Rest day in Sodankyla, Finland - double hurrah!! Arrived gopping wet yesterday and spread everything out in our cabin to dry, including pitching the tent in the middle of the floor!
We've found with the combination of rain and mossies, it's best to use campsite cabins where available rather than camping. As we get into less damp and insect infested climes, we'll up the camping quota. Wordy excuse for being a pair of soft Southern jessies....ha!
Spent our morning off attending to all those little jobs that go by the wayside
When you spend all day on the road.
All rank gear nicely laundered, bike serviced and everything else dried, aired and repacked.
Spent the afternoon in the bright lights of Sodankyla. Made the impetuous purchases of oil (for the bike), mossie nets (for the Goff noggins) and visited the Library and Tourist Information bureau to ponce Internerd connectivity.
We were slung out of the Library after 10 mins as they were closing at 15:00! Government Servants are lazy ba$tard$ regardless of Country!
Spent the evening gonking and dossing preparing for our return to the daily grind tomorrow.
Total today 0 miles and 0m of ascent!
Saturday 28 June 2008
Packed and left our comfy cabin at 09:00 in light mizzle. Seems 48 hours of non stop torrential rain is just not enough for the Eau Gods of Finland.
Never mind, it soon brightened up to battleship grey and temps hovered around the region of B.B.B.Baltic in the Bathroom. Good news? Wind from the West so across our bows rather than down our throats.
Destination today; campsite outside Vikajarvi, Finland. Around 60 miles.
With a combination of rested legs, minimal hills and zero head wind, the turbo charged Goff's got the hammer down and burned some Finnish tarmac.
Saw a few more Reindeer and aggressive/lazy/crap Finnish drivers who insisted on wiping their wing mirrors down our offside panniers. Plonkers of the first water....
Scenery a bit, ermm, samey. Trees, straight roads and a few houses/farmsteads.
Weather brightened as the day progressed and we stopped for a pancake and coffee in a Chinese restaurant en route!
Arrived at our destination for the day; Vikajarvi in very good time to find the campsite shown on the map to be a figment of Monsieur Michelin's imagination. Refuelled on CAKE and coffee, mingled with the inbreds and then shot off to knock off another 15 miles into Rovaniemi, where Santa lives. Big, walloping, triple HURRAH!
Much to Tracey's disappointment, whistled past Santa's Village on the way into town. Suffice to say Tracey's disappointment turned into Miles' chagrin in very short order....
Santa's Village is bang on the Arctic circle and is where the package tours bus kids into each Christmas for expensive rendezvous with the 'real Santa Claus' in Lapland. Hmmm, bit like a Disney version and I'm not sure I'd bother....if I had kids, errm or still believed in Santa or, errmm, well you get the point.
Anyway, we later found Santa, being at a bit of a loose end, was off getting radical surfing in Hawaii so wasn't in anyway.....
Scooted the final few miles into Rovaniemi, battled with town traffic for the first time this trip and found the best digs so far in a poshish ski resort just outside town. Unfortunately, no snow...boooo!
Spirits were lifted however when we found our room had its own Sauna which we made very good use of. Miles suggested sleeping in it to acclimatise for Greece but this idea was very sensibly torpedoed by SWMBO.
Total today a massive 84 miles and 490m of ascent. Total trip 467 miles.
Enough for now, more Southerly ramblings tomorrow.
Back soon. Miles & Tracey.
