It was one of those projects that you always have to leave for the next year, until in one of my visits to Saint Petersburg I met some people from a local diving club who proposed me going diving to the White sea in just three days. It was not at all planned and I didn’t have any equipment with me, but that could be solved easily just taking some things from the club and borrowing the rest. In total we were a party of around 12 people including children and two chow-chow dogs. We left early in the morning from Vyborgskaya metro station for a trip that took all the day. Slightly over 1000 Km. Along the main route to Murmansk, all the way to the north, up to a place called Polyarniy Krug, which as its name lets you guess, is right under the polar circle. There we turned east for the last 30 or so kilometres of unpaved roads. We were lodged in a tiny hamlet called Nelmaguba, a small settlement of wooden houses where at the bottom of a narrow bay surrounded by conifer forests and marshes. In total I counted around forty houses, very few of them inhabited year round. There is electricity there and also running water, but no sewerage. Toilets are no more like Shrek’s, a little wooden house built on top of a deep hole. There is high grass everywhere, and streets, or better said the spaces among houses are paved with a few wooden boards lying on the ground. Of course to walk there rubber boots are essential. We were all staying in one of the houses where we had the minimum facilities. A gas kitchenette, a stove and beds distributed in three rooms. Inside there were not any doors but curtains and between the main room and the exit door there is a smaller storage room were you can leave your boots, coats and tools.

We arrived already in the evening, being welcome by a cloud of mosquitoes of which there are lots in the far north. That year was pretty dry, so some of the marshes around Nelmaguba were dry, what reduced considerably the amount of insects. The trick is covering arms and legs, may be using a repellent if your blood is too sweet, or easier, staying close the sea, as they don’t like salty water. I didn’t get more than one or two bits the first evening and nothing else.