Crossing the Arctic Circle

Crossing the Arctic Circle by Foot: Here’s What No One Tells You

By Jessica Monroe
Personal challenges and surreal beauty from an offbeat icy trek.

Planning for the Impossible: Why the Arctic?

When I first told people I wanted to cross the Arctic Circle on foot, they blinked. Then came the questions. “Why not just fly over it?” “Are you trying to freeze to death?” “Is that even possible?” But the most common reaction was silence. Because who does that? Who willingly hikes into one of the most desolate, brutally cold, and remote parts of the planet?

Apparently, I do.

This wasn’t an impulsive decision. I’d spent years traveling through jungles, cities, and high-altitude deserts. But the Arctic—the mythical line that separates the temperate from the extreme—called to me like no other place. There’s something magnetic about the idea of going beyond the ordinary, into a space where nature is untamed, where silence roars, and where the landscape feels more lunar than earthly.

So I mapped a 10-day trek through northern Sweden, starting from Kvikkjokk and heading toward the edge of the Arctic Circle near the Laponia World Heritage Area. No support vehicle. Just a backpack, grit, and a desire to find something I hadn’t felt in years: stillness.

Day One: Into the White Silence

I took my first steps surrounded by snow-laced pines and frozen marshes. The wind had a voice, and it wasn’t whispering—it was howling. My backpack pressed heavy on my hips, and the cold bit at my fingers even through thermal gloves. But I was ready, or so I thought.

What no one tells you about hiking in the Arctic isn’t the cold. It’s the quiet. There are no birds, no insects, no hum of traffic or electricity. Just your breath, your heartbeat, and the crunch of your boots in snow. It’s eerie. Beautiful. Almost religious.

By the end of the first day, I was already confronting the enormity of solitude. The sun dipped below the horizon in slow motion, bathing the tundra in a lavender glow. I pitched my tent near a frozen stream, ate a cold meal in silence, and laid back on my sleeping mat wondering if I had made a mistake.

The Terrain Is Alive—And It Tests You

People think of the Arctic as lifeless, but that’s a myth. The ground beneath you pulses with stories: old reindeer tracks, moss-covered stones, and whispers of Sami ancestors. Every step is a negotiation with terrain that shifts from snow to bog to rock.

On day three, I twisted an ankle slightly in a rocky patch hidden by frost. It reminded me just how quickly this environment punishes overconfidence. I learned to tread lighter, both physically and mentally. There’s a humility that comes when you realize the land doesn’t care about your goals. It just is.

And then there’s the weather. It doesn’t change by day—it changes by hour. I woke up to blue skies and ended the day in a blizzard. My eyelashes froze. My water bottle turned to slush. But when the storm cleared, the light returned, and I saw the northern lights ripple across the sky like an electric tide. It was the kind of sight that made you forget pain.

The Loneliness Hurts—Until It Heals

By the middle of the trek, I hit an emotional wall. I hadn’t seen another soul in days. My only conversations were with the ice, my thoughts, and the occasional whisper to the sky. I started to question everything: my purpose, my sanity, even the value of travel.

But then, something cracked open.

I stopped resisting the loneliness. I stopped craving distraction. I started listening—to the snow squeaking underfoot, to the wind forming patterns in the snowdrifts, to the warmth of my own body as proof that I was alive. I began to belong to the silence.

I journaled by headlamp, made snow angels in untouched powder, and caught myself smiling at nothing. The Arctic wasn’t just challenging me. It was rewiring me. Making space for clarity. Making room for grace.

Crossing the Line: The Arctic Circle, and Something More

On the eighth morning, I reached the imaginary—but deeply symbolic—line of the Arctic Circle. There was no sign, no flag, no marker. Just my GPS and a long exhale. But it didn’t feel anticlimactic. It felt perfect.

Crossing the Arctic Circle was never about bragging rights. It was about inner boundaries. I had crossed the line between fear and resilience, between noise and quiet, between motion and meaning.

I stood there for a long time, breathing in air that felt untouched by civilization. And then I took one step further—into the pure white expanse, into the unknown, into whatever comes next.

What No One Tells You—But I Will

Here’s what I wish someone had told me:

• The Arctic doesn’t care if you’re strong. It wants you to be present.

• It’s okay to cry when the wind won’t stop and your feet feel broken.

• Beauty in the Arctic isn’t loud—it’s patient.

• You don’t conquer this place. You come to be unmade and reassembled.

The cold teaches you how to warm yourself.
The silence teaches you how to listen.
And the vastness? It teaches you that you’ve always had more space inside you than you knew.

Chase the Quiet

If there’s a place you’ve been avoiding because it feels too harsh, too far, too empty—go there. You might find out that what you were really afraid of was the part of yourself that thrives in that environment.

Crossing the Arctic Circle by foot was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. It was also the most honest. And I would do it again in a heartbeat.

Have you ever taken a journey that broke you open and built you back stronger? Share your Arctic or offbeat trek story below, or tag @AffordableJourney with #NorthOfFear.