Why would anyone want to spend three days and nights in a frozen landscape, carrying a rucksack through ice and snow and living from what is still left in it? In fact, the answer is difficult to put into words. If you ask what we did on this hiking trip, it basically comes down to what was just said. But still it was much more than that.

First of all, life becomes simple. The day is divided in three parts: Get up, walk, rest. No classes to be attended, no shopping to be done, no deadlines to be met. The mind is freed from all the heavy workload of modern-day civilised society, and the senses open up to a very intense experience of life. You have just arrived in the camp and put down your rucksack. A warm shiver runs down your spine as your shoulders slowly relax. The glow of the campfire becomes the centre of your world; the hot tea in your mug becomes an ocean of joy which washes away everything that had been troubling you. Don’t pull that chocolate out of your rucksack and devour it in one. Take just one small piece. Put it on the tip of your tongue. Feel it melt in your mouth; how that sweet taste slowly creeps forward, spreads out, gains control of all your senses until you cannot take it any more. And then swallow.

Second, you are not alone. Such a trip is a group experience in the first degree. It’s not simply about being together in a forest, but about sharing and cooperating and really living together. Nobody has to do everything, but everybody does something – and without being asked. Maybe that is common practice around here, but for me as a Non-Finn it was quite extraordinary to be in a group of ten people where every single one knows not only how to take, but also how to give. That alone will be enough reason for me to participate in the next trip in December, even if my feet freeze and my ears turn into ice crystals.

Finally, it ain’t over when it’s over. The memory remains, and it somehow even becomes physical. For example, I don’t have too many kitchen utensils here and therefore use my hiking equipment as well. Every morning when I eat blueberry soup out of the pot I had with me on this trip, when I hear my spoon gently scratch over the aluminium surface, for a short moment I can smell the campfire again. True, I don’t have an orgasm because of that – at least not on a regular basis – but still…

In a nutshell, I can recommend hiking with UlSu to everyone who has not completely forgotten his or her animal instincts. The wolf is howling from the inside, and that is the beauty of it.

Stefan Knop

UlSu made a hiking trip to Patvinsuo National Park on 1.-4.11. Attendants were Marko Hyrkäs, Outi Hyvärinen, Stefan Knop, Hanna Sissala, Susanne Kumpulainen, Akseli Saarinen, Katja Rouvari, Terhi Laari, Matti Lahti and Mika Paakkunainen.