Yet another winter ride

I'm repeating myself, but this is the last "winter is here" post until I have something more to write about, I promise. The winter just makes me so childishly happy after the rainy and depressing fall.

The winter started here the last days of November, though we had a few days with very cold weather and snow in October as well.

The ski tracks are also in good shape, and if not for a slight injury in my left hand, I would certainly have gone skiing as well. I only have a five minute walk to a groomed xc ski track, and skiing is excellent high-intensity aerobic training.

The nearby lake also now also have ice on it and based on the number of people out skiing and fishing on it, the ice seems to be strong enough for riding a bike.

The amount of snow is still pretty small, about 15 cm in open places, and for the most part the trails are pretty hard from people walking on them, so an ordinary mountain bike is currently generally sufficient. Still, there are places which would be unrideable with a normal bike but easy to ride with a fatbike. I haven't yet encountered anything really tricky, though, so I cannot yet compare the performance of the Mukluk in difficult snow conditions with that of the Pugsley. According to everything I've read, the Mukluk should be noticeable better in conditions where the twitchy steering of the Pugsley takes more effort, but that remains to be seen.

Independence Day

Today Finland celebrates 95 years as an independent nation. The turmoil in Russia during the Bolshevik revolution gave Finland the needed opportunity and Parliament of Finland declared Finland's independence on 6 December 1917. After that a very violent civil war followed, with the Whites fighting against the socialistic Reds (in reality it was a lot more complex than non-socialist versus socialists). With a little assistance from Germany the Whites won over the Reds, who were assisted by Russian troops. The wounds from the traumatic civil war healed slowly and it took a new war to finally reunite the people of Finland. In 1939 the Soviet Union attacked Finland in the Winter War, which lasted a few months. A forced and fragile peace followed until the Continuation War started in 1941. It lasted until September 1944, when a temporary Armistice was signed. Finland kept its independence at a great cost. The total losses on the Finnish side was around 63000 dead or missing against 265000 on the Soviet side. The Finns fought hard enough against the numerically superior Red Army that the price for conquering Finland would have become too high for the Soviet Union. There were of course a whole lot of additional details, including Germany fighting on the Finnish side, but that is the topic for another history lesson.

The Finland of today stands in gratitude to my grandfather's generation, who sacrificed their youth, and in many cases lives, defending Finland. Still, Finland's independence has been a success story by all measures and this has mainly been due to the resourcefulness of the Finnish people, since Finland doesn't have particularly many natural riches.

And now to the Independence Day ride. The winter started a week ago and I've now winterized the fatbike, see the ThingLink stuff on the following picture.

I put flat pedals, freshly bought from Foxcomp, on the bike, since my old Shimano MW-81 winter SPD shoes are nowadays good to only a little below freezing. I think the shoes have shrunk, and my post-frostbite toes are no longer as warm as before. A pair of Keen Summit County winter boots with space for liner socks and thick wools socks should keep my feet warm in temperatures down to about -25C. -30C is probably too much for trips lasting several days, though. A pair of gaiters keeps the snow out of the boots.

Big Fat Larry 4.7" tires on 82 mm Holy Rolling Darryl rims. A lot wider that my 3.8" Larry tires on 47 mm TrialTech rims for summer use.

The fatter tires on the 82 mm rims needed some modifications to the drive line to avoid chain rubbing when in the lightest gear. The rear cassette was modified by removing the second smallest cog and putting a spacer between the hub and the cassette, essentially moving the cassette a few mm outwards.

Around 3 mm of clearance between the chain and the tires, which should suffice.

The Salsa Anything cage makes it possible to put a 5 liter bag with gear on the fork.

I was the first one out this morning. There are only a few centimeters of snow in the dense forest and 12-15 cm in open places.

Not much snow yet, but it makes for a very graphical landscape.

This time I was out for pure fun, and a coffee breaks increases the enjoyment a lot.

At its best, the winter is a very nice time of the year. And there are no mosquitoes.

That's it for now.

Winter!

