Finnish Lapland

As proven, my love for the north keeps on calling every year. Why? Cold places, snow and northern lights have always fascinated me. This year’s destination isn’t a popular one such as Lofotens, which are subject to numerous reviews and distinct trip guides. Therefore, I am willing to narrate what has genuinely impressed me, activities you have to put on your bucket list and places that must be visited in the Finnish Lapland.

The narrative thread

I don’t want to narrate this trip chronologically since there’s no need to be on a schedule or at a precise spot at a given time.
That’s what it felt to me: you lose track of time.

Where to?

When @foxsbackpack and I organised the trip, we had some spots that knew we had to visit, some of them are quite popular and other less popular. But didn’t have a tight schedule, we did what we could do given the weather conditions and where we were based.
Here is a quick list of places we visited:

• SALLA - In the middle of nowhere

• Oulanka National Park

• Myllykoski

• Levi

What to do

Honestly? There are many things you can do in Finland but what I would highly recommend doing is getting out in the wild, among frozen trees and get lost. Whether it is by ski, bike, snowmobile or anything else: every single place is magical, and you can find beauty at any spot.

Snowmobile Safari

Thanks to the tourism board of Salla, we had the chance to stay in a beautiful cabin over the week and get to experience a lot of things, such as the snowmobile safari. Probably one of the highlights of my whole trip. We started very early in the afternoon, left the base camp and drove up towards a lookout, and everything was frozen, I couldn’t even believe my eyes. Check out this video.

After reaching the lookout, we headed to the cabin (the one in the picture above) and drunk a coffee with a fresh-made doughnut. Probably the best I have ever eaten. We stayed there and waited for sunset, I had quite a lot of shot in my mind that I wanted to take and was so blessed to get exactly the light I wished to have. I will now let the pictures talk.

Husky Safari

Another great activity that the tourism board of Salla proposed us was the Husky Safari. Let’s make things clear: I am not a big fan of dogs. But, the experience of riding a sleddog is unique, and I enjoyed being out in the wild with so many puppies.
Not my highlight for this trip but I enjoyed the experience.

Ski Resort

Here comes the fun. If you follow me on social media, you might know that I enjoy skiing during winter times and biking in summer. When they told us we had an entire day for skiing it felt like Christmas. Kari (the man in the pictures) showed us around, many snowy trees and great powder.

Ski resorts are not big like those in the alps, but the atmosphere is incredible in Finland.

Reindeer Safari

Lumiukko. That was the name of my reindeer and it means snowman. He was a big boy, and drove around the enchanted forest with frozen trees for half a day. We started from the Salla Reindeer centre and then went to a Kota (typical Finnish cabin built by the government to offer a place to stay when travelling long distances) and had some coffee. The guides explained to us what the tools that they bring around are and how they take care of reindeers.

While we were sitting around the fire, drinking some coffee, the guide started handcrafting tools. The setting was unbelievable, fireplace, coffee, good people. Overall, I would 100% recommend this experience.

What to see

Myllykoski Kuusamo

Myllykoski Kuusamo is one of those must-see places. It is located in the Oulanka national park and has two of the most iconic cabin all around Finland. You can quickly get there by car, park and with just a 10 minutes walk you can get to the iconic suspended bridge crossing the river.
The view is stunning, from one side the cabin on the river, from the other side you get a full picture of a cabin exposed on a lagoon.

Santa Claus Cabin

Located in Levi, one of the biggest tourism hub of Lapland for skiing. The cabin is right on the ski slopes and, therefore, there’s quite a lot of traffic around the cabin. I would recommend staying there for sunset or try hunting the northern lights there.

Northern lights

Northerns light are simply mind-blowing. Every time I go up north, my wish is to see them, and luckily enough, I get the chance to see them. It is an explosion of emotion, you don’t know how to react, where to look.
I read an article about northern lights and thought it would be nice to share with you what it says: According to old Finnish beliefs, the reason for these colourful night skylights was the mythical Firefox who was running across the Arctic Lapland. People believed that this giant fox in the sky created the Northern Lights by moving its tail. This is why in Finnish the Northern Lights are called “Revontulet”, i.e. foxfires.

So, make sure you go and hunt for them, it is worth it.

That’s it. We did many things in only five days, and I happy to not have been rushing from one place to the other to make everything happen.

If you have any question don’t hesitate to write on my social media, you find the links below, or even via email.

Cheers