Finland - in February

Has anyone ridden through Finland in the winter? Am considering a February trip to South Lapland - I gather the major routes are plowed and salted but would appreciate 1st hand knowledge of the state of the roads in winter.
Cheers
Steve

Ask Hubert!

http://www.thetimelessride.com/US/My-Rides/Arctic-Norway.htm

Liv.

Hi

A buddy of mine from the Chain Gang told me about your question. I live in Helsinki.

The state of the roads here is highly variable since the country is pretty long north-south. At that time of year you will probably have wet/icy conditions in the south, but as you head further north the conditions will change into pretty hard winter.

They use only grit (sand) in most places, very little salt. Studded tires are a requirement for all cars during winter. I've only driven there 2x in a car, but you can expect hard-packed icy snow in a lot of places, if not must.

The main thing you should be very careful of is reindeer! Whereever they DO apply salt, the reindeer will sit in the road and eat it. So as you can imagine, the safety benefits of salting are offset a bit by large numbers of animals in the road way.

My guess is that, as you head north, the road condition will be pretty open and maintained all the way to Rovaniemi (at the arctic circle). After that civilization gets pretty sparse and road maintenance drops accordingly.

Hi Steve,

I used to be a biker in Finland. We all used to pack our bikes in the back of the garage from late October to late April. You would probably be the only over 50 cc bike on the roads in there at that time

Anywhere outside capital area you cannot rely on roads being salted, so studded tyres would be vital. There is now regulations regarding studs on motorcycle tyres, so you should be ok to fit any kind you wish.
All cars have to be fitted with winter tyres December, January and February, but most people use them for much longer.

Roads can be dry if it has been very cold for period of time, but if it goes close to 0 C it usually starts snowing, snow sticks to roads and gets very slippery. Salt only works in temperatures above -5 C. Therefore it is not applied in any colder temp than that. Late February is coldest time of the year. I spent a week in southern Lapland last year at that time, and temperature was between -18 and -28 C.

Finland is beautiful country and Lapland is extra special being so sparcely populated, but riding conditions would be extremely hazardous that time of the year.

Best of luck if you decide to go ahead.

Cheerio,
Sami

Finland

Hi!

You can have a look on Allroad tour's pages:
http://www.allroadtour.fi/levi2001/index_en.htm

There is a story and pics from a winter ride made some years ago.

Another trip from the same:
http://www.allroadtour.fi/barents2003/index.htm

I tried to get to Nordkapp in March a couple of years ago. Had drastically conflicting advice on studded tyres - some saying they were essential, others saying that riding on tarmac with them in was worse than riding on ice! In the end I just went with knobblies made of 'special winter rubber', whatever that is. I didn't get to Nordkapp - I got just shy of the Artic Circle, and had go the rest of the way in a 4x4 - oh the shame We camped ( yeah, I know ) and the bike got snowed in one night so I couldn't even get it to the road. Don't think I would have made it all the way to Nordkapp anyway - roads got too bad in places.

Be sure to wrap up warm!

Pluck