Day 8: Kiilopää

When we stepped outside of the apartment this morning, it was clear that it was going to be another very cold day. The thermometer on our building was indicating about minus 20.

We were going out earlier than normal - around 9am - so it wasn't very bright yet.

The reason for the early start was that we wanted to catch the ski bus to nearby Kiilopää, where there are some great snowshoeing routes. There's only one bus per day to Kiilopää and it stops outside one of the hotels in the village at 09.25.

The route it takes isn't very direct, stopping at all kinds of other hotels on the way, so it was about an hour later when we arrived at the Kiilopää national park gate.

For comparison, this is what the gate looked like when I stayed in Kiilopää in the summer.

We strapped into our snowshoes and set off on a route called Poropolku (reindeer trail), which is the easier of the two snowshoeing paths we were planning to follow today.

Everywhere looked so different to how it did in July!

The first part of the walk involves navigating the edge of a ski run. We always have to be careful not to accidentally trample the ski tracks with our snow shoes.

Fortunately, that part is only short and after that there is a proper path to snowshoe on.

The sky wasn't anywhere near as clear as it had been yesterday and there was a lot of mist over the hills in the distance.

To be fair, the walk had been very misty when I'd done it in July too.

The first part of the walk is quite easy, mostly being flat.

We passed some beautiful trees as we snowshoed and in one direction I could see the sky perhaps starting to clear a bit.

After a while the route crosses a bridge.

Obligatory picture of the same bridge in July! 

Shortly after the bridge, we had to negotiate the reindeer fence. I got quite good at these over the summer but they are harder to climb over when you're wearing snowshoes.

After that the path becomes a bit harder, climbing more steeply uphill.

There were some great views though, with a little pink becoming visible in the sky where the sun was trying to poke through the clouds.

Our route led further and further uphill...

...and the sun began to get stronger.

Eventually we reached the summit of the hill we'd been climbing. 

Under that mound of snow above were the pile of rocks which mark the summit in summer.

As you can probably tell from the pictures, it was rather cold up here today!

Everything was frozen, even my neck gaiter.

There was a fantastic view of the sun though, and we could see that the clouds were starting to move.

From here the route leads downhill again. After about ten minutes or so, I was excited to get to this signpost.

I remembered taking a picture of this one in the summer and being amazed how high off the ground it was compared to in winter.

After this point the path was quite straightforward...

...if a little cold.

By midday we'd finished the walk and we had to decide what to do next. There is another snowshoeing route called Kiirunapolku, which we tried for the first time last year. It is considerably harder than the route we'd just done, despite being about the same length, as it involves climbing to the top of Kiilopää fell at 546m. The ski bus wasn't coming back to Kiilopää until 16.45, so we had plenty of time to kill. We decided to give it a try.

Our first task was to get to the starting point of the walk. This involved following a much easier 1km trail called Vasapolku.

We remembered from when we came this way last year that we'd passed a bench covered in snow. There was so much snow this year that we nearly missed it entirely!

Here's Tim pretending to sit down on the bench this year...

...and here's the same pose last year. Definitely more snow this year!

Shortly afterwards we found the starting point for the Kiirunapolku trail and got our first glimpse of the Kiilopää fell we were going to climb, just starting to emerge from the clouds.

Unsurprisingly, the route started by leading us uphill.

The sky really had started to clear up by this point and there were some fantastic colours.

The top of the fell started to become clearer.

And soon we could see the sun itself.

I loved seeing the trees silhouetted against the sky.

Though it was a bit disconcerting, being able to see so clearly how far we had to climb.

Our route led us uphill, alongside the reindeer fence.

I climbed down alongside this fence as part of a walk I did in the summer.

As the day had brightened up, we had some great views downhill towards the forests.

It was ridiculously cold, though!

And there was still quite a long way to go!

I'd just paused to take a photo of the scenery, when I realised I could see something unexpected.

Reindeer! When you see them lying down in the snow like this, you can imagine how much they must have been suffering during the Lapland heatwave last summer.

We'd been climbing for about an hour by this point and we were definitely getting closer to the top.

The colours in the sky continued to be amazing and now we could almost see the whole sun.

The last part of the ascent was the steepest (and coldest - there was a biting wind!) but eventually we made it to the top.

This is our victory selfie  

When I climbed to the top in summer, the weather turned quite misty and I didn't get a view at all.

Today we could see quite far.

It was great to have made it to the top, but we still had quite a steep descent ahead of us.

The snowshoes and poles were invaluable; I would have struggled to make it down without them. Although we did get overtaken by a very fit Finnish man at one point who appeared to be trail running up and down the hill!

In the photo below, you can see Tim snowshoeing alongside what looks like a fence.

I climbed up this way in summer, so I can confirm that it is in fact a staircase

The sky was still incredible to look at, which is why Tim is so far ahead in the pictures. Every time I wanted to take a photo I had to stop and take my big gloves off.

And I kept wanting to take photos

Eventually, the worst of the descent was over.

From this point we just had a more straightforward stroll through the woods, although still with some great views.

We were really lucky with the views, because as we got closer to the Kiilopää centre we could see that the sky was starting to cloud over again.

It was about half past two by the time we made it back down, in the last of the daylight. I was very excited to find that Kiilopää was hosting some Moomins ice sculptures this year!

Here's me looking very cold with Sniff, my favourite character

After all the exertion we were glad to get inside and warm up. The doughnuts are 100% the best bit about the food offering at Kiilopää.

As the ski bus wasn't due until 16.45, we had time to get a proper meal in the restaurant though. The restaurant itself is very cosy...

...and it was cool to see old-fashioned snowshoes on the wall.

The food is not going to win any prizes, though. I reverted to one of my staple choices from last summer; ham, blue cheese and tinned peach pizza  

By the time we'd finished eating and went back outside to catch the bus, darkness had well and truly fallen.

The ice sculptures looked great illuminated in the dark though.

It's been a really fun, although tiring day. We caught the ski bus to Saariselkä and then went back to the apartment to start packing up our stuff, ahead of our early morning flight from Ivalo back to Helsinki tomorrow morning. It's been another fantastic trip to Lapland, and I have a feeling that it won't be our last