At the end of the winter, some men from Vormsi and Noarootsi (North-West Estonia) went out onto the sea to hunt seals. The sea was still frozen. However, suddenly the weather changed, and they drifted out onto the open sea on an ice-floe. After two dangerous days their ice floe reached Finland, and they were saved. The article analyses reports about this journey written very shortly after the event. The most important of these were penned by the Vormsi pastor and by his Noarootsi colleague. Both seem to have belonged to opposing theological traditions (Pietism, Enlightenment), and their reports differ considerably. This can be explained by the two group's different story-telling traditions - none of which so far has aroused much interest from folklorists, since these stories do not fit neatly into traditional conceptions of folklore. The article aims at highlighting that the way a story is told not only depends on the facts to be reported but owes much to the attitudes and previous experiences of the story-tellers. This, however, is not only applicable to stories told by the "folk". The author also raises the question of whether folklorists and historians can or should tell a good story in a thrilling way that nevertheless satisfies scholarly demands
