I decided that sleeping on a train was more akin to trying to sleep in Business Class on a plane. It wasn’t great but it was better than not sleeping. There was much rocking, rolling and sudden jerks more designed to keep you awake rather than soothe you off to sleep like being on a cruise ship.
There seemed to be many stops during the night but fortunately none of them were announced over the tannoy system which was just as well as the Finnish language is almost completely incomprehensible when written and even more so when spoken. Words seem to be unnecessarily long and there are just too many of them. In the morning when we did get about 5 minutes of Finnish announcement and when then came the English translation it was just 6 words ‘the next stop will be Rovaniemi’.
Karen got up and tried the shower. Her recommendation was for me not to bother so I didn’t. Instead, we packed up the few things we had got out and sat and waited for our breakfast to be delivered. It wasn’t.
I thought I had ordered some but perhaps I hadn’t or perhaps we had to collect it. As it was only a yoghurt and some juice, we decided it was no great loss.
At Rovaniemi everyone on board bar 21 passengers alighted at precisely 7.20am. The others were apparently carrying on for another 2 ½ hours into deepest Lapland. The weather was bright but a brisk 11c.
I had booked a rental car. As the rental car desk was shut I was emailed in advance and told that the paperwork had been left in the car. The key was apparently in a lockbox attached to the car. So, we set off on a treasure hunt to locate the car. It took a while as the email said it was grey whereas it was more of a greenish brown colour. The key box was cleverly attached to the window. It was a very nice Toyota Yaris automatic with Apple car play.
Despite check in not being until 4pm we thought we would drive to our base for the next 2 nights at the Santa Claus Village about 5 miles North of Rovaniemi and exactly on the Arctic Circle. The place was deserted but Karen decided to go into Reception to see how early they might let us check in. To our delight they said straight away.
We drove to our sweet little Christmas Cottage festooned with lights and an outside Christmas Tree. Inside it was just as sweet and we had our own little Sauna. We made a welcome cuppa. Karen had a proper shower whilst I waited for the Sauna to heat up before jumping in. Sadly, with her neck wound still healing she had been told to avoid saunas for this trip.
Then we set out to explore Santa Claus Village. It was a most intriguing place. I expect it looks very different in the winter covered in a blanket of snow but for now it was not exactly pretty, more like a large concrete car park with some funny shaped buildings.
Reception had warned us that the Village was a conglomeration of some 60 different businesses and that showed. It was all a mish mash and not in a good way.
But before having a proper look round we were distracted by what for us was the main attraction and that was the Arctic Circle marker. I had found there was a Live Cam overlooking the line and we waved at Barry who was watching us online as we stepped over the line.
We stopped for the usual photos. The line where it is dark for at least one whole day each year and light for at least one whole day. I did wonder what it would be like standing on the line itself on those days and looking both ways.
After this we ventured into some of the shops. We seemed to have picked the best 2 to start with as they then got progressively worse. The best place was the official Santa Claus Post Office which is where all letters from across the world from children to Santa end up. Karen bought an ornament, and I bought a first day stamped envelope.
Tat was the order of the day for both the goods being sold everywhere else as well as the display and buildings themselves. This included the Mrs Claus building set up which was a bit weird and creepy.
Some disappointed we eventually found an acceptable café having dismissed several after we had looked inside. I had a toasted cheese sandwich whilst Karen had a slice of apple pie along with a couple of hot drinks. The price was the equivalent of a full meal at home.
I had thought we should try and do something with either Reindeers or Huskies whilst we were here, but the price were ludicrous. Some places wanted 60 Euros to be taken to just see them, whilst being pulled by Huskies on wheeled sleds in the summer were over 100 Euros each. I knew Karen was not keen on this at all as she had been told that you get covered in their excrement as they run ahead of you. There was one place which was charging 19 Euros just to walk in an enclosure to feed Reindeer. So, for now we decided to forget the thought of doing anything like that.
As we were walking around there was a Finnish air force large jet (F/A-18 Hornet?) doing combat low level training overhead. It drew a crowd and was so noisy. It did barrel rolls as well as other horrible looking manoeuvres. I hate watching anything like that as I always fear the worst for those on board and those watching.
Instead, we went to the Christmas House and decided to meet the ‘real’ and the ‘official’ Santa Claus. There was no queue. Now I’m not saying he was not the real Santa, but he was a lot younger than me (in his 20’s). However, he did have a cracking accent and was not fazed by an older sceptical couple from the UK. We agreed to have our photo with him knowing that the purchase price would be eye wateringly expensive.
It was.
Partly to annoy them I chose not to purchase the size they had printed out instead and mainly to keep the cost down I said I wanted the much smaller version. They obviously do not get many requests for that as they had to ask how to print that size. Of course, as soon as I was given it I scanned it onto my phone which they had also wanted to charge extra for.
We wandered back to our little cottage pleased we had made the effort to get here but overall disappointed with the place. What it needs is one person to take full ownership and responsibility. All the businesses need to be joined up and coordinated. There needs to one central business offering Reindeer and Husky opportunities. There should be something relating to the History and traditions of Santa especially in different countries across the world. The food choice needs to be of a much better quality and choice. The whole set up needed the Disney touch instead it felt like a poor man’s disjointed Disney Springs. It is a great idea and concept (and to be fair the parts of the business controlled directly by the Santa Village company is of a different standard to the rest). It is just poorly executed. If I had paid £700 for a day trip from Norwich, I would be so disappointed.
After a while we set out for dinner. Karen now though wasn’t feeling great and didn’t want to sit in a restaurant and had set her mind going to MacDonalds back in Rovaniemi for yet another burger. I knew this was because Barry & Ellie had been here and that it used to be the most Northerly one in the world (we had also visited the most Southerly one) until one was recently opened in Tromso, Norway.
Back in the cottage, Karen watched something on iPlayer whilst I read the latest John Grisham on my kindle.
As we had had a disturbed night on the train and had been up early and we were had an early night after I had had my second sauna of the day.
