Trip to Lapland

Going to Lapland is one of those ‘once in a lifetime’ trips, especially through the eyes of our 5 year old Dylan. A day package excursion flying from Norwich airport on Sunday 13^th December.

We kept the trip a secret from Dylan until arriving at the airport, aiming to give him a lovely surprise but more so to save our sanity avoiding all of Dylan’s incessant questioning of “WHY…” Milo decided he was too old for the trip – big mistake he would have loved it too! He stayed at home enjoying his space.

At the airport the whole process of check in, boarding the plane and flight was made fun as the plane full of passengers were all going to Pajala for the same reason. The memorable moments for me were,

• Dylan’s opinion of another passenger, who was not for Lapland but more likely off to work as a rough tough rigger worker, with his long pony-tail and t-shirt of a bearded skull and cross bones – Dylan’s assumption was “…he is a pirate, mummy, his cutlass must be in his bag…”
•  When the plane was visible to the passengers with ‘InterAir’ on the side there was a wave of amused uncertainty as nobody had heard of the airline, being a bit late leaving the vibe was how hard do we flap. The reality being the Polish owned airline was employed for its expertise to manage frozen conditions, perfect!

Pajala is in Sweden only 20kms from Finland being 100kms inside the Arctic Circle and only needed a further car journey for a day to be at the North Pole. When we disembarked from the plane it was into a really bright fresh minus 21 degrees which dropped to minus 25 degrees by the end of the day. The most noticeable sensation in such an extreme temperature was the manner in which the inside of your nose iced up as warm breath hit the coldness, this took a bit of time to get used to. The snow was pretty icy as fresh snow had not fallen for a view days but was expected in the coming week.

We were greeted by Laplanders dressed in traditional costume to embark a bus to Santa’s village where we were all togged up in thermal wear from head to feet, with lots of assistance to make the process really easy. We were told to keep warm by making the most of the different fires and tee-pees with refreshment, then ready to play.

Playing started with,

• Sleigh rides pulled by the reindeer, a really lovely gentle ride through the snow filled fir forests, sitting on fur hides.
• Tobogganing from the top of a reasonable slop on trays with little control. Dylan was good at this and kept going up over and over, I had a go and it was really good squealing fun.
• Star Angels, snow ball fighting and snow man building if you could find soft snow – we did some of these.
•  Sleigh rides pulled by huskie dogs, a really energetic ride. Dylan’s description of this experience was it was like riding the ‘Jolly Roger’, as the speed we were travelling over the ice ruts meant we felt we were airborne going up and landing back down, definitely hanging on to the sleigh and each other as tightly as possible. And yes we experienced huskie dog’s pooing whilst running fortunately no dogging was required! It was by far an exhilarating experience enhanced by the huge crying noise made by the huskies when waiting to run impacted by the dogs silence when running.
• The finale was to follow the long enchanted magic trail to visit Santa in his warm abode, with letter in hand Dylan was able to post and have a chat with the big man himself. Santa was very authentic and engaged with Dylan well. Conversation since has been associated with his Santa chat, telling us what Santa and his reindeer wanted for their Christmas Eve supper. The sleigh ride back to the meeting room at minus 25 degrees was perishing on my face with a definite need to warm up.

The journey home was much as we experienced coming in reverse to our waiting plane being as our flight was the only flight of the day in to Pajala. So it was interesting to watch the process of de-icing the plane as we waited on the runway ready for the three hour journey home with many sleeping children.

An absolutely fabulous trip which I believe I have captured in my pics and video below, it’s only a couple of minutes long accompanied by the music of ‘Lapland’.

Learning lessons with Successes (Belated Nov posting)

November has been tough for Milo as he has been learning life skills!

I was all set to share how well Milo had done to secure a job for himself by himself in a local computer shop. Milo had died and gone to heaven to think he would be surrounded by computers with the opportunity of hands on experience to repair and even build computers. Here comes the BUT - in the moment he had earnt that success of “yes I’ve got a job” it was taken from him as he is not old enough to be left in the shop. The owner had not realised Milo was only 16 years old and needs to be 18 years from Health and Safety. It was tough!!

In the time of stating this posting in November the events of Milo’s life have been wonderfully rewarding as well,

• He was then promoted from Corporal to Sargent in Air Cadets. What a thrill!!! In Milo’s eyes he sees this as a proper promotion which has the standing within the squadron he enjoys. This is him striding as a Sargent at Remembrance Day Parade in Wymondham.

• He was voted ‘Cadets Cadet’ by his colleagues and juniors at ATC, presented with an engraved cup

• He was nominated as the ‘Senior Prefect of the Year’ 2014-15 at school with a very warming speech given by one of the senior teachers, stating how he met every one of his prefect duties dealing with some difficult situations. He conducted himself in an unassuming manner and a significant support to his colleagues to assist and cover their gaps.

• And now he has turned 17 years old and had his first driving lesson on his birthday. He practices driving coming home from school, costing £1060 for 8months insurance on his dads policy, the experience a bit unnerved as Dylan is shouting from the back sit “…we are going to crash!...” So along with birthday cake with grandparents we celebrated with a meal at Pedro’s where the staff sang Happy Birthday and had to have a pud to get the candle!

At the time of finishing this posting it looks very likely Milo will get his job in the local computer shop in the New Year, riding on his heavenly cloud.

Exciting times!