A lapland tour on three days is at least limited by time and distance. How ever when we made our recent tour to the north we think we did catch the most important parts possible on such an short time. Our main goal was to celebrate my friends 40 birthday by giving him some memory for life.
We started early in the morning Malmö Airport and changed flight in Stockholm on out way to Umeå. SAS domestic flights aint to much to speak about. They are more or less a seat and free coffee. How ever if you have an early flight you can preorder some breakfast.
The good part with our early flight was that we could start or lapland tour already around 10 in the morning. We picked up our rental car from AVIS and started to drive west.
Storforsen
Our first destination on our lapland tour was Storforsen, a waterfall with an average flow of 187 m3/s. The rapid stretch 5 km and 82 meter of which 60 are a single waterfall. Its not hard to understand that this is a popular tourist attraction visited by 150 000 people every year. While its an easy walk during summer, the path was icy during our visit. For that reason we only made the lower parts before we went to Hotel Storforsen for a well needed lunch and coffee.
Arctic circle
After our stop at Storforsen we started to drive north and after some hours it was time for our next break, the arctic circle. Its actually hard to think on a lapland tour and not make a stop at the arctic circle. Its of course invisible. But just the feeling of being on the boarder to the land of midnight sun and polar night makes you speechless.
Ice hotel
After we made the most to have photos of the arctic circle we started to drive straight to the Ice hotel in Jukkasjärvi. The main destination on our lapland tour. I don’t think the Ice hotel need to much of introduction. Let us just say that it was fantastic! To sleep in an ice room is a wonderful experience. Its so warm and cosy in your sleeping bag and totally silent. We also tried their arctic menu on the saturday and it was a pure joy.
Dog sledging
On the Saturday morning we had booked a tour on a dog sledge with Lapland wilderness tour. If you like us, lives in the south this is an amazing experience. To fly over the ice of Torne Älv, see the joy of the dogs and being so close to nature is just wow. Half way we did get a typical Swedish fika and the opportunity to cuddle with the dogs. If you looks for a way to get in contact with the nature this is the way. I would say that beside the ice room this was the second high light on our lapland tour.
Gammelstad church town
On the Sunday it was time to head home. With about 5 hours of driving a head of us we started to drive to Luleå around ten. Before we took our evening flight to Stockholm there was two thing more to do on our lapland tour. The first thing was to see Gammelstad church town just outside of Luleå. With a heritage back to the 13 century and a part of UNESCO.s list of world heritages this is a place to visit. If you are in to history, to visit such an old community that never have had a big fire makes your knees week. You can literally feel and touch the history when you walk around the old houses.
The second stop we did on our way to the airport was to try an ice road. I thought it should be slippery and hard to drive on the ice. But as long as we didn’t over speed there was no problem.
Summary
Lapland is big and I mean huge. The distances up here is enormous and it takes time to drive from one destination to another. How ever I do think that our lapland tour is a trip that would work for most, independent of age. There was something for al and there was no extreme driving times. Even if I suggest you down load a movie or two for your kids. Don’t think you will have connection for your Iphone al the time.
To see Storforsen and the Arctic circle together with dog sledging makes our lapland tour a fantastic adventure in the nature while the Ice room and arctic menu gives it a touch of luxury. Before you can end your lapland tour with some historical feelings.