Travel
A magical trip to Lapland
by Chris Allsop
Snow-filled forests, Northern Lights... For a skiing holiday with a difference, Chris Allsop visits Finnish Lapland.
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Seeing the Northern Lights on the first night of my trip to Finnish Lapland took the pressure off my need to spot them for the rest of the week, although I still did. It meant I was free to concentrate on the other main reason for the trip: to learn cross-country skiing, which is basically second nature to all Finns. Having spent years on crowded ski slopes, I loved the idea of a slower, more relaxed kind of skiing that meant I could appreciate the incredible landscape.
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The province of Lapland is roughly all of Finland north of the Arctic Circle. It’s a place of teeming lakes, wooded hills beneath a duvet of snow, and tap water purer than bottled. Reindeer heavily outnumber people and the temperature can hit -40°C.
I spent most of my week in the resort of Saariselkä – a cosy town where you can buy toboggans from a vending machine at the subtly named Santa’s Hotel. Home was Holiday Club Hotel, a basic but comfortable affair with buffet breakfasts.
Donning my rented thermal suit, I attended my first cross-country skiing lesson. Despite the mercury registering -10°C, with snow collecting in my instructor Danila’s goatee, I began to sweat 10 minutes into the lesson. By the second morning my group was happily circumnavigating the village. All this exercise meant I was well up for the hotel buffets, which involved a lot of reindeer, served as a ruby red carpaccio matched with sharp sweet lingonberries or in warming stews. Reindeer isn’t gamey, as you might expect, but more delicate and beefy.
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One day, I travelled an hour south to the Sami capital of Inari. Set on the south-west edge of Lake Inarijärvi, the country’s third largest, I had a crash course in Sami history at the Sami Museum, Siida, before poking around local silverwear shops and dinner at Hotel Inari’s Restaurant Aurora. I sampled delicious lake fish followed by apple pie served with juicy cloudberries.
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With Finland known as the ‘land of a thousand lakes’, it’s not surprising there’s so much good fish on the menus here. The smoked, meaty Arctic Char at Pirkon Pirtti, a restaurant back in Saariselkä was, for me, life-changing for someone who isn’t a fish-lover.
I bid farewell to Saariselkä and moved half an hour south to the remote Muotka Wilderness Lodge. These two-person Aurora Cabins (complete with private saunas) let you gaze upon the night sky from your bed. I hardly slept the first night because there was so much to see.
While at Muotka, I also yahhed a team of yipping huskies, was pulled in a sledge by a reindeer and snowmobiled through the still forest searching for more Northern Lights. They were a no-show, but cradling a hot spiced apple drink in front of a bonfire was a compensation almost comparable.
Getting there
Inghams offers a Northern Lights Two-Centre Adventure, combining four nights at Holiday Club Hotel and three nights at Muotka Wilderness Lodge, including a variety of activities such as husky and reindeer safaris and snowmobiling. A four-day ‘Learn to Cross Country Ski’ package is pre-bookable. The trip runs every Sunday through the season (3 December 2017 – 3 March 2018).