Saturday 19th: doing stuff in the arctic, getting on train again

I was feeling quite tired this morning so I had a slow start. I was also enjoying the comfort of the hotel, and thought that since I paid some good money for it, I should get some good value from it with a good sleep-in etc. I have spent the last month in budget accommodation and nice, but spartan university accommodation. So this was a welcome dose of comfort.

The view in the morning.

 Eventually I got out there. I was interesting in going on this trip organised by some people where you ride around on snowmobiles and going through the forest and other places. But the day before, I had seen that it seemed to have been cancelled for today. The lady at reception kindly called them to ask what the full story is. It was cancelled, but I was able to hire a snowmobile and drive around on it myself. That sounded pretty cool.

I went down there and they told me that the the snowmobile hire happens from their other office in the next town which is 5km away. Damn. I was also interested in trying skiing. So, before getting over to the other town (the other town is away from the mountain, by a lake. This town is at the base of the main skiing mountain) I went to the ski hire place. However, since I had checked out of the hotel I had my bag with me. I needed a locker, but all the lockers were very small so my bag would not fit in. They said they didn't have any bigger ones, so there really wasn't any way I could do the skiing. A bit disappointing! Still, it was a bit late in the day and I wasn't really sure that I wanted to spend my last time in the arctic by falling into the snow lots. I think it would be difficult for me to learn to ski in such a short time. I would like to come back here someday with more time, because I think the skiing could be really fun and the mountain looked really impressive.

There was another place in the town that rented snowmobiles. I made a little inquiry, but they were 35 euros or so, plus cost of petrol. You also had to fill it up with petrol before you came back. I really didn't feel like messing around with that in a place where I don't speak the language. Plus, paying for petrol is a depressing experience which I was enjoying having an absense from.

So now I decided to head to the next town with the snowmobiles. Earlier, when I had asked the guy about the snowmobiles he said that there is a bus that goes there, but that he has no idea what times it runs. He also said it's not really within walking distance. But I decided I'd try the walking.

Making my way out of the little village.

It might sound like a risky thing to walk the long way to the other town when the guy said I probably shouldn't. But there is a main road ride next to the path with cars going by every 30 seconds or so. Also, I think I would get just as cold if I was skiing. The main thing that was concerning me was that I wasn't entirely sure I was on the right road. Most of the signs have ice covering a lot of the words.

After travelling for a little way I had to step off the side, away from the road, to use the outback bathroom. I walked a little way along a path through the thick snow that had been compressed by other walkers. From there I decided to step off that a little bit. As soon as I did, I fell into the snow up to my waist. It was a bit of a shock and I was slightly stuck in the snow. I wasn't sure if wriggling might cause me to fall more into it and then become submerged (I don't understand snow at all). I managed to get myself out and back onto the compressed snow. I had lots of bits of snow all over me and quite a bit in the opening to my shoes. I had to get it off or else, when it melted, due to body heat, it would turn to water and get me wet which might make me very cold. I took my gloves off so that I could better do that. I spent a fair while making sure I got it all out. After that I realised that after my bare hands had been wiping away the snow for so long, they were now very numb and cold. I was getting a bit worried by all this. I had been walking for a while and wasn't sure if I was on my way to the intended town, or heading towards endless wilderness. I breathed warm air onto my hands for a bit which didn't do much and then I put my gloves back on. After about 10 minutes of nervous wriggling of my fingers my hands stopped feeling like ice and started feeling very warm. Hooray I was going to be alright!

The hole where I fell in. It's deeper than it looks! While my hands were freezing I had enough time to take a picture.

I kept walking a bit more and finally found the town. Yay!

This guy has a sled. The town is just a little beyond the bridge.

The town had a souveneir shop. I went in there to warm up a bit. Then I went to find 'Yllas Adventure' where they do the snowmobiling etc. When I got there, I was feeling not so sure about doing snowmobiling by myself. I didn't really feel in the mood to learn to drive a new vehicle. It was quite expensive at 45 euros for just one hour. I decided to do some ice skating on the lake instead, since I know I can ice skate, and it was cheaper. I will definitely have to go back sometime and do the snowmobiling with an experienced person and a bunch of other people. It would have been really good.

