What happens when you sit on a frozen lake for three hours with a handline and nothing but snow-covered forest around you? More than you'd expect.
Ice fishing is the quietest adventure we offer. There's no adrenaline rush, no dramatic before-and-after, no Instagram moment where the light hits perfectly. What there is: a frozen lake, a hole in the ice, a handline, and the kind of silence that most people haven't experienced since childhood.
And yet Arctic winter fishing is consistently one of our most requested experiences. Here's why it resonates.
The Setup
We travel by snowmobile or on foot to a lake selected for conditions and fish activity. The guide drills holes through the ice (typically 40 to 80 cm thick) using a hand auger. Each person receives a simple handline: a wooden reel with monofilament line, a small jig, and bait.
No rods. No reels. No fish finders or sonar. This is traditional Finnish ice fishing, the way it's been practised in Lapland for centuries. The technique is simple enough that complete beginners catch fish within the first hour.
What You're Fishing For
- Perch (ahven): The most common catch. Perch are active under ice and strike aggressively. Even a small perch puts up a satisfying fight on a handline.
- Pike (hauki): Less common but occasionally spectacular. Pike up to several kilograms are caught through the ice around Pyhätunturi.
- Whitefish (siika): Prized for their flavour. Whitefish require a bit more finesse but are a rewarding catch.
The Real Experience
Here's what nobody tells you about ice fishing: the fishing is almost secondary. What people remember is the setting.
You're sitting on a frozen lake surrounded by snow-laden forest. The only sound is wind moving through spruce trees, and sometimes not even that. The sky is enormous. On a clear day, the light changes constantly: blue-grey in early morning, golden at midday when the sun barely clears the treeline, pink and violet as it sets again an hour later.
The guide builds a fire on the ice or on the lakeshore. There's hot coffee, sausages grilled over open flame. Your hands are warm inside mittens. Your line drops into dark water through a perfectly round hole in the ice. And you wait. Not anxiously, the way you wait for a bus. Patiently, the way you watch a sunset.
Many guests tell us afterwards that those three hours on the lake were the most peaceful they've felt in years.
Practical Details
- Duration: 3 to 4 hours, including travel to the lake
- Difficulty: Easy. No fitness required. All ages welcome
- What's included: All fishing equipment, hot drinks and snacks by the fire, guide
- What to bring: Warm layered clothing, especially warm boots and gloves. We can provide Arctic boots if needed
Combine It
Ice fishing pairs well with our other experiences:
- Fishing + Bushcraft Skills: Catch your fish, then learn to cook it over a fire you built from forest materials
- Fishing + Ice Floating: The patience of morning fishing followed by the deep calm of afternoon floating
Both combination packages run as full-day experiences with lunch at Mokkatupa restaurant included.
A Finnish Tradition
Over 1.5 million Finns fish regularly, and ice fishing in winter is deeply woven into the culture. It's not considered a sport so much as a way of being: a reason to be outdoors, to slow down, to connect with the landscape through an activity that demands nothing but presence.
When you sit on a frozen lake in Pyhätunturi with a handline, you're participating in something that has been happening on these same lakes for thousands of years. The tools are simple. The practice hasn't changed. And the silence is exactly the same as it was a millennium ago.
Book your ice fishing experience or browse all our Arctic adventures.