Pyhä-Nattanen

Pyhä-Nattanen or Nattaset is a place that has been on my to-do list for a long time.

Now, finally, with a little push from my friend,

we went to explore the fells.

It is impossible to not have heard about the place,

as in Some looks like everybody has been there.

This was obviously for me a reason to go there at off-season,

as I don't want to be there with everybody else.

First time I came across with the place in Samuli Paulaharju's book

about Sompio wilderness area history (Sompio, 1939).

He is writing that Sompio is an area between two Pyhä.

I knew the southern Pyhä as I had lived there for four years,

but I was curious about this other Pyhä.

What is it? Where is it?

So we hopped in my car and started to drive north from Sodankylä.

We knew that the place should be some kilometers away,

but still in Sodankylä commune.

As we drive more and more north

and 100 km and a bit more than one hour later arrive

to the feet of Pyhä-Nattanen, it truly hits me,

how wide commune Sodankylä actually is.

As we started walking uphill,

and the huge pahta (or tor) formations came to our sight,

I knew why this was so popular scene.

My mind took me straight to the GOT world.

To the old ruins of ancient mythical culture.

I was so sure, that soon a huge dragon would take of behind the next pahta.

I had never seen pahta before

and I was super curious about these rocky pancake piles.

How nature does something this cool?

I did some home work after the trip.

The rock is actually 1770 million years old.

The rock is granite, which has habit for horizontal erosion.

And the pahta part of the rock is the most hardest one,

so they have been standing there through multiple ice ages,

when all the more soft rock around them has been washed away.

Another surprise came to us as a snow.

We made this trip in beginnig of October,

so there has not yet been snow fall,

but on top of Nattanen we had little snow!

This was thrilling, as I had been waiting to see snow for half an year.

Though I was super temptet to climb and jump on the pahta formations,

even my self-control said,

that not in this weather.

The rocks where super icy and slippery.

So I decided, that I need to come here on a dry summer day.

Just for jumping and do some adventure climbing.

A Golden Eagle was guiding our adventure from above.

The End