Canadians should embrace Norway’s dedication to open-air life | Canada Voices

Marina Jimenez is an award-winning freelance travel writer and former journalist with The Globe and Mail.

The luggage compartment of the snow train in Norway is unlike anything you would see on Via Rail. It is filled with backpacks, expedition skis and Nordic sleds, known as pulks, laden down with winter camping supplies.

It’s a typical day on the 290-kilometre line from Oslo to Finse. The train is crammed with Norwegians headed to the car-free hamlet in the Alpine wilderness – a collection of hiking and skiing lodges with nine permanent residents, perched on the edge of the Hardangerjøkulen glacier.

I am also headed to Finse, but unlike the locals I am filled not with excitement, but apprehension. While I like to think I am a nature-loving Canadian, I feel wholly unprepared for the wilderness adventure – called a “Shackleton Challenge” – I have signed up for. Organized by an expedition clothing company named for Sir Ernest Shackleton, the famed British polar explorer, the trip aims to teach participants basic Arctic survival skills, including how to ski to and camp on a glacier.

Finse, a stark, treeless landscape prone to white outs, so closely mimics the desolate beauty of Antarctica that it has attracted, over the years, adventurers training to conquer the South Pole, including Shackleton and Norway’s Roald Amundsen. It was also the filming location for the ice planet Hoth in Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.

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Fortunately, I couldn’t be in better hands: The Shackleton Challenge is led by Louis Rudd, a former Royal Marine and the first Briton to have skied solo and unassisted across Antarctica.

To Norwegians, hiking a glacier and putting up a tent in the snow is anything but alien. Nobody needs an instructor.

Norway’s cultural identity centres around a dedicated love for nature. A special word exists to describe it: friluftsliv. The term describes open-air life, or spending time outdoors in a way that promotes physical and spiritual well-being, regardless of age, physical condition or weather. (Henrik Ibsen, the Norwegian playwright, coined the word in the 1850s.)

Finse is less a town than a base camp, dedicated to helping Norwegians get outside, which they do with a frequency and enthusiasm that puts Canadians – with all of our vast geography – to shame. Hop off the train, snap on your skis, and disappear into the white landscape.

The ease with which Norwegians can access the great outdoors is, in part, owing to its geography and small population (5.4 million). Most residents, even in Oslo, can reach wilderness within an hour. But it also relates directly to the degree to which government in Norway facilitates this as a part of everyday life.

The right to roam (allemannsretten) is a long-established legal right that gives everyone the freedom to enjoy the outdoors, regardless of land ownership. People can walk, cycle, ski, swim and camp in a tent in uncultivated land without needing the landowner’s permission, as long as you stay at least 150 metres away from the nearest inhabited house or cabin.

Canada, with 41 million people, is much larger and more diverse. But in some parts of the country, it is more difficult to reach true wilderness.

I reflect on this following Prime Minister Mark Carney’s recent release of his government’s nature strategy, a bold plan that pledges to create new national parks and protect the ocean with conservation areas, wisely involving Indigenous input. As Mr. Carney’s plan states, protecting and restoring nature is, among other things, “the foundation of our … well-being.”

Kudos to Ottawa for offering free admission to Parks Canada national parks, historic sites, and marine conservation areas this summer. Environmentalists are happy, even if they also point out that the government could do more to ensure it protects wildlife and their habitats as well.

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More could be done, though, to back up Jonas Gahr Støre, Norway’s Prime Minister, calling Canada “an honorary Nordic.” The statement is true when it comes to our investment in public health care and education, and our parliamentary system of government. But Canada should also embrace Norway’s concept of friluftsliv.

Some Canadians – think British Columbians – put time in nature at the core of everyday life. But for many, the “We the North” mentality is more an attitude than a fact.

While Canada has a spectacular wilderness – mountains, fjords, lakes, rivers – our sheer geographic vastness, lower population density, and car-dependent infrastructure make daily access to it challenging and costly.

By contrast, in Norway, nature is integrated into everyday life and doesn’t rely on occasional free access to provincial and national parks.

Norway actively promotes the benefits of friluftsliv to all of its citizens all of the time. Norwegians are taught from an early age about the importance of respecting nature. Friluftsliv kindergartens exist that permit children to spend 80 per cent of their time outside.

Norwegians can also borrow outdoor gear, including skis, life jackets, tents and fishing rods from municipal or charitable outdoor gear “libraries.” They can stay for free at the more than 550 staffed or self-service huts, lodges managed by the Norwegian Trekking Association that offer cozy accommodation.

Finse has one such hut with a mix of private and shared rooms, a family-style buffet, a list of suggested day hikes and a microbrewery in the basement.

Is it any wonder Norway consistently ranks among the world’s happiest nations? (Canada, in contrast, has dropped to its lowest ranking ever at 25th out of 147 countries, according to the 2026 World Happiness Report.)

I ask locals if it is true that all Norwegians love the outdoors. Most nod in agreement. “I personally don’t ski,” one young woman tells me. “But my mother and I horseback ride instead.”

When visiting, you almost have no choice but to adopt the Norwegian way. Locals love to tell you: There is no concept of cold, only an absence of heat. There is no such thing as bad weather, only inappropriate clothing. And so on.

Perhaps, we can learn something from our Nordic ally.

Despite my reservations, I complete my Shackleton Challenge on Finse’s glacier, bruised but triumphant. Sure, I fell many times on the ice, but at the end of the six days, I felt much happier than I have in a long time. I survived – dare I say enjoyed – camping in the snow and climbing to the glacier base, under the direction of Louis Rudd and his team.

I returned home to Toronto with a fresh perspective on how to get through our long winter months. With the zeal of a new convert, I resolved to spread the word about friluftsliv and honour the value of outdoor time, whether it is a walk in the woods, a nap in a hammock, or an adventure on a glacier.

The writer travelled to Finse as a guest of Shackleton.