Mar 1, Sat (Kolari - Ylläsjarvi)

Woke around 7am, but we were still a long way from our destination, outside in the morning half-light it was very snowy (lots on the ground, more falling out of the sky). The both of us went to have breakfast in the restaurant car a bit before 10am, we were joined by L&M about half an hour later. Sometime during that slow breakfast we crost the arctic circle, occasionally we would see among the endless trees and increasingly deep snow an old shed - one or two appearing to be collapsing in extreme slow motion. The train was running late and we arrived at Kolari, the literal end of the line, a little less than an hour late. We got on a bus and held on as the driver hurled along, overtaking other traffic, at great speed along obviously icy roads. Pretty nerve wracking. After an hour of being chauffered by a wannabe rally-bus racer we were dropped off at our destination, in front of a hotel at Ylläsjarvi. There wasn't much about, although we could see a roadside shop some distance away. We were not staying at the hotel though, we had to walk (encumbered by our luggage as we were) some distance along a side road to our cabin. There was about a metre of snow lying all over the place and it was very cold (-11° C). Not far from the cabin we met the proprietor and he guided us the last few steps and made sure we were ok. Very nice little place, reasonably isolated in an already isolated environment. After settling in for a bit the four of us walked off to the shops to buy quite a lot of food. After our return and the proper disposal of our stores Leila roused us to go on an evening death-march to the Ylläs ski-resort about 4km away. The intention was to walk there, rent cross-country skis and then ski home. It was very cold and, on arrival, enthusiasm for doing the return leg on skis was not general. We rented cross-country skis and waited for a bus to take us home. Did I already say it was cold? It was. Very. Leila cooked up a Karelian stew with mashed potatoes for dinner which was quite nice. The sauna was lit and enjoyed by most, Lara was too tired though. Not incredibly hot, but still very very nice when the temperature is more than seventy degrees cooler outside (where Leila insisted upon occasionally going to cool down in the snow). Slept wonderfully.

Mar 2, Sun (Ylläsjarvi)

I woke feeling particularly well-rested and at ease with the world. Through the window we could see it was lightly snowing (which it would do throughout the day). Leila and I breakfasted on rye bread, cheese and herring while we waited for the lazy-bums to eventually get out of bed. It was Lara's birthday today (hooray!) so we gave her a present (a nice shawl) and so did Martijn (motorcycle over-jacket type garment?) and sang her the few bars of Happy Birthday we remembered. Once everyone was breakfasted and washed Leila's exhortations drove us out into the snow where she conducted a brief cross-country ski class which had us back and forthing in the front yard until she judged we were bored enough doing that to get on with the real thing. I do not cross-country ski very well, Lara claims to be no expert and Martijn had never before worn skis of any kind. Leila, on the other hand, spent the bulk of her formative years criss-crossing snowy wastes and gained the same familiarity with skis that other children in warmer climates achieve with bicycles. Furthermore, Lara and Martijn are both natural athletes and to them mere unfamiliarity proved to be a minor, indeed inconsequential, issue. I, however, have not yet forgotten my lack of skill in this particular arena and spent much of the following three hours struggling breathlessly to keep up (or at least in sight). Although Leila really only had to ensure that I didn't take a wrong turn somewhere and precipitate search & rescue operations. On the way home we stopped off at the shops to pick up some vegetables and sausages. Back at the cabin we had a light lunch (blueberry soup, bread and cheese) and then, eventually, got the fire going to roast the sausages over. Finnish sausages are not all that good really, we discovered, and on my first bite I regretted sneaking a second pack into our shopping trolley. Martijn and I finished off last nights stew as the girls headed back out, in the late afternoon, to look for souvineers and enquire about snowmobile rentals. When they returned we had dinner (vegetarian spaghetti bolognese) and got the sauna going. The sauna was hotter on this night, up to about 82° C, so much so that even I cooled off properly (by wandering, wrapped in a towel, barefoot across the snow to plunge my arms into a pile of snow and throw it up into the air over the top of us. Leila helped out by pelting me with snowballs. Very cooling. Later, the tv was switched on but there wasn't a show worth watching, so we all retired to bed pretty early.

