On the edge of the Arctic Circle in a Glass Igloo

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Lying in a warm bed, staring at the winter sky through a glass ceiling is an amazing experience and was how the day ended as this is what we came for.

Glyn and I got up at 7am so as to see a little more of Helsinki before its time to fly up to Rovanemi. The temperature was a dry chill of -9 as we stepped out and immediately headed off in the wrong direction as I'd gotten confused with the various numbers in my tiny map that is only readable in extremely bright light.

Eventually we ended up at some bended wooden chapel thing that is unusual looking but not that exciting. Then we trudged up past Bar Bakkari to the a rock Church which unfortunately is not some form of extreme metal palace of worship but a building hewn out of rock that wasn't open yet. Here we saw the only tourist shops we've encountered that were selling Moomin tat and Santa's Mini Market - all were closed as it was still only 8.30 am. Helsinki so far has been a very quiet city, the traffic is minimal and I've not heard one horn used, so it didn't feel like a working day does.

After checking out, we dragged the increasingly heavy shared suitcase over the cobbles to the rail station, desperately looking for somewhere to buy tickets using cash. We found a really miserable woman who barely looked at me as I paid the €10 for both our tickets. We have now twice gotten away with unintentionally overweight luggage on Norwegian Airlines which is a bonus. We ate at the airport, guessing that it would be a whole lot cheaper than the ice hotel near Sinetta which was our next destination.

Glyn slept again on the plane (who is this man and where is my husband?) and an hour later we arrived in the very snowy Rovaniemi. Whereas the trees of Helsinki were almost black against the white snow, here the trees are a pale grey and weighted down with thick snow and ice. The airport is a Christmas grotto as we were now in Santa's hometown everyday is Yule. The zip had split on our suitcase but somehow Glyn managed to fix it and so we dragged it across the snow to the waiting prebooked transfer van, because there is no public transport. Sharing the van with a Sunderland couple also on the Groupon offer, we had the 'different type of cold' conversation as the van sped through snow clad never ending forests with occasional animal footprints too close for comfort to the road. The roads were heavily gritted and just about dry in places, it felt a lot safer than the UK roads when we have a tiny flurry of sleet. A petrol station had a neon sign that claimed it was -13.

After half an hour, we arrived at the Snow Hotel and Glass Igloos just outside a village called Sinetta. We are in number 14 which already had its own snowman! It is incredibly toasty inside with a fridge (why when you could just leave stuff outside?), two beds with buttons to electronically lift you up to look at the northern lights should they appear. There is also a bathroom with frosted glass so you can poo in private.

We must have spent a good few hours in the snow hotel, first of all photographing the standard rooms thinking that they weren't as impressive as other Snow Hotels we had seen online and wondering if Groupon had tricked us. The ice bar was pumping terrible trendy music, but the actual bar and various seats covered in reindeer hide looked impressive, lit up with multi coloured lights. There were three dining rooms and a chapel all full of snice (that's snow and ice to you) carvings and not too many people standing in the way of photographs. And then we found the showpiece bedrooms, oh they are big and fancy with tons of carvings from folklore and other random stuff. It was all a photographer's dream but tripods were necessary as even the though the ice was lit with multi coloured lights, it was pretty dim. By the time we got outside it had gone dark.

At reception we booked a private snow sauna and hot tub (the non private ones are separate genders and we wanted to be together) for tomorrow plus tomorrow's tea as the chefs need to know in advance. Tonight's meal is chocolate and crisps bought in a Kioski in Helsinki as we can't afford to eat here twice! We also asked about snow shoes and the probability of falling into the frozen lake. The receptionist assured us it was frozen solid, then thought about it and he said, 'hmm, maybe not.' Hopefully I won't find out the hard way.

Just our luck that there is a fat chance of northern lights turning up during our visit. The prediction is KP 1-2 and we need at least a 4 here. Dammit. Added to that, there's thick cloud cover so we can't even find the full moon let alone any stars. But we weren't going to let that stop us doing night time photography and thus we headed to the frozen lake that was as hard as concrete. I said to Glyn, 'there's no need for snow shoes here, it's solid' and then promptly sunk knee deep into the snow.

We saw people speeding by on snow mobiles in the dark, unfortunately we don't have time to go on those and they are incredibly expensive. We took photos of the electric lights shining through the trees and saw very vague and pale green hues in the skies, giving rise to false hope of aurora borealis. Glyn found a plastic sled and shot down a slope in the dark as I tried and missed to photograph him. When it was my go, I spun around, ended up going backwards and flipped out of the sled and whacking my head on solid ice and making my fingers bleed - nicely done.

The ice bar is open twice a day and for only an hour each time. We were the first in for the second sitting at 9.30pm when Glyn was super pleased to discover that they were playing the same shite cd as earlier. I had a Finnish blueberry liqueur in a glass made of ice for €10 and Glyn was impressed to get a sachet hot chocolate in a polystyrene cup for €5. The barman must get very bored of repeating himself every night warning clientele that the ice glasses are very slippery and at that price I would be mortified to drop it. It's hard drinking when wearing multiple scarves, snoods, hoods and gloves but I managed. The slippery ice glass slipped off on the slippery ice table after I was done. Next I decided to try the cloudberry liqueur as this is a Finnish fruit or so I'm led to believe. It was nice enough. Glyn also tried glow wine, a non alcoholic beverage that was a bit like mulled wine. He topped it off with a bright red strawberry juice that was ok. You can see why it is only open for an hour - the novelty wears off almost as quickly as your purse empties.

People were throwing their ice glasses as the wall so we had to give that a go. My effort was a bit pathetic so I jumped madly on the broken pieces until they were mashed into the floor.

We returned to our igloo and went to bed, with the electronic back rests at 45 degrees so we could sit up in the dark staring earnestly at the cloudy sky through the glass wishing for the northern lights. There is an alarm should they put in an appearance so fingers crossed!

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Photos

Ice bar
Snow hotel