Thursday 3 July 2014

Lappish fun, part 2



The next morning we set off early to another little fun area to meet the man in the red suit! We even had a few hours of daylight today. In winter in Lapland they only have between two and four hours of daylight each day:



Once we got to Santa’s hut they had some of the kids knock the door and sing Jingle bells really loudly to see if he would answer the door. He did! So all the kids were brought in to his cabin and they had a chance to tell him what they wanted for Christmas and they were all given a toy reindeer. We gave Santa my nephew’s letter and he gave us a reindeer for him as well.




After that we hung around that area fro a while trying out the different activities such as more reindeer rides:




Husky dog rides:


And then the story-teller was back this time teaching us the traditions of Lapland and all about the traditional costume of Lapland:
They told us these were igloos they were building I forget what they said they were for though.


We had dinner here before we moved on to our next destination.


Our next destination was Santa’s Village to cross the Arctic Circle line. The blue lights were to mark where the Arctic Circle line was.  


Once we did that we had time to explore:


Santa’s Post Office:





If you wanted you could visit the man himself again as he had followed us over but we just explored the shops and toy factory:










After that it was time to head back to the bunker to give back our snowsuits and boots and then to the airport. Check in was quick and soon we were back on the plane waving farewell to Lapland after a great two days in the snow:

Back in Ireland they had some more cute decorations in the baggage claim hall I couldn’t resist taking pictures of:


Lappish fun part 1



In 2009 we did a two day trip to Rovaniemi, Finland in other words Lapland in December! When I say we it was two adults no children but we had a very important Santa letter to deliver for my nephew.

The Flight was at 10am so we didn’t have to be in the airport until 8am. 
 I love how they had the airport decorated for Christmas as well:



Since everyone on the flight was going on the same tour there was much fun and frolicking on the flight. Everyone was given Santa hats and a sing song of Christmas songs lasted for the duration of the flight. Once we landed in Lapland we got our luggage and headed out to the buses waiting outside the airport:



They brought us all to a bunker to get our snowsuits and boots. They did have hats and gloves up we used our own.


Once we were all suited up we went to some area where there was tobogganing and games set up for the kids. This was the only part of the trip where I thought not having kids with us was a little boring because there was literally nothing for the adults to do except stand around and watch the children play with Santa’s helpers.




After that they took us to an ice restaurant where everything from the chairs to the building itself was made from ice. It was quite funny here because they were giving us soup but because the place was made of ice by the time they got the soup to us it was cold again!




After our food there was an option on whether you wanted to go on a snowmobile or reindeer ride through a forest. We chose the reindeer ride so we went out to a hut in a forest and this lady told us some stories about the reindeer first while she gave everyone hot berry juice:


Then we met the reindeer and went off on our sleigh ride through the forest. While we were on our sleigh ride it started snowing as well:
 


After that we headed back to the hotel. We were staying in the Santa Claus Hotel. They checked us all in and gave us a bag of food to snack on since we were supposed to have dinner in the hotel and we missed it. Outside on the street were huge snowmen and Christmas trees so I popped out for a few pics before heading to bed.