Codefreeze 2025: Ice, Snow, and... Quantum Computing 🚀
A first day of shared experiences, from Nordic Skiing trails to quantum mechanics and climate action.
Kilopää, Northern Finland – The Codefreeze 2025 unconference has kicked off in spectacular style! After my arrival yesterday, my first day here has been a mix of great outdoor activities, fascinating discussions, and breathtaking scenery. Let me take you through it.
Ice Bathing
My day began at 6 AM with the usual routine: a strong coffee, some yoga, and a quick bodyweight workout in my room. But what followed was anything but usual. At 8 AM, we gathered for "The Dip" – a bracing plunge into icy water at a bone-chilling -17°C air temperature (this means getting out of the water even feels colder)! The shock of the cold was intense, but the post-dip rush was incredible. What a way to start the day!
Nordic Skiing
After lunch, we rented our nordic skis for the next days and next up was a 4.5-hour Nordic skiing adventure. We had a mix of experienced skiers and beginners, but everyone embraced the challenge. We embarked on an impressive ~18km trek through the stunning Finnish landscape.
The -17°C temperature, surprisingly, wasn't a problem at all, thanks to the constant movement. We even made a pit stop at the charming "Laanilan Savottakahvila" cafe for some delicious cake and warm juice – a perfect mid-skiing treat. We captured some amazing photos along the way, documenting the beauty of the winter wonderland. It was a fantastic workout and a truly memorable experience.
Back at the hotel, we checked the session board and then headed to our community cabin, "Ekin Kammi," for a round of sauna and, of course, more dips into the freezing water. It seems we've developed a bit of an ice-bathing habit!
A Quantum Dinner 🚀
At 6 PM, we gathered for the "Quantum Dinner." The topic of the evening was, unsurprisingly, quantum computing. I have to admit, I got so caught up in the discussions that I barely ate! It was fantastic to see so many people engaged with this complex subject. To help visualize the concepts, we created Bloch sphere beach balls – a fun and interactive way to understand quantum states.
We delved into superposition, entanglement, and decoherence, even touching on logic gates and exploring quantum programming with tools like Qiskit. Using our Bloch sphere beach balls, we explored various logic gates, such as the Controlled Not Gate (CNOT) and the Hadamard Gate – key components for entangling qubits.
Climate Fresk
The evening wasn't over yet! From 8 PM, we held a Climate Fresk workshop. Over two hours and five rounds, we worked with 42 cards, mapping out the causes and effects of climate change on a large sheet of paper. Having participated in such a workshop before, facilitating it this time provided a much deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of these issues. It was a thought-provoking and engaging experience, although it did prompt some reflection on our own travel choices to the conference – with most of us having flown to Finland.
It's past 11 PM now as I am editing this blog post... We wrapped up the day with further discussions about climate change and software craftsmanship in our community space. I'm exhausted but incredibly happy to be here.
Day one of Codefreeze 2025 has been an incredible mix of physical activity, intellectual stimulation, and community building. I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings! It will definitely start with ice bathing again though…