Mar 3, Mon (Ylläsjarvi - Yllästunturi - Lainio - Ylläsjarvi)

Another excellent night's sleep gave way to a slightly brighter morning, the snowfall had stopped and the sun would break through for a few moments before breakfast. Today's plan was for Lara, Martijn and myself to go snowmobiling while Leila would cross-country ski by herself. We wandered down to Ylläsjarvi to the small snowmobile place they had but found that all of their snowmobiles had already been rented for the day. Back at the cabin Leila did a bit of ringing around and located another place not too far away. So we donned the skis and followed Leila as she led us a couple of kilometers to the tiny hamlet of Ylläsrinne. After helping us with the negotiations and making us promise to be careful Leila left, saying that she would try to meet us at Lainio (which was about 14 km away). We had two snowmobiles, a single and a double (this is because Martijn had mistakenly left his driver's license in Zurich), so while I took the little yellow sporty model Lara and Martijn rode the big sedan. Off we thus went, four hours of roaring around the wilderness on the smelliest mode of transportation this side of a Dehli garbage truck. The tracks we followed were very, very bumpy. So it was only when crossing frozen lakes that we could really let rip. Our first port of call was an involuntary hill-climbing run to the top of Yllästunturi itself (we got lost pretty much immediately). Lara got a little bit stuck, but worked her way out of trouble. I got enormously bogged down and required Martijn's help to get out again. At the top we stopped for chips and hot chocolate and then decided we had better head immediately head for Lainio. Incredibly, Leila was almost there when we arrived. Lara and Martijn took the snowmobiles for a quick hard-core session while I stayed with Leila and I explored the ice-hotel which was Lainio's principal feature. Very pretty, very cold and very expensive to stay there. The rooms are very simple (they have to be, in each everything except the mattress is made of ice and snow) and the bathroom is a long way down a tunnel of prettily lit ice - brrr. Lara and Martijn returned to help us look around a bit more, then Leila announced she should leave if she was to have any chance of getting back home before dark. Leila would end up covering more than 30 km on skis for the day, plus she beat us back to the cabin (in our defense we had to return the snowmobiles and go to the shops before heading back - still, Leila's feat was pretty astonishing). Back at the cabin we were all reunited again, exhausted but satisfied with another great day in arctic Finland. Martijn cooked pancakes and bacon with maple syrup ... he smoked out the cabin a bit, but the pancakes were heart-stoppingly good!

Mar 4, Tue (Ylläsjarvi - Luosujarvi - Ylläsjarvi)

By morning the snowmobile crew suffered backaches to varying degrees but no-one tried to beg off when Leila suggested we cross-country ski out 5 km to look at some reindeer. So we suited up and headed off. After a few minutes work the aches of the previous day melted away and even I was finding a bit of rhythm. The day was a little brighter than the previous and we could even see some blue in the sky by the afternoon. We huffed our way to the reindeer place but all we could find was some sort of reindeer information sign and no reindeer - bummer. Leila suggested we go a further 2 km and have some munkkikaavi at Luosujarvi, remarkably this met with little resistance (I was too bloody tired to put up an argument). At Luosujarvi we sat outside a kiosk and ate munkki and drank hot chocolates while resting up for the return trip. There were lots of people around, nearby a family were roasting those nightmarish sausages over an open fire and skiiers and snowmobilers were coming and going constantly, quite a busy place. Something was up with Martijn's right ski so it took a little while to get going again. I put in a hard couple of hours and tried to lead the way home, finding that if I could find my rhythm then cross-country skiing was no harder than jogging. We got back by 3pm (having done 14 km in three and a half hours, which is not bad for mug skiers like us), Lara was a bit knocked around (low glucose) but otherwise we were ok. Less than twenty minutes later Leila had me back on the skis and off to the shops to supplement tonight's cooking requirements requirements. I had changed into my jeans already and decided to go like that, which made for a pretty cold run. That night Leila and I cooked up a thai curry.

