All the photo and video equipment was ready for our second trip beyond the Arctic Circle, this year in Finnish Lapland. The phone would have been used only for some highlights. We had taken into account that the cold of the Arctic night could have caused some difficulties with the electronics, and indeed the temperatures ranging from -27C to -36C made us give up on using it, so the phone was the only means to capture the various moments of this our second magnificent vacation in the Great North.
00:00 Finnish Lapland
After many years ago, in a quite curious way, I overcame my fear of flying, today I find all those sensations transmitted during takeoff and landing very fascinating, so, like a kid glued to the window, I capture its highlights. Then comes the transfer and the first approach to the temperatures and light of the Arctic night! Incredible, fascinating, severe.
We arrive at Muotkan Ruoktu Tunturikyla
https://www.muotkanruoktu.fi/fi/
04:41 Muotkan Ruoktu Tunturikyla
Within the same Reserve, there's a village that Hans Niittyvuopio, an elderly Sami, wanted to sell a few years ago to whoever wanted to carry on this reality with total respect for nature and the history of the existing structures. And so it was. Kevin and Kinga, the owners, along with Mathieu and Mathilde, Jean-Philippe and Carla, welcome us in this our wonderful experience.
Life in this small village is marked by the rhythms of nature.
Activities to discover the reserve in this first week of January are a bit slowed down due to the too low temperatures. So, life around the fireplace, a beer, new friends, and a good book.
And then you return to your chalet in the light of a moon present day and night. Outside the cold, inside a warmth that is far from the excesses of urbanization.
Then you think of the Sami nomads who populated these lands, and then you feel closer to the cycles of nature and everything becomes normal.
08:01 Inari
Seat of the Sami Parliament, Inari is a small village on the large lake of the same name. Beyond the bridge, the Sami museum, to remember customs and above all what their long history as a nomadic people has been.
A walk on the vast frozen surface of the lake, being welcomed into a Sami community dwelling and finally a magnificent walk along the Juutuanjoki river, crossing it on the suspended bridge near the Jäniskoski rapids. A wild and severe nature made even more magical by a light snowfall.
Here we say goodbye to the Great North.
A short stop in the capital awaits us before returning. Despite the severity of the season, leaving Muotkan Ruoktu and Inari, makes us melancholic.
14:41 Helsinki
We step out of the hotel and it almost feels strange to see the sun. We've spent wonderful days where its light was just a dawn quickly linked to dusk.
The air stings, maybe we're less covered, maybe it's the humidity, but we'd gotten used to those -30 degrees and were starting to feel good, despite the first approach not being exactly easy.
We already miss the North.
Having to choose a destination that gives us an image of Helsinki, after Senate Square, we head to take the boat that takes us to the Suomenlinna fortress, literally "castle of Finland", declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1991.
A journey that lasts just over 10 minutes, but beneath us, the icy waters of the Gulf of Finland. Around us, a frozen sea where seagulls gently glide. Our boat, like a small icebreaker, calmly makes its way. Another new, curious experience.
Информация по комментариям в разработке