299 students and me went to Lappland, organized with the best promoted travel organization at university's in Estonia and probably the whole north of Europa. We went to Saariselkä. The Village has currently 311 inhabitants and has around 10.000 beds for tourists. The place is beautiful different than what we are used from central Europa. It is cold. Soil is poor of nutrition. Life is slow and rare. We had temperatures from -4 to -15°C. Sun went down at 15:00.
Everything is frozen and nothing moves. The atmosphere is lifeless, timeless and completely calm
After 2 hours of hiking I was so surprised to find a living creature. This squirrel seems very prepared for the winter
The sun disappears early. Ski Loipe and hiking paths have lamps in the forest.
Santa Claus
We visited the real Santa Claus in Finnland! It is a beutiful decorated village with a lot of things to do(if you have enough money). We visited Santa in his village called Santa Claus village and actually there are 3 Santa Claus houses with 3 real Santa's inside!
House of Santa Claus number 3. This Santa was a Mrs Santa and she asked only 10Euro for a visit.
The ride to Lappland from Estonia took about 24h.
Lappland Activities
The goal was to go ice fishing. We had more fun drilling holes into the 30cm thick ice.
Sledding down the ski slope
Husky sledding
Norway
We visited a village in Norway called Bugøynes placed almost the northeast tip of Europa. After trying some local fish soup we were brought to a big sauna directly at the artic ocean. After the hot sauna the 3 degree cold water was a welcome cooling-off.
Spending a longer time of your life in another country can teach a lot. It can make you rethink your construct of the world that you have in your mind. It can show you styles of life's and see yourself from another perspective. Public transport is free Which does not mean that it's the best idea to make it for free. The transportation is mostly quick and on time. For me this was very convenient during my semester to go for example to university or visit the beach. Still the market of E-Scooters, taxi and car rentals are booming. You can literally always see a rental car on the streets. I can only assume why. I think that the free availability makes the public transport in Estonia a transportation for poorer people. Not taking public transport can providing social status. On the streets you can see a lot of expensive cars. On the other side students from wealthy countries like Germany prefer the convenience of a taxi or short car rental(here provided by bolt) instead of taking ...
