Lapland! (written on 18-12)

Lapland, Cottage, Alcohol, Sauna, Sleeping, Northern-Light, Travelling. These are the keywords of the past week. It all started with the final presentation on Thursday the 10th of December. Nothing spectacular happened and everyone passed it. Holiday!! The celebration of it that night wasn't so intense for me. Mainly because I was pretty tired of the days/evening/nights before the final review.

Friday evening we took the train to Rovaniemi. Although we were accompanied by enough alcohol, sleeping was my most important activity. After Rovaniemi we needed to take a bus heading North for another 150 km. A taxi had to be taken in Kittilä to reach our final destiny: a cottache with 2 sauna's, but without: electiricy, water and central heating. We arrived while the temperature was -4, by which we were pretty lucky. It took a while to heat up the wooden stoves, cause most of the chimpney's where stuck with snow. The next day it was around -25. Which is cold, but not too cold if you only walk from the house to the wood staple, sauna and back. That day we also chopped a tree of about 25 meters. Because we had a small and "not sharp" axe it took a while, but nothing is impossible. After a while it came down and you can imagine that for a Dutch guy chopping down a tree is quite a happening.

The third or the fourth day it was -35. Sauna gets a new dimension by these temperatures. The sauna cottage was about 40 meters walking from the main cottage. After being in sauna for about 10 minutes you can sit outside on a elevated terrace, or roll through the snow. Almost everything you touch at -35 degrees Celsius sticks to your body. Opening the door, walking (naked) outside and sitting (naked) on a bench becomes a total new experience, even after 4 months of sauna practice. But after a hot sauna it doesn't really matter anymore how cold it is, it is beautifull. A clear sky, a white ground, steam coming from your body, sitting on a bench to which your balls freeze while you're sipping your beer. What a wonderfull world!

From the wonderfull world we went back to Helsinki. We arrived back last friday and in the evening we had a goodbye toast. After a short sleep Javier and I went to Sebastians summer cottage in Kristinestad...... the cooling down!