Tour de Nord - Teil 16

Part 16: Fell Saana (1029 m), Kilpisjärvi, Finland

So we returned to Finland eventually. If only at its westernmost point - for starters. ;) The scenery from Senja to Kilpisjärvi had changed quite dramatically. It was a nice ride (Robert had given me also stories and descriptions for this part of my journey :) ), even though I instantly missed the mountains as soon as I had left them behind me...

But Finnish Lapland is beautiful, too. Just different. ;) I have been in Lapland many times before, but not in Kilpisjärvi. The "tunturi" (fell) there is different compared to southern parts of Lapland: less green, more fell and a bit more hilly, so to say. So it was a good way to slowly prepare myself of having to go south eventually... ;-)

The only consolation for "loosing" mountains was the fact that,
as soon as I had crossed the Finnish border, reindeers crossed the street!!
I love reindeers as much as mountains...
And there are plenty of reindeers in Lapland! :)

And streets are a lot better in Finland!

In Kilpisjärvi, we stayed in a simple cottage at the "Kilpisjärven Retkeilykeskus" (so roughly translated, an hiker's inn). It was the most expensive accommodation of the entire trip (per night)... so I stayed for one night only. But the location was good! It was the starting point to ascend Saana as well as to visit the Three-country Cairn.

 He's not actually a pet... He's a Kromfohrländer! That's different. ;)

To make the most of my money, we started to ascend Saana as soon as we had arrived! :-D And that was quite a change, too! In Norway, I could be lucky if the trail was even marked along the way - and it certainly was usually left as natural as can be. But finding the summit of Saana didn't require any kind of thinking nor hiking. It was more of a stroll to the top. :-D The trail wasn't only very well marked, but 2/3 of the trail even consisted of planks and stairs! It was almost a cultural shock for me. ;-)

Nevertheless it was a beautiful walk, and I enjoyed it a lot. After we had left the stairs behind us, the scenery had changed to a quite rocky environment without any trees or bushes. It was kinda cool, and I started to fantasise that we'd landed on another planet... That reawakened some adventurous feeling. ;-)

 You can't go wrong here... Not even I could.

 (Wo)man on the moon

 Ah, nope, still ascending Saana! ;)

 Sort of on the summit of Saana

 Clouds looked scary, but no drop of rain struck us! :)