I got invitation from Joppe Ranta, who is one of the most known finnish bushcraft people here in Finland. He was organizing an outdoor event in Haltia Nature Center, Espoo.

First i wasn’t going, since my bank account said no, but my friend asked me to join with him, offering a ride there. I couldn’t say no!

This event was a so called Retkiyöhaaste, which is a bit difficult to translate. Retki means trekking, dayhike, gathering outdoors etc. Yö means night and Haaste means challenge Basicly this is the challenge of spending a night outside, 4 nights, 4 seasons. This was a winter challenge, after this i have the spring left.

I drove to Lempäälä, where i met my friend Ari. Loaded up my gear to his car and off we go. Took around 2 hours to get to the Haltia. We couldn’t find the way down to the yard, so we took our gear and walk. later we discover the small road behind the house which was under the construction.

It was a bit disappointment to find out that we didnät have the whole area in our use. Only the area behind the fences, so only place we sould hang our hammocks were in the side. Trees were a bit thin but enough for my XLC and Ari’s Ridgerunner. Our ”job” was to tell about hammocks and how to use it.

Just when we got all set up, one woman came to tell us that the childrens snowshoe trail goes exactly there were our hammocks are! But we found a solution, since this was the only place were we could hang our hammocks…

Few others set their stands, tents and kota’s (hut’s) on the same side where we were. My friend Susanna had many of the Petromax products available. Anssi Romo was promoting his designed Juuvi stove and talked about Tuntsa hut’s. 

Also there was some known outdoor people to tell about hiking experiences etc. One person told his experiences from ultralight gear.

During the day, we told about hammocks to many many people. Hardly got chance to sit down a bit or eat! It was funny, how some people has wrong ideas about hammocks. Usual question was about how they laying there, straight, not diagonaly. Also some didn’t have any cover under, no pads or underquilts etc, so complaining about being cold. But i think we got many wrong ideas fixed and many got interested this kind of sleeping system. We usually say, that Finns are tent people.

After the event was closed, rest of us would be stay here whole night. Some had tents, loue, hut’s and we were only ones with hammocks.

Went to sleep around 10 pm, it was slowly turning to snow finally. It was raining whole day! During the night i had to get up 2 times for peeing and cleaning the tarp, which had lot’s of heavy snow.

I slept quite ok, was warm and cozy in my sleeping bag and Selva underquilt was really warm too. Fabric works really well, even the air was quite moist. Same with the hydrophopic down.

We got up around 8 am finally and packed our gear. We didn’t eat any breakfast, just talked with the friends for awhile and then we went to check the Haltia exhibition.

I liked the nature photos, but otherwise this wasn’t nothing so special. Some art was there too. The wide screen was shot by 4 big beamers, which show some bears with cups, winter views from lapland etc.

Well, it was a great trip, was nice to see friends and experince and see some new things.

Enjoy your time in the nature too, any way you can 🙂