Thursday, January 31, 2019

The Winter Is Real

January is one of the most challenging months above the arctic circle. It is truly dark and very cold. When you wake up in the morning and it’s pitch black outside, you need to remind yourself that actually there is a little bit more daylight every day. It’s also very difficult to motivate yourself to go out when there is -30 or below. However, truly, those are the reasons why every January I feel so alive and so proud to live up here!

My boy and his friend building a snow castle. The darkness and freezing temperature are no reasons to stay indoors. In the area where we live, you can make a fire on your front yard.


Keep Your Hat On

The coldest measured temperature ever in Finland is -51,5°C, from January 1999. I remember that year. In my home village temperature was below -40 for almost a week. In that coldness, the diesel “freezes”, so that it’s very much like stiff jelly. And you really don’t want to drive, because the tires become squares. Still, people lived their everyday life.  Shops, banks and other services worked as any other day, but some buses might have been delayed. Yet, schools were open with limitation of no outdoor sports, though. I worked then as a youth worker. That was the only time when we didn’t have to remind youngsters to wear a knit cap when going out.

Goatling fur hat keeps me warm.
In really cold weather, you need good clothes, preferably out of cotton and wool - and several layers of those. It’s the air between layers that help you to stay warm. In Northern Finland, we are quite far away from the sea, so the air is dry and wind is rare. Nevertheless, breathing the really cold air hurts. You need a scarf in front of your face to warm up the air you breath. The moisture of exhaled breaths freezes instantly: to the outside of the scarf, to your eyelashes (blinking feels funny!) and to all hair that shows under our cap.

The one thing that really bothers me when I watch films or TV-series, where it’s supposed to be very cold: people often do not have any head covering. Not plausible! “The (fake) winter is coming…” 80% of your body heat evaporates through your scalp. You should really keep the hat on!

The warmest shoes, "nutukkaat". Traditionally you have dried hay in these. 



Better Than Fantasy



Do you want a post card from Lapland?
You can order this from our webstore.
See more amazing photos
of my friend @schwartzmatero.
This January we had several very cold nights when thermometer fell below -35°C. I was awake after midnight when it was a full moon. The moon was so bright! Trees were all covered with frost and snow and glittering in the moonlight. Even if I have seen these sceneries my whole life, I still stayed a long time during the night just watching our riverside. It’s more beautiful than Narnia or the kingdom of the Snow Queen: it’s real!

So, despite of relative remoteness, cold climate and oppressive darkness at hearth of winter, there are positive and beautiful things in Lapland, which is still home, after a year of touring.