The sun had just set on our midnight sun fishing trip, and the sky was a brilliant hue of reds and oranges. Suddenly there was a tug on one of our fishing lines!midnight sun fishing

Janne (our guide), swung into action. He grabbed the rod, handed it to Laura and she began reeling it in – this was exciting! Suddenly, to my right, another line tugged, we had another fish! Janne grabbed the rod and handed it to Jenni to reel in. It was all kicking off on our midnight sun fishing trip!

As Laura and Jenni were grappling with their catches, pulling them in carefully, another line tugged – we had another bite! This time it was my turn to reel it in.

This was the most exciting part of our evening of midnight sun fishing in the Finnish lakelands. We’d left around 8pm to begin our fishing trip on Lake Kyyvasi, leaving behind our beautiful Finnish lakeside cottage and heading out onto the nearby lake.midnight sun fishing finland

Janne took us through the safety procedures and we were off, zooming across the glass-like surface of the lake, in search of our catch.midnight sun fishing

The Beginning Of Our Midnight Sun Fishing Adventure

The lakes promote sustainable fishing, which in reality means ensuring that only a small number of fish are kept per trip for consumption and all fish either less than 45cm or larger than 90cm are automatically returned to the lake. This ensures the fish population remains healthy and avoids decline in the future. 

The first couple of hours were exciting, and we watched with mild confusion as Janne expertly set up the 7 lines in a ‘trolling’ fashion. Fishing is one of those activities I hadn’t really thought too much about, and assumed it was a relatively simple task: cast off a line with bait, wait for a bite, reel it in. Seems simple right? Wrong.

The reality of the troll fishing technique is very different, and incredibly complex!

midnight sun fishing finlandmidnight sun fishingTo begin with, two guide buoys were sent out either side of the boat, floating alongside the boat around 15 metres from the boat. Attached to these two main lines were various lines from our 7 fishing rods. How they didn’t get tangled up escapes me, if we had attempted it ourselves it would have looked more like a spiders web than the organised fishing lines we had either side of us!midnight sun fishingAs the evening proceeded, we caught and released around 18 fish as they were too small to be kept. We were waiting for the big one…

Midnight sun fishing

Midnight sun fishing

And then it arrived, just as the sun had set at around midnight.

Janne was grappling with his net to bring in the 2 fish on the ends of Jenni and Laura’s lines, and I was trying to bring mine in.

But this one felt different.

I’d reeled in a couple of other fish that evening, and those experiences had proven to be very relaxed and fun, given the small size of those fish and ease of bringing them on board. But this one was not easy.

This one was either a fighter, or a biggy.

The scene around me was one of excitement, Janne was hanging over the edge of the back of the boat trying to net Jenni’s fish, and as he finally netted it, just beyond the end of the boat, around 5 metres away, I caught a glimpse of the monster I was reeling in, and it looked big!

Fishing in Finland

Cracking the surface of the lake, all I saw was its huge mouth open as it surfaced and dived back under, this one was definitely a biggy AND a fighter!

Janne, having finally gotten the other fish on board and released them, turned his attention to my fish, it growing ever closer to the back of our boat. After a few more minutes, it was around a metre back from our boat.

I was getting excited now, and tired! I was not used to this type of activity, especially given that the boat was still chugging through the water, which meant I was having to reel the fish in with the drag of the boat as well, never mind the highly annoyed fish on the end of my line!

A minute later, the catch was close enough to the boat, and Janne expertly netted it and brought it onboard.

Fishing in Finland

Fishing in Finland

This was what all the fuss was about, a 4.5kg, 90cm pike! Our biggest catch of our midnight sun fishing trip!midnight sun fishing

We were all delighted, me especially as it had been a bit of challenge to get this bad boy on board.  After a couple of photos, we decided to put him back as he was far too big for us to eat. So back in he went, off to live another day.

It was the highlight of our fishing trip.

As the excitement of our midnight sun fishing trip unfolded, an epic sunset was taking place all around us. With the midnight sun, it felt as though the sunset lasted FOREVER compared to the sunsets we’re normally used to. The sky changed colour so many times over the course of the evening.midnight sun fishing

midnight sun fishing finland

After all this excitement, it was time to call it a night, and we headed back to shore, Janne opening the throttle one more time as we sped back towards the jetty, arriving back around 0030 tired but delighted with our midnight sun fishing experience. 

For Laura and I, it marked the end of our first ever fishing trip, and it had been spectacular. There’s something special about being out in the middle of a pristine Finnish lake at midnight with a sky projecting a bright symphony of reds and oranges. As we were in the midst of catching those 3 fish at the same time, I grinned a little at where we were and what we were doing.

Fishing in the Finnish Lakeland was a brilliant experience, and one we’ve also experienced in winter, when the lakes freeze over and you can go ice fishing

It’s also not something just for the experts. As complete amateurs, we feel we learned a lot and it awakened an interest in fishing we didn’t know was there. I’m sure we’ll be searching out other fishing trips on our adventures now.

We arrived back to our cosy cottage around 1am, and sat up for a bit as the sun and sky continued to change colour around us.Midnight Sun Finland

Planning Your Trip to the Finnish Lakeland:

Accommodation

We stayed in a cottage owned by local company Rock and lake and would highly recommend them. They offer a large selection of cottages (over 20) of varying sizes for rental in the Finnish Lakeland area, which are easy to get to.

Arranging Your Fishing Trip

Our midnight sun fishing trip was arranged by Rock and Lake (in conjunction with Kalaxi Fishing Oy) and as you can probably tell from this article, we loved it! Visit their website for more information and contact details.

General Information

The Finnish Tourism Board, Visit Finland are a wonderful source of knowledge on all types of travel to Finland and a friendly bunch to get in contact with too!

Note: We were guests of ‘Rock and Lake‘ in conjunction with ‘Visit Finland‘, however all views expressed in this article are our own and this is an honest account of our experience.

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