Day 3: Äkäslompolo

We had a slow start to the day today as my cold was making me feel a bit miserable. I stayed in bed for a while in the morning, while Tim went out to the sports shop to pick up the skis and snowshoes which we had arranged to rent. For the past two years when we've been to Lapland, we've taken part in some organised snowshoe walks and last year we had a cross country skiing lesson as well. This year we had decided that rather than spending money on the organised activities, we would be brave enough to rent our own equipment and strike out on our own

I felt better by later in the morning, so after lunch we left the apartment and went for an exploratory walk.

There was an enormous pile of snow in the carpark outside the apartment!

We set off along the road into the centre of the village.

It was quite a clear day, and once we'd walked along for a while, we were able to get our first glimpse of the frozen lake in the distance beyond the trees.

Everywhere looked like a winter wonderland

It felt incredibly cold outside and the bits of my face that were exposed felt like they were starting to freeze. It soon became clear why; the temperature was a cool minus 27 degrees 

I was clearly a little bit startled by the temperature

Tim had managed to buy new gloves in the supermarket yesterday, but he hadn't been able to get a hat. We'd been hoping the bag was going to turn up and that we wouldn't need to buy a new one, but it became clear on this walk that his ears were going to freeze if we didn't buy one asap. We tried the sports shop first of all, but their cheapest hat seemed to be €30 and the majority were in the €40 - €50 range. Tim seemed to feel he'd rather lose his ears than pay that much for a hat, but happily we found another shop near to the supermarket which had a bargain bin outside it. We picked up this hat for €12.50 in the end

In order to get to the frozen lake, you have to walk across the supermarket car park. The supermarket had decided to liven it up this year, with the addition of this enormous reindeer

We followed the path towards the lake...

...and were soon rewarded with this beautiful view of the moon over the fells.

It was a very clear day, so we were able to see in all directions...

...though despite the fact that it wasn't even 2pm yet, we could see that it was soon going to be getting dark.

We couldn't head too far at this time of the day - plus Tim's beard had started to freeze - so we decided to go back to the supermarket to warm up and stock up on some supplies.

When we got back home, we found that Tim had a missed call on his mobile from a Finnish number. We assumed it was to do with his suitcase, but they hadn't left a message and nobody picked up when he tried to call back.  The good news is that a few hours later he got another call, from a lady at Kittila airport who said that the suitcase had been found and wanted to confirm the address it should be delivered to  Fingers crossed it's going to arrive at some point this evening!