21-01-2016 / 28-02-2016. Sweden – Sarkimukka.
Sunday the 21th of February our unique trip to Lapland was starting. Destination: Pinetree lodge, Sarkimukka – Sweden.
Monday.
The first day I woke up crazy early – I was so excited. Today it was husky day! The Pinetree Lodge has 134 Husky dogs and 1 small new inhabitant: a Christmas Puppy. I was surprised when they told us we were allowed to control the sleigh ourselves. One person was allowed to sit in the sleigh and the other had to stand behind to steer. What an amazing experience! The barking dogs, the crackle of the snow and the sleigh is the only thing you hear. The view is unreal, everything is white. The waters, the trees.. Everything is covered with 2 meters of snow.
It was lunchtime already, so we secured the dogs and saw a small, wooden house. Our lunch location! The wooden house was not bigger then 2 by 2 meters and we were able to make a fire inside – there was a hole in the roof. While we were watching the view – the white landscape – we enjoyed a warm soup, a tea and a cinnamon bun, a real Swedish delicacy. After this lunch we prepared ourselves for a 2,5 hour journey back to the lodge.
Tuesday.
I’m not really a walking person – I don’t understand when people tell me they just had a ‘lovely walk in the mountains’. But when they told me we were going to walk in the mountains with rackets, I could imagine that would be fun with all this snow. In the end it wasn’t really walking. It was more a fall-stand-throw-a-snowball-fall-stand-throw-another-snowball-kind-of-walk. So yes, I actually liked it. A lot. When Kas decided to go for a walk without those rackets, he totally disappeared in the snow – you can see this on the picture. After again a lovely lunch we had the pleasure on meeting the four-legged residents of the country: the reindeers. Here we experienced the reindeers are not only very tasty, but also very special and friendly ;).
Wednesday.
An active morning was waiting for us. After a solid breakfast we walked to the trail of the Buggy Race. The one with the fastest round was the winner of the day. My first round wasn’t that fast, but after my third round I really had the feeling I was driving insanely fast – and yes, I felt quite cool about it. Unfortunately my fastest round was 1.37 minute and I was one of the slowest of the day – great. The fastest time was 1.20 and it wasn’t Kas.. He became second with a speed of 1.22 minute – Kas always wants to win so you can imagine he was a bit disappointed;).
After dinner it was snow scooter time! With those incredible fast and crazy cool scooters we drove to an open space where you can see the Northernlight very clear – if the Northerlight is there. It was super cloudy and the chance of seeing the Northernlight was minimum. But in the end, driving on a snow scooter in the dark was a great experience. We made a fire and a couch of snow and enjoyed the darkness & the cold. It was actually quite comfortable for a night picnic in –20.
Thursday.
Because we enjoyed the snow scooters so much the evening before – we could drive those the whole day today! The plan was to drive to the Snowy Mountains. This is quite a drive and the guide decided to drive over the big lake (you can drive fast because you don’t have any obstacles). Because he was driving so fast and I was behind him – I did the same. We drove only between the 35 and the 45 km/h but I had the feeling I was almost flying.
When we stopped for a small break, the rest of the group didn’t come. The guide took his snow scooter and went looking for the other part of the group. The guide find them quite fast but they were all stuck in the water. Because of the pressure of the snow on the ice, the ice became watery. If you cross over it a few times there’s a change you get stuck. And so they did. After 1 hour all the snow scooters were out and half of the group had wet feet. We decided to go to a wooden house close by to warm ourselves again. For the ones who are wondering – we didn’t make it to the Snowy Mountains, but this was a great experience as well.
And today was full of great experiences. During dinner we saw a group of people running away. This was the sign. Before we knew the whole restaurant was outside and there it was: The Northernlight. The sky was super dark, there were many, many stars and a part of the sky was coloring dark green. It was moving all the time and for unexperienced photographers: unshootable. But we saw it. And it was AMAZING!
Friday.
When I woke up I wasn’t so sure about today’s program. We started the day with Ice fishing – ice fishing? It doesn’t sound like my kind of thing, I’m super impatience. And we ended the day with a Cross Country Skiing tour. Jup. Interesting day.
The ice fishing was fun – for an hour – and we did even catch a fish! Afterwards it was time for the Cross Country Skiing part . I’m not a super good skier, but I can ski a bit so I expected that I wouldn’t have any problem with Cross Country Skiing But I can tell you: this is something really different then skiing and you can not compare those two. After this great adventure we had lunch in a Tipi – we had wraps with reindeer meat so my day couldn’t get any better .
Saturday.
This day was supposed to be our free day, so we could plan something we liked the most. And this was a tough decision because I loved everything. When we really had to decide – we did choose the husky’s.
Today was much colder then the days before so when we returned to the lodge around 3pm I didn’t mind at all. Everything was frozen and I was super cold. The first day in Lapland it was around –10 and today it was –29.
To all good things comes an end – also to this amazing and special holiday. It was a fairytale.
letsdiscovertheworld.com 