14 PhD students and two supervisors spent seven days at a writing retreat in the University of Oslo's Alpine research centre in Finse, where the natural hygge of a Scandinavian research station combined with deep snow and harsh weather conditions, to provide optimal conditions for intensive writing and supervision and group work sessions, as well as for occasional skiing adventures, in which dreams of the Empire (striking back) and of territorial exploration were confronted with postcolonial and intersectional reflexivity.