Winter Wonderland in Europe

Our next excursion for the day was a reindeer ride through the woods. Once again with the short days, it was quite grey when we ventured off. This wasn’t the sleigh ride I expected as we were in a traditional sled close to the ground.

While the husky ride felt more like something the dogs really enjoyed, it didn’t feel the same for the reindeer. We did learn some interesting facts about the reindeer with Lapland having a maximum number allowed before culling takes place as they do a lot of damage to the forests. The reindeer are all tagged and are free to roam. When it comes to the snow season, a certain number of reindeer are herded and utilised for the reindeer rides for tourism, and meat and skin and reindeer products for the locals. Reindeer meat is a traditional meat here and while it does seem wrong to be eating “Rudolf”, it is the same as having beef and lamb at home.

Lapland reindeer are semi-domesticated animals that are a central part of the region's culture, used for transportation, food, and warmth by the indigenous Sámi people for centuries. They are well-adapted to the arctic climate, with thick fur and specialised hooves. In fact, there are more reindeer than people in Lapland.  

The ride was a much slower pace than the husky ride but it was still a great experience slowly ambling over the snow with the forest surrounding us. I did get quite friendly with Sid, the reindeer pulling the sled behind us.

Many times during our ride he would pop his head next to me to say hi. At one point he popped his head between Brad and I, huffed and fogged up my glasses. He really go up close and personal.
And I learnt a very interesting fact - reindeers burp. Sid tried to blame Brad but it was definitely Sid.
Poor Sid is at the awkward stage when his antlers are shedding the velvet covering. This process occurs when the antlers are fully grown and the blood supply ceases to flow to the antlers. The velvet like covering starts to dry up and become quite itchy, causing the reindeer to scrape their antlers wherever they can to remove the covering. It doesn’t look that pretty for the reindeer but it doesn’t cause them any pain either.

After the ride we got to feed the reindeer and warm up in one of the teepee like structures of the traditional Sami. Warm berry juice and ginger biscuits are a treat.

This was another surreal and amazing day. Being from Australia we would often find ourselves smiling with joy at the snow covered landscape, being amazed at the beauty of it all.Read more

Tonight’s adventure saw us venturing into the woodlands about half an hour from Rovaniemi to a partially frozen lake. Here Errol, Peta and I squeezed and pulled our way into Tellytuby like floatation survival suits. Sadly Brad was too badly injured to be able to take part in this excursion so he had opted to stay back at our hotel in the warmth.

Once we had donned our very flattering outfits we carefully made our way down to the lake. The use of a pump to stop this section of the lake freezing over creates a small circular space for us to float in. We carefully made our way down the steps into the freezing water, trusting our floatation suits would keep us dry and warm. Thankfully mine and Errol’s did the trick but PETA’s make have has a leak near her neck and within minutes she was feeling the freezing water inside her suit.

There was a bit of an art to manoeuvring around the water while trying to ensure water didn’t make its way into your suit around your neck and head. This activity was meant to be below the Northern Lights but the weather and cloud cover prohibited us from seeing anything. However it was still quite relaxing lying back and looking up to the tree tops and dark Winter sky.

Unfortunately there was a group of four younger Greek people keen to turn this relaxing activity into an active fun event with yelling and splashing about. It did take away from the experience for me.

The survival suits we wore enable people lost at sea to survive in the freezing waters for a few days but after about fifteen minutes the cool started to seep through the suit and I was happy when it was time to hop out. Although that was a very undignified and amusing process for me as I couldn’t control where my body floated and couldn’t get my boots down. Thankfully Errol helped me through the process.

Poor Peta, when we got out of our suits discovered her entire top was wet as she had taken in a lot of water. Not pleasant for her at all. Errol also got a bit of the freezing cold water in his suit as well.

Once we managed to gracefully remove our suits we ventured into the nearby teepee to sit around the fire and enjoy some hot juice and smores. It was a nice way to warm up before heading back to our hotel.

This was yet another amazing experience and it was a pity Brad couldn’t take part inRead more