Transun Holiday to Lapland by a customer
We arrived at Entontekio airport on the Sunday afternoon, the views as we flew into land were amazing and the temperature was -6. The airport is tiny, so it took no time to collect our luggage, be met by our Trans sun rep Jamie and get shown to our coach. On route to the hotel, we were given a brief precis of what to expect; the journey was only 15 mins but we stopped on route to collect snow suits and boots which were provided for all the excursions.
We arrived at Hotel Jussantupa in the village of Hetta. The hotel is a small family run hotel and was open just for the guest on our trip. Check in was very straight forwards and in no time, we were in our room unpacking.
The week itself was very well organised, everything was explained on the first evening after dinner. There was a timetable on the hotel notice board with the exact details of each day’s excursion as groups were broken down into 2 or 3 to incorporate everyone. Aswell as the excursions included in the holiday there were numerous ones that you could book independently through Trans Sun. The people on the holiday were lovely, aged from mid 20s through to late 70s. There were couples, friends and several people travelling alone who were soon made welcome and joined in with others. We soon got to know each other and formed a what’s app group to share photographs mainly of the northern lights. We also put stickers on our door if we were happy to be woken late at night/early hours if the northern lights made an appearance.
The excursions included within the holiday were: A visit to the local Hetta museum. Huskey dog sled ride An evening trek into the local hills with an informative talk An introduction to walking in snow shoes A visit to a local Ice -hotel An evening Snow mobile ride A reindeer sleigh ride.
All the excursions were superb. The huskey dog ride was my highlight, it was very informative and a real buzz physically controlling the dogs/sled yourself. It was done in pairs so you both get to have a go. You need to be a reasonable level of fitness to complete some of the activities, namely the snowshoe walking and the trek into the hills. The snow was very deep in places and it was easy to lose your footing.
There was plenty of time to relax in between, my mum and I did a lot of walking and exploring covering 5/6 miles each day. It was so nice just to be out walking in the snow and seeing the fields of reindeers that residents owned. We were also only minutes away from an enormous frozen lake which was out of this world and great to walk along.
The weather when we first arrived was -6 and it was very overcast so we did not initially experience the northern lights. On the Wednesday we had a 4am knock at the door, piled on our snow suits and ran outside into -15 conditions and were luck enough to see some northern lights. From that day on the weather got colder, the sun got brighter and the displays of the lights just got more and more magnificent. The temperature by Saturday was -30 but that evening around 10pm we really did get lucky and the lights were absolutely out of this world, with different colours and not just the usual greens. Those that had rooms out of the back of the hotel looking into the mountains were able to enjoy the display into the early hours of the morning.
The hotel itself was lovely, the food was buffet style but there was plenty of it. If you have a big appetite you were able to have 3, 3 course meals every day! The village of Hetta was small but we found some lovely little coffee type shops so enjoyed local delicacies aswell. Alcohol in the hotel was very expensive, 17 euros for 2 beers and the bar closed at 8pm on the dot every evening. Not every supermarket is licensed so sell alcohol in fact they are very limited ones that do. We had one opposite the hotel so manged to get a nice bottle of wine for around 10 euros which we had to drink in our room; this was encouraged by the rep! Spirits etc… were very expensive it would be advisable to get a bottle at duty free to pop in your hip flask or have in your room!
The snow gear and boots provided were brilliant but quite heavy; it’s not essential but I took my own snow jacket/trousers and snow boots to wear in between the excursions as it was more comfortable. I would advise layers, a definite snood or balaclava, thermals including socks and a really good pair of thermal gloves as my fingers were the first things to go as it got cold.
I cannot recommend this holiday enough, memories that will last forever with my beautiful mum; we both loved every minute and would go back in a heartbeat. This is not the first holiday I have booked through Ally, and as always she was extremely helpful especially with the extra difficulties surrounding the COVID rules.