would be enough.

A half hour later another storm struck and kept on going until the next morning. The rest of the night was uneventful.

22/3/2026

We ate breakfast, packed up, and contemplated if we were only going to ski 10 kilometers to Saarijärvi and stay there, or go the full 20 kilometers back to town. My friend’s foot wasn’t getting any better, and it would be stupid to continue further north and almost double the distance, so we had decided to turn our noses back toward the start.

My friend took the French ladies’ painkiller and 1000mg of paracetamol and we were off. Ten kilometers of buffeting headwinds, but sunny, skiing later we were at Saarijärvi around 14:00. We took our gear inside required to make a cup of coffee, and who else was there but the old iron lady. She was chipper and remembered us from Termisjärvi. She offered to take a picture with the disposable camera my girlfriend had bought for me for the trip and promptly was off to Kilpisjärvi from where she’d come.

Needless to say, our doubts were dashed. If a 70-or-so old lady could do 20-24 kilometers a day then so could we. More painkillers for the both of us and some coffee later we were off back toward where we’d started. The weather was good, and after a cresting a low fell, the last 6 kilometers was easy downhill. During the trip my friend was quite surprised that his foot didn’t hurt that bad.

We booked a hotel room and there my friend asked his partner on the phone, who’s in medical school, about this “Ketoprofen,” painkiller. She replied that in Finland at least you’re meant to take it once every 6-8 hours for moderate pain and not mix it with anything else, and only in 25mg doses. 

Oops.

We laughed it off, and settled into our comfy hotel beds, tired from our about 50 kilometer arctic-storm trek, where we got absolutely no fishing done.

Our entire trip from start to finish.

 Closing

Though my friend’s original plan of a little under a 100 kilometers was dashed on account of his foot and the horrible weather and delays we experienced, the trip was amazing. I would not recommend it for a beginner, but we survived, and are better off for it.

This little account could’ve been much longer, but I decided that focusing on the key parts and the more interesting side-details like the iron lady was the right way to go. Things like nightly awakenings, preparing and eating food, and even going to the outhouse, (an experience on its own), I left out. This is a very crude and barebones account. I've left out all the jokes and camaraderie between my friend and me. The conversations with the iron-lady and the officials looking for the missing old man, and much else. 

If you want a more expanded version of my account, written in a more narrative way from my point of view, please let me know. 

Thank you, once again for reading. I hope you too are planning an adventure like mine, and have the means and time to execute one with someone who’s a good friend or a close partner.

I’ll see you next Saturday. 

Dedication

This post and the adventure itself is dedicated to my grandfather, who had many similar wilderness treks/adventures of his own. 

My Grandfather (Buppa), and me.