Ice skating was quite different to how I imagined. The ice was much more rough than what I'm used to. I think they hadn't cleaned up the top layer very recently, so some bits of snow had melted onto the top which caused some rough and bumpy bits which made it a bit harzardous to skate in some sections. Although some other sections were very smooth and I could get some speed up. Also, the ice skates were the kind that are strapped to the bottom of ordinary walking boots, so they didn't clamp my ankle into a tight position like I am used to. At first it was quite difficult, but I got more used to it. When I asked about the safety of the lake with regards to cracking, they told me that the lake is frozen right to the bottom! It's a big lake,too. So, that's a lot of freezing.

You skate around a track rather than a big open area.

Big crack in the ice. I was told that because it has frozen so deeply into the lake, the changing sizes of the water when frozen has caused these big cracks to appear. They're going to pour water into them sometime to try and fill them up. They were a hazard. You have to skate over them to make sure you don't get stuck and trip.

After a while I stopped skating and contemplated what to do next (I had gone the whole skating time without falling over, except about 20 metres from the end where my skate cracked into a soft bit of ice and sent me tumbling a few metres). It was becoming late afternoon and my train was leaving at 6:40pm. I wanted to get some food before I caught the bus to the train station. The people in this town said that the bus does stop in this town, but they didn't sound quite as sure of the location of pick-up compared to the lady at reception back in the hotel. Also, there would probably be other travellers waiting at the hotel for the bus, so I thought I would be more certain of catching it if I was there. I really didn't want to miss the bus. So I decided to walk back to the hotel. It was quite a nice walk the first time, allowing me to see some forest, and I felt more confident now, knowing that it is the right road. It is nice seeing some more natural forest rather than the little huts of the ski resort.

After I had just left the town, I saw some people scrambling out from the forest through the thick snow and onto the path. I caught up with them as they sat around getting all the snow off them. They were about 6 people from China. They had just got here, off the bus. The bus dropped them off on a road which bridges over this one (the bridge in the picture above with the sled rider). They had to clamber down the side of the hill formed by the bridge crossing, and then onto the path, and then they were told that their accommodation would be a short walk up the path away from the town in the direction I was heading in. They were quite friendly and talkative so I decided to walk with them. Early in our conversation, when they asked where I was going, I said 'Yllas Saaga' in a slight Finnish accent (due to realising that the Finnish won't know what I mean unless I say it properly), and I think they thought I was Finnish! That was the first thing I'd said. They seemed confused, thinking that I was a speaker of Suomi, so I assured them that I don't speak it at all, and then asked if they speak english. They did. They were all computer programmers in C, C++ and some scripting languages. They were in Finland for a company training trip, saying that there is some technology here in Finland which they are being trained on. After a while, they turned left down a road toward where they needed to go, and I kept going on the same road.

It was about 3:30pm at this time, and the sun goes down at about 4. So I think it was getting colder. But because I was walking quite fast so that I'd have enough time to eat and catch the bus, I was getting hot rather than cold.

I made it back to the ski resort at the base of the mountain and got a margherita pizza from Tikka Pizza. They gave me a free cup of tap water with it. Fantastic.

My hair is frozen. In this town, I think -18 was good weather, whereas it could get to -30 or lower after the sun went down.

Awesome log cabin.

After that I walked back to Saaga Hotel to wait for the bus that was coming at 5:05. Bus arrived on time and we had a pleasant journey to the train stop. When we arrived, the train was already there! After the previous day of it being 4 hours late, I wasn't expecting this. But there were employees on the train fixing up the rooms and sheets etc so we had about 40 minutes to wait until we could get onto the train. I waited inside the building at the train stop. I met a nice girl and her mother who I think were from Russia. We were both confused at what the announcements were saying over the speaker. They were saying that the train was going to be a little late, so we should wait inside.

I got on the train and found that I was sharing the room with an older man who'd finished a skiing trip. He could only speak a little bit of english. He was friendly but a little awkward. He kindly gave me some hot tea which tasted very sugary, and a plain roll. I took off a few layers of clothes and sorted my stuff out. Then I got into bed and fell asleep listening to Bill Frisell's Where in the World album. I was feeling very tired. I slept through the whole night without waking.