Showing posts with label Finland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Finland. Show all posts

Monday, March 4, 2013

Ivalo Airport

Ivalo is a very small city - with 4000 people, no university and no full-scale hospital it barely earns its 3-gate airport.

BUT, in that tiny space they find room for a children's play area. And once my kids found it, they quieted down.  That's the other point I want to make about making airports more friendly towards children - it makes the children more "friendly" to adults, by getting them happy and out of the way.

Here's the one photo that Terry allowed me to keep even though it is horribly out of focus. I promised him I would make it very clear in this post that he does not authorize this photo and wishes I would delete it.
The thing in the foreground is a kiddie sized table with two wooden puzzles on it. There were also 2 plastic bins with toys and books.

The family sees the light (Finland cont'd)

Our 3rd night we were on the schedule for the entire family to go to the aurora camp to try to catch a peek at the lights. We hemmed and hawed a bit about whether we should really bring the kids and in the end decided the sky was clear and it's a once in a lifetime opportunity.

Nobody remembers why Terry opened the door about 30 minutes before we needed to leave for the adventure, but after a moment's glance outside we started bundling everyone up at lightening speed. The aurora was out!!!

We got no photos as the camera was all packed up for the trip, but we got outside with enough time to show the kids and to watch for 5 minutes or so before heading to the meeting point. And no, I don't have faulty math. It takes a while to get all that clothing on.

We thought we did a super job bundling the kids up this time, but Alex did complain a bit about being cold. The nice part of the aurora camp is there is a field house with a fire going and people poke in and out to see what's going on. Terry and I traded off being inside and outside, but as we let the kids bring their LeapPads they couldn't have cared less if we were there or not.

The aurora never showed up as well as it had in the earlier evening.  We got a couple of photos that show it faintly, but the clouds started appearing soon after we got to the camp.  We ended up calling it a night earlier than the planned return time, apparently that's common when the weather just plain sucks.

Here's the one I took. And at least the kids got to see it, although they are not likely to remember it as they really didn't seem to care.
 

Saturday, March 2, 2013

Husky dogsled ride

Alex: tights, corduroy pants, regular socks, ski socks, long sleeved T shirt, hoodie, her own Lands End snowpants and jacket, the hotel-provided Finnish brand coverall-type snowsuit. Estonian super warm hat. Scarf double wrapped around her face. Mittens.
 
Zoltan: just about the exact same gear.
 
Lynne: Longjohns, polartec fleece ski pants, jeans, long sleeved T shirt, flannel shirt, thick wool sweater. hoodie. Two pair of ski socks (one thicker than the other). Hotel-provided coverall snowsuit. Hotel-provided lined leather mittens.

We did have to open the door to our little apartment while we were bundling up but, I'll be honest, there were a couple of points when we were having our snack and petting the dogs that we all got cold. Yup, that's what I said. And mind you, we are people who spend an hour at the playground when it is -20C in Piter.

We have precious few photos from the day and nothing of the dogs in action. This is because Terry was busy hanging on and Lynne had two little heads right where she would normally hold a camera. And besides, it was extra super cold while the dogs were running and my hands would freeze right off and then I would probably drop the camera.

But we do have some photos from the day. The kids enjoyed the ride but they liked petting the dogs even more!
  Doggies getting a rest
                                                                                         






Thursday, February 28, 2013

Reindeer Herding day

On our second day in Finland we went out with the reindeer herder and got to feed the reindeer. We also got to see Russia. It didn't look any different from Finland.

There isn't too much to say about that day - we planned badly and didn't dress the kids warmly enough, even though we wrapped her in blankets and a reindeer hide Alex got very cold and didn't truly warm up til we got to the fire for lunchtime, so we spent a lot of time worried.

Here's the kids at the beginning of the day, still warm and happy and playing in the snow while the older folks learned how to throw a lasso.
 And here they are feeding the reindeer.
 

Tuesday, February 26, 2013

The first day

We were up unfortunately early for how late we all got to bed, and of course all bellies grumbled. We got some coffee into the adults and granola bar into the kids and by the time we were dressed and coherent it was time for breakfast. During breakfast one of the staff members asked me what the kids eat for dinner, so they could be sure to have something on hand they'd eat. More on that later.

After breakfast we got the kids and me our gear - the place provides snowsuits, hats, boots, pretty much everything. The gear is good, but it turns out for a modestly warm day like today (only -2C) Lands End does just as well. The Kamik boots kept the kids' tootsies warm and I have to give a shout out - some of the resort's boots are Sorels, which have been the other boot we've used and recommended.

