We’ve just arrived in Tallinn, Estonia, this afternoon by ferry from Helsinki.
It was a 2 hour crossing, very pleasantly spent treating ourselves to a splendid lunch in their top restaurant, with a view of the islands, yachts and shipping cruising by.
We shared Escargots in garlic cream sauce, and shrimp & avocado salad for entrees, then pork fillet for Jan and fillet of beef for Mike as a main.
Washed down with a Luxemburg champagne for Jan, and a very nice Shiraz/Merlot from Sicily for Mike.
Hey – it’s a tough life, but someone has to do it!  (And it is very infrequent so far this trip).

Anyway, highlights from the last week, apropos the enclosed photos:
• Driving in Finland
• Santa’s Village in Lapland
• Huskypoint
• Jamsankoski campsite

Driving in Finland is beautiful but eventually very boring – miles and miles of forest (pine, spruce and silver birch), interspersed with lakes and farms,
the only excitement being the reindeer and elk wandering the roadsides.
We saw quite a few reindeer, but didn’t spot an elk (moose for those of an American persuasion). The only other challenge to the brain is trying to pronounce the place names on the road signs.

Our first stop in Finland was Rovaniemi, in Lapland on the Arctic Circle – but going south this time.  We visited Santa’s Village, which is on the circle line (just east of Baker Street ;-), and made point of visiting Santa in his office, and telling him how good all our children, grandchildren and friends have been this year (so far).  He said he knew NZ and Australia quite well, having come through there briefly last year (Dec 24th), and looking forward to another visit.  He mentioned that the elves were flat out, and everything is on schedule for this year.  We also visited Santa’s Post Office and saw the little helpers franking all the cards and letters by hand that people were sending off.  We confess to sending some cards & letters too.

Our next stop was Huskypoint, where they breed huskies for dog sled racing.  They have 215 Alaskan husky dogs and puppies at present at two sites 200km apart.  Their main activity time is winter, of course, and they usually have 3 teams of 14 dogs entered in the big races in Norway each March – 500km and 1,000km races over 2-3 and 5 days respectively.  Plus they do guided treks for tourists.
We got to pet many of the dogs – they love attention and are all over you, then we got to cuddle the puppies too – just 6 weeks old.  Unfortunately we weren’t able to sneak one out under a jacket, and they don’t sell them either.

We were then taken on a 1km dog sled ride, with the team pulling a buggy through the forest – and wow! – the speed they go is amazing.
The lead dogs are the older, smart ones – they know the commands left, right, slow, fast, stop, etc.  The dogs further back are the ‘grunts’ – the young, strong ones.
Apparently they run for 2+ hours at a time in the winter races, with only ½ hour breaks, for a whole day.  They then rest for 8 to 10 hours before heading off again.  It was a great experience.

The campsite we found at Jamsankoski was by accident.  The site we had chosen at Jyvaskyla was almost full and they wanted to charge €50 per night because the Finland Motor Rally was in their area, so we kept going and found this delightful site 40km further south (For only €21 per night)
Our pitch was right on the lakeside under pine trees, stepping out onto a wooden deck by the water – fabulous view (and sunset, and idyllic surroundings).  It was just a pity we could only stay one night as we needed to reach Helsinki the following day (Friday), to organise possible side-trips to Porvoo and St Petersburg, plus a ferry to Estonia.

Next week: Helsinki, Porvoo and Tallinn.