I'm a little late and everybody else has been out enjoying the sunshine and winter on both Saturday and Sunday. I was away for most of the weekend and got home just in time to start riding one hour before sunset. By that time the weather had turned cloudy and non-photogenic, but I still think I'm entitled to a blog post about the long awaited winter.

Looking out right now, it feels almost unreal that I tested my new kayak just one week ago. We now have snow and it feels like winter with a temperature of -12C (10F). As I mentioned, I started a short two hour ride about one hour before sunset.

The fall misery is covered with fresh snow.

Lake Littoinen is covered with ice, though it is only strong enough for small animals.

Someone had actually been out skiing on the ice. That seems quite brave.

The snow gives a lot more light, but it still became dark some time after sunset.

Let us hope that the winter is here to stay. The weather forecasts at least seem promising.

A new kayak

I recently bought a kayak after not doing any active kayaking for seven years. The main reason I quit sea kayaking back then was a back injury (a badly herniated disc between L4 and L5), which did limit me for some time and still makes it impossible to run frequently on harder surfaces. Additionally, with two small kids under two years old at the time, I didn't have the time for it.

Nowadays my back is a lot better and while my family still mostly takes precedence over my own selfish pursuits, I do have a little more time available. During the fall, the idea of to do some kayaking again matured, and I started to search the internet to see if anything interesting had developed during the time I hadn't followed sea kayaking very closely.

I had a fairly good idea of what I wanted. A composite kayak was no longer my first choice, since I would like to do some more kayaking in the stony waters of Osthrobotnia in Wester Finland. Check out the picture below to see why a composite kayak is not the first choice in that area (that kayak is the one I previously had). Some more googling showed that the best choice of material for my intended use still seemed to be Prijon's HTP plastic, which is a lot stiffer and durable than other plastic alternatives and in a totally different league than composite materials. The only downside of this material is the weight, which means that a kayaking weighing 25 kg in fiberglass would weight about 28 kg in HTP. Checking out the Prijon models two or three alternatives were found, and when a used Prijon Kodiak became available locally the choice became quite easy.

The Prijon Kodiak is a high volume expedition kayak and has been used for some serious expeditions in difficult conditions. As such, it has an unnecessary high load capacity for me. Being used to bikepacking and having the gear and knowledge to be totally self sufficient for a week of bikepacking with less than 15 kg of gear and food, the Kodiak's 50 kg of loading capacity, excluding myself, certainly is more than enough. The main disadvantage of this is that it floats unnecessary high in the water, making it less stable and more sensitive to wind. With my height (192 cm) and shoe size 46 I don't fit into much smaller kayaks, though. The Prijon Marlin HTP version could have been an option, but it is no longer made and would probably be hard to find used. The Prijon Yukon, also no longer made, would probably be easier to find used and is probably the most versatile kayak available. I don't think it would have been fast enough for me, though. The other Prijon models are not big enough for me.

While waiting for the winter to arrive, it occurred to me that there was no reason not to go out and test the kayak. Today I had some time for that and paddling around Kuusisto seemed like a good option. I started in a grey November drizzle, but soon the cloud cover became less uniform. The air temperature was 4C and the water temperature was probably close to that. Hence the water was cold enough that a drysuit was the only reasonable clothing to have, since in case of an (unlikely) capsize the situation would otherwise quickly become very dangerous.

The kayak certainly felt stable enough, despite some very contradictory information on internet. It is hard to say anything about the speed, but the Prijon Kodiak is supposed to be pretty fast.

There was no wind and the light and everything felt very Novemberish, though not in the worst possible sense.

Returning for the camera, which I had on a paddle float.

After almost three hours I closed in on the island that I was to spend a small coffee break on.

Since I bought this kayak for shorter or longer tours, and not for exercise, the coffee was more than just coffee, it also had a symbolic significance.

After the short break, I continued and had about one hour of paddling left.

Sunset in less than one hour.

After four hours of actual paddling and around 25 km I was back where I started. Despite doing only very sporadic paddling for seven years, paddling felt great and completely natural.