The morning was meant to be cross country skiing. Between Zoltan's faulty skis and the complexity of the activity the kids quickly dropped out. No matter, the experience started on the lake out the back of the resort, and the tobaggans and sledding hill were feet away. In essence, we waited for the group to return and got a bunch of runs in. You can see how happy the kids were!
 Having so much fun, in fact, that nobody thought to give them (or ask for) a snack. So a ravenous, about-to-grump group entered the dining area. We quickly load the kids up with rice, bread and fruit and I notice the only hot meal offered is a cabbage roll ... with pork. I ask if there's anything else as I don't eat pork and they say they will do something for me. I am a bit skeptical about what exactly will happen, and start to load up on salad and rice. And then, as the kids are pretty well finished with their meals, a delicious chicken curry appears at our table. Terry gladly helped me eat it.

After lunch we had to rush a bit to get everyone on the potty and back into snow gear for the afternoon activity - snowshoeing. So. Much. Fun. Zoltan this time agreed to hang out on the sled, and Alex made it about halfway before she also wanted a ride.


Here's Alex eating snow. I think this place has never seen tourists like us. When the guide heard Alex was eating snow her response was "No, you don't want to do that, it's very cold!" Um, for my kids, -2C is not cold.

 Bliss!

Monday, February 25, 2013

The hunt for the aurora

When we wandered off the airplane into the velvety black night and headed toward the building of the airport, we were pretty well done. It had been a long day of travel, especially for a mere 2.5 flight hours (I may have mentioned this previously).
Right at the entrance of the arrivals area were several people holding signs for the people they were meeting and bringing to hotels. None bore my name. I started to worry. Terry went to get the bags and I went to find the phone number of the hotel, hoping that our ride was simply running late. I watched a couple of guys hustling into the building and, yep, one had our sign. Huge sigh of relief.

We were at the hotel before 8pm, and the night runs went out at 9:30. During dinner one of the guides came by to tell us the aurora was starting, very faint but you could see something in the sky if you knew what to look for. We abandoned our dinner and ran out, but it was truly faint and we did not know what to look for. But, it gave us hope for the rest of the night.

After dinner was a race to get the tired grumpy kids to bed, which required a decent bit of unpacking to find pajamas and such. For the first time, they did not stay up chatting when put to bed in the same room. They were beyond exhausted.

Terry had gone out with the group with a promise to SMS me if the aurora put on its show. I unpacked as much as possible, organized things and by 10:30pm local time (midnight thirty to my body) I decided I was done.

No sooner had I lay down when the phone started to sing. Aurora! I threw on my coat, boots and hat and ran outside to see what I could see. At first it was nothing much, a faint fuzziness that could have been clouds moving around had the night not been so clear. I texted back that it was here but faint. Then I looked up again and saw a brilliant streak of green move across the sky. And more.

We both got to see the aurora on the first night here ... the rest is just icing on the cake. And what icing!

Helsinki airport

We did our research and knew Helsinki airport had 4 children's play areas. Two were within an easy distance of our next gate so we wandered toward the farther one, as we had 3 hours to kill.
Small, but very well done. Here's some photos.



Note to American airports and businesses catering to children:  In most of the major airports in our country, there are plenty of pockets of dead space about the same size as this play area. This one was sponsored by a manufacturer of winter clothing, they had their logo everywhere and also had stacks of their catalog within the rooms. Brilliant. If we ever end up anywhere cold enough again, we are likely to buy this company's products. It's a huge win-win situation.

But I digress. We gave the kids about an hour in the one place, then moved them to the closer-to-out-gate space, which was a bit smaller. Between the play areas, eating, and watching planes come and go, the time passed quickly.

We left the house around 11am local time, and got to the hotel 11 hours later. A bit annoying as we were only in the air about 2.5 hours, but it gave us a dry run for our PCS and other future trips and I am so proud and amazed at how far the kids have come as travellers. We had a Trunki and a roller bag for their carry-ons and they actually fought over who got to roll the roller bag rather than who got to sit on the Trunki. Their moods stayed relatively good even as naps got missed and healthy food not eaten. Because we knew we didn't have a lot of airtime and the airports were entertaining enough we brought little in the carry-ons - little enough that just about every snack got eaten and just about every toy played with. Success!