2024-03-30 66 29

Location

In the forest next to a road near Takajärvi, Kuusamo.

The point on a topographic map: [1]

Participants

Kripakko

Expedition

We were in Kuusamo at Easter, having a long weekend, and I noticed that this hashpoint was in a rather lucky spot. It was reasonably near and next to a road that would likely be kept open in the winter, and I felt like going adventuring and driving to it. After other activities today, I left late in the afternoon but early enough to have sufficient daylight for taking photos.

As I went, I found out that the road was indeed open and easy to traverse by car. It was snowing a little, not so much that the car would get stuck but enough to make the countryside roads slightly slippery. To my surprise, when I was on the final stretch approaching the hashpoint, there was a herd of reindeer blocking the road. Reindeer are populous in Northern Finland and mostly roam around freely in herds, but in the winter they stay in pens where they are fed. There was apparently such a pen right here, and the reindeer were free to walk around in the vicinity, including across the road. I had to wait for a while until the road was clear.

I drove past the hashpoint and found a place where I could turn the car around. Maybe I could have done so on the spot had I been careful, but I wanted to play it safe. Despite the road looking pretty wide, the fringes were potentially soft, and the car might very well get stuck there. I then stopped on the road, making sure I did not block it, and went to visit the hashpoint which turned out to be 15 metres off the road. The forest was covered in almost a metre of snow, which I could manage wearing tall rubber boots. Going further would have been easy enough with snowshoes or short skis, at least in level terrain like this.

I then drove back to the town and refuelled the car. 95-octane (RON) gasoline cost 2.00 EUR per litre (for Americans, 8.18 USD per gallon) today, argh. Still not nearly as expensive as two years ago when the prices skyrocketed after the war in Ukraine escalated.

The length of my trip was about 62 kilometres.