Come with us to an expedition by the Baltic Sea
At Eurochange we love to be part of our customers' travels. Each time you buy your currencies in our exchange offices we feel a little part of the illusion of organizing your trip.
This time we are going to accompany 4 adventurers who will cross 120km on foot over the frozen Baltic Sea to get from Oulu to Kemi (Finland).
The participants of this feat are Jose Ivars, Paco Sanchez and Albert Bosch and they will rely on a technical director who will assist them from Finland. They will walk for 5-7 days over a layer of ice between 3 and 30 meters. One of the team members, Jose Ivars, tells us more about this adventure.
What has led you to make this journey by the frozen Baltic Sea?
The three members of the expedition have enough experience in expeditions in altitude in the highest mountains of the planet and the Baltic offered us the opportunity to return to make a committed adventure and at the same time more authentic with only 3 members and in total autonomy. It is also a way to return to the origins of our passion that is the nature in pure state.
To progress on a surface of just 15 cm of thickness of ice, navigating with a compass and sleeping in a tent with temperatures under -25ºC make of this a full adventure.
How will your days be during the journey (hours of walking, rest, what food you carry with you, …)?
We will have approximately 12 hours of darkness that we will be used to cook and sleep and the rest of the day with light we will progress towards our destination. The rhythms will depend on the conditions of the ice because the wind forms waves in the ice which slows the march quite, we will also avoid the areas of thin ice that can be broken with the weight of the sleds that we drag.
The food is freeze-dried to avoid too much weight, although always a bit of typical Spanish sausages fit in the backpack. The important thing is to have a high caloric intake for the body to resist physical activity, intense cold and recover well for the next day.
How do you know if the conditions are optimal? Do you have to be alert to the weather?
We have the logistical support of Alex S Casanovas, the head of the Spanish Juan Carlos I station in the Arctic, who support us from the Finnish coast and sends us reports on the ice thickness from the Finnish Meteorological Institute.
Among the things that we take into account to start the route every day there are the temperature, the direction and speed of the wind, the thickness of the ice layer – as I mentioned above – and the lines that the Swedish icebreakers open and may affect to the route.
How do you communicate during a trip of this type with the coach? And with the rest of the world? Is it as simple as carrying a mobile in your pocket?
In this case we don't carry radios and the communications will be done by mobile. The coverage in this area of the Baltic Sea is quite good (Finnish and Swedish operators). The problem is that the batteries of mobile phones are quickly discharged in the cold so we limit the communication to about 10 minutes at night inside the tent! We carry a blanket-solar panels to charge the batteries in daylight.
Do you have other adventures of this type in mind?
We each have individual plans for this year. Pako Crestas has an adventure travel company and a few free days at the end of the month traveling all over the continents and Albert Bosch is one of the great explorers of our country with a wide event agenda.
All three of us are planning to open a new ice climbing route to the highest mountain in Greenland (Gunnbjorn fjeld 3,694m) on the remote eastern coast of the country. It is a remote place only reached by plane and very few people have put their foot on its top. We want to try a new route in alpine style to the summit.
The journey will begin next February 23 when the team will travel from London to Rovaniemi (Finland). On Saturday, February 25 will begin the crossing from Oulu and about 6 or 7 days later they will arrive in Kemi where they will end the adventure.
From Eurochange we will inform you of the progress of the expedition because we will be very aware of these adventurers whom we wish that everything goes very well.
If you don't want to miss anything, on the website of Baltic Sea 2017 you have all the information.
See you soon!
