After a thirty five mile dash along a sandy beach from the wooden lodges at Lodochny Ruchey we arrive at the mouth of the Varzuga River. This river is over 254km long and is fed by an enormous area of endless forest deep within the Kola Peninsula. The Salmon fishing here is among the best in the world and it is a Mecca for many a sport fisherman, who pay thousands for the privilege of catching these Atlantic salmon and putting them back, after the important picture of course – a rare example of conservation linked with salmon fishing.

As you stand looking across the river mouth near the beached trawler its power is awe-inspiring. The water streams inexorable through its narrow exit into The White Sea, dark and foreboding. It looks deep, very deep and treacherous with, on its land side an enormously wide estuary full of Whooper Swans and many species of Duck, who at the time of year that we visit in August are already assembling to fly south away from the Arctic Winter to come.

On the far bank sits a somewhat derelict village where we have never seen more than four or five old people walking along the sand. It is possible to get a ferry of sorts over to the village and explore the trackless forest and beaches to the east but the ferry is unreliable and it could be weeks before a return journey could be negotiated with the supposedly inebriated ferryman.

For this reason this is as far east that we go-for the moment anyway, so we spend an hour or two enjoying the sights and sounds of the meeting of the river and the sea before heading off into the dunes to camp for the night around a warm log fire.