White Friday

My original plan was activate in Saturday three new summits in Central Finland were I had not visited earlier. All those are located very close of the City Jyvaskyla. Driving 300 km north and do the job – easy case – and the same driving back. In Friday started to snow heavily in Central Finland. First I thought that when the snowing is over it is easy to go and activate them. But, but – on the Saturday morning when I was driving towards Jyvaskyla they talked on radio that around Jyvaskyla was terrible traffic jams and main roads are full of snow, power is cut in many places etc. What closer I came that more convinced I became about the message in radio. As extra I had a special task to visit in my grandparents’ house where they had lived until 70’s. The house was also close of City Jyvaskyla and distance from there to the first summit was 40 km only.

My grandparent’s house was located only one kilometer from main road but the sub road was full of snow, not cleaned and there was woods across the street. The amount of snow was 20 cm plus, temperature about one minus degree.

Being there and looking around - White Friday changed my plan. I decided to return to south and activate my “home summit” Jyranvuori OH/JS-066 and leave the planned summits to next summer because I suppose this snow will not smell before Eastern. Late afternoon I reached Jyranvuori where I kept couple of qsos and will be on air tomorrow again. Well planned is halve done, but not always!

73, Saku OH2NOS

The original (red one) house is more than 100 years old.

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Very beautiful! My wife and I would love to visit Finland some day. Are places like this available for rent? Perhaps if we ever get there, you can advise as to some summits to try?

Kent K9EZ (temporarily home bound due to a slightly torn Achilles tendon…ugh…)

The Geneva area is white today too.

You can find similar cottages especially from Lapland for renting.

If you are reasonably fit, good in orienteering in all weather conditions and have basic skills to cook your own food and cut wood with an axe, you could also use snow shoes in National Parks. For example Syöte National Park has many relatively easy one point SOTA summits. The huts there are open for one night stay for all walkers in the Park. Some of them might need a reservation typically EUR 10/night. The main limitation this time of year is the short day light time. Sometimes there is too much snow to walk any reasonable distance.

73, Jaakko OH7BF/F5VGL

At least the weekend got happy end. Another summit today from Jyranvuori with 33 qsos on 14, 21 and 28 MHz. One summit to summit qso with HB9TVK/p. Thank you for all the chasers!

73, Saku OH2NOS

Below operator’s room (FT-817, MFJ-971 & 7 Ah battery) and dipole’s feeder point roughly 9,5 m above the ground.

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