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Published: September 9th 2007
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Weird weather seems to follow me. When I was participating in a work abroad program in New Zealand, I experienced the worst summer New Zealand had had in years; when I arrived here in Finland, winter wasn't really winter - there was no snow on the ground and the temperature was unseasonably warm. Spring has come early here: there is very little snow on the ground, no ice to skate on and green sprouting up on the trees more and more.
When I couldn't use my brand new skates, I decided that I needed to experience real Finnish winter! Three of my friends and I decided to head up north to Lapland, to Saariselkä (approx. 260 km north of the Arctic Circle). How much more north and wintery can you get?
We departed Jyväsklylä last Wednesday and took the overnight train to Rovaniemi (one of the bigger "cities" in Lapland). The train ride was bearable, but only because it was close to deserted in our car. Even with this fact, I would say that I would much prefer being on a plane for 8 hours than the train car that took us up north to Rovaniemi! The city itself
is very commericalized - many tourists visit Rovaniemi to see "Santa Claus Village" (adults and children alike). We decided to skip out on the village and focus on seeing more of the town. After walking around for a couple of hours, we decided to check out the university in Lapland. One of the benefits of having a Finnish student card is that you have access to discounts almost everywhere. Even though we don't attend the Lapland University, we were still able to take advantage of the ridiculously cheap student meals that Finnish universities offer.
The campus itself is obviously new and it's gorgeous. There were windows everywhere, artistic displays (I have a feeling that the campus is probably known for its fine arts faculty) and very modern design. Like much of Finnish architecture, everything looked simple but very well made and clean. Finns eat their meals fairly early and we arrived just as lunch was ending. They were serving burgers! I hadn't had a decent burger since I left North America and decided to give the cafeteria a shot. I wasn't disappointed 😊.
After lunch, we went back to the train station where we were scheduled to catch
a bus further north to a town called Saariselkä. Saariselkä is home to the northernmost ski hill in the world and it was where my Finnish tutor suggested we go if we wanted to do some good winter activities (e.g. skiing, snowshoeing, etc.). There aren't many hotels and hostels in Lapland but there are plenty of cottages to rent. Turns out we picked a good one! Our cottage was equipped with a fireplace, sauna, two bedrooms and a dishwasher! Our student residence is comfortable but very modest, for four exchange students, the cottage was luxurious. We were all pretty tired from the long train ride and decided to have a relaxing night in front of the fireplace and in the sauna. After a long day of walking around Rovaniemi, the sauna was the perfect way to end the day.
In the morning after our arrival in Saariselkä, we awoke to freshly fallen snow and lots of sunlight. The weather was perfect at about -2 and we knew we were going to have a good day ahead of us. We stopped in town to pick up a few supplies and then went to a rental place where we rented snowshoes
for the day. The rest of the day was spent snowshoeing up the ski hill and enjoying the gorgeous views from the hill. I don't really need to describe how spectacular the view was, I'll let the photos do the talking for me.
Snowshoeing up and down the ski hill was a lot of fun but really tiring. When we arrived back to the cottage, we decided to have another easygoing night and had another long sauna session and watched some movies on Tahir's laptop. Another really good day, capped off by a relaxing night in the cottage.
On Saturday, we weren't treated to the same sunny and mild weather from the day before but we didn't let that stop us from going on a 6 km hike. We took a different route up a different hill (a cross-country ski hill this time) and even though the hike wasn't as much fun as the snowshoeing was, we still had a good time. We were slowed down every once in a while by stepping into huge holes that had been covered by thin layers of snow, but we all completed our 6 km hike in one piece.
Yesterday
was our last in Saariselkä and we were all dreading the long train ride home, as well as the prospect of having to leave our beloved cottage! I forgot to mention that on Saturday, we met one of the owners of our cottage who had to stop by to fix our dishwasher. He turned out to be the same person who had built our cottage! At first we thought he was joking (silly us, Finns aren't usually known for their humour) but he assured us that yes, he had built the cottage with his own two hands. We talked with him for a while and found out that he owns some of the land around where our cottage was located and was in the process of building another one. He said that the one we were staying at was built by him alone and that it took about a year finish. After finishing his coffee, he was on his way, probably to help some other tourists who couldn't figure out how to work something in their cottage...
In the early afternoon on Sunday, we took a bus back down south to Rovaniemi and then the overnight train to Tampere
where we spent two very long hours waiting for another train that took us home to Jyväskylä. It's about 6:30 pm right now on Monday and I've spent the whole day catching up on sleep that I was robbed of because of a packed Sunday night train from Rovaniemi to Tampere. Now, it's back to studying (which still isn't as stressful as it is at home) for the next two weeks and then I'm off to Russia for a week!
It amazes me that I've been here for three months already - sometimes it feels like I've been here much longer and at other times, I feel as though I've just arrived. The reality is that I'm going to be heading home relatively soon and even though I miss you all, I'm finding it difficult to think about having to say goodbye to all the people I've met and to Finland itself. Everyone I've met has been very good to me and I've thoroughly enjoyed experiencing Finnish culture and a different kind of lifestyle than the one back in North America.
Hope you're all enjoying the early spring and the next time you visit here, I'll have more stories for you - this time from Russia!
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