Mar 5, Wed (Ylläsjarvi - Kittila - Ylläsjarvi)

The morning blazed with bright sunshine and clear blue skies, the temperature was -25° C. We had to return the skis and so set off (on the skis) for the Ylläs ski resort about 3.5 km away. On the way we stopped off at a souvineer shop so Lara could buy some sunglasses and Leila could post off our postcards. Back on the skis we huffed our way up the ski resort and handed back the skis before retiring to the bar for a bit of peace and quiet (plus munkki, hot chocolate and other sugary stuff). We took a bus back to our cabin in Ylläsjarvi and then had thirty minutes to make a scratch lunch before our taxi came to pick us up. We were driven to Lainio (not far from the snow hotel) to have a go at dogsledding. A few huts, some fences, and about thirty-odd huskies all barking at once marked the domain of Rami the dogsled master. The noise was cacophanous and a little off-putting at first. But it was clear that the dogs lived for the run and very little else. Rami gave us a quick lesson on how to drive the dogs (let them go) and what not to do (let go) then we sat in a hut around a lovely fire while waiting for four other clients to show up and chatted with one of his staff. When the others arrived we went out to those amazingly impatient animals. The dogs, knowing that things were going to start soon, went absolutely wild. Barking, lunging in their straps, occasionally biting a neighbour out of sheer frustrated energy, barking some more, more lunging and then all of this all at once. Leila and I got one sled, Lara and Martijn another. The boys would do the first bit of driving, while the girls would be wrapped in blankets within the sled. Honestly, with all the growling frenzy of canine anticipation straining at its collective leash, I was sure that once they were let go I wouldn't be able to hang on. Rami led off with a small sled and three dogs, then Martijn's with 5 dogs, then mine with five dogs and then the other clients on who cares what arrangement behind us. The dogs practically exploded out of the blocks, the barking clamour stopped instantly and they got on with doing what they wanted to do most - run! After a few hiccups and near-death experiences involving almost tipping over the sled while going around a sharp bend (Leila shrieked a little at this, I think I did too) I managed to get the hang of things pretty well. The dogs were pulling the sled along a trench that was about 50 cm deep, so there was no risk of getting lost, and it was pretty exciting. We stopped a few times, Rami changed a couple of dogs around (apparantly one of the lead huskies on the sled behind us was a bit lazy), and in the midpoint Leila took over the driving. It was a wild and fun ride. Afterwards we sat in the hut warming up by the fire and talking with the staff and the other clients while we waited for our taxi back to the cabin. Back in Ylläsjarvi Leila and I went for a walk to get something for dinner from the shops. A setting sun splashed the snowy landscape with orange and the sky darkened to an indigo blue. That night, standing barefoot on the snow cooling off from the sauna, we looked up and the stars were brilliant.

Mar 6, Thu (Ylläsjarvi - Helsinki - Baltic Sea)

What a day! Sunshine in the morning with temps down to -22° C. We scratched together what food we had left to make breakfast, packed our bags and walked off to the bus stop. Our plane was a few minutes late, apparantly the weather in Helsinki was lousy (wet snow), this made us nervous because we had to catch the Sweden ferry pretty much as soon as we arrived. In the end it was no problem, the plane went fast, the taxi driver was probably a distant relative of Kimi Räikkönen and the big Viking Line ferry (the M/S Gabriella) was still there when we got to the harbour. We all stashed our stuff in our one tiny room and then went in search of an early dinner and a few drinks. This ship is a real party boat and we didn't want to miss out on anything. Most of the time we spent in the Fun Club where we drank cocktails, watched cabaret shows and danced until late. It was enormous fun. We briefly went up to the disco but it was full of drunk kids and bad music. Plus Martijn and I had to monster some jerk who thought it would be funny to drop ice-cubes on us from the balcony. We cornered and abused this drunken lout as best we could, but neither Martijn nor I knew sufficient Finnish to do it properly. I tried to get Leila to teach me how to say "do you know how to swim?" in Finnish but I couldn't keep it all in my head long enough to deliver the threat. The idiot was decently cowed anyway. So we strutted our girls back to the Fun Deck for further and more civilized fun. Back in the room around 1.30am, we hit the bunks and fell instantly, dreamlessly asleep.