Ok, it’s not quite a disaster, but it will mean a change to our trip. The day started like this.
We had a quiet night sleep next to Russia and headed on this morning. We stopped in the town of Kirkenes but it was Sunday and everything was shut. So, we continued on our way south. Thankfully we didn’t have to backtrack too much before we turned off towards Finland.
It was a cold dreary day, as we drove into Finland, admiring all their wonderful pine trees. It’s probably been cold and dreary other days, but we never noticed as the scenery was too busy wowing us.
We stopped at a scenic little spot where tree islands dotted the lake, and water trickled over some rocks. It was pretty but too cold to sit outside. We had some lunch, then settled down for an afternoon nap. I snuggled under my blanket but it was still cold, so I put our trusty diesel heater on. Except It’s decided not to be trusty anymore. The frikking thing has stopped working! It’s like It decided that as we are heading south, It’s no longer needed. It’s going on its summer holidays. Prick. But to be fair, It has done us well in Norway. Imagine if It had decided to pack up in the middle of a snow storm!
I’m sure Finland has its own charm but it’s very hard to find it in the forests. Or maybe that is the charm! We had two failed walks today. The first one headed downhill to a lake, and was supposed to go around the lake, but it was very overgrown. And we couldn’t be bothered with it. Our second hike was from the Aurora village, which was deserted for the summer. It was a pretty trail through the trees, but when bird sized mosquitoes came at us, we retreated quickly to the van. I had head nets in the van, but hadn’t thought to take them with us!
Today we drove through forests, alongside lakes, and through tourist villages, set up for the northern lights. We are thinking we’d like to come back some time to see the auroras, from September onwards (not this year)
As our heater has packed up, we now have a new system. We drive until it’s time to go to bed. Then the car will be warm from driving, and bed is always warm. This means we’ll be heading south much quicker than expected.
Maybe we’ll just keep driving until we hit warmer weather. But then there is the fact we have no air-conditioning in our cab. So no doubt I’d then be suffering from the heat (I mean, I’m stripping off when it’s 15 degrees at the moment!). So at this point I will shut the fuck up and stop talking about the weather because we’re in Europe having an amazing holiday.
Around 8pm, I found a perfectly good camping spot in a clearing in the forest. No wind, no people, but not particularly scenic. Just trees… and gravel. And staying the night didn’t fit in with our plans to drive until sleep time. So we cooked our dinner there instead. Soup and garlic bread, the perfect winter treat. Then we continued driving. I’d found another spot by a lake about 30 minutes away, but when we arrived, there was scaffolding lying around ready to be erected. Plus a whole lot of power lines and a power station. Yeah… not for us.
As we drove, we kept checking side roads for little pull-offs, but some had ropes or stones blocking the way, clear signs they were private. We saw plenty of campervans parked in pull-offs along the main road, but that wasn’t for us. We’d have to be really desperate to sleep there.
At 9pm, we turned down a gravel road off the main highway, trees on one side and a lake on the other and no mozzies that I could see. It was the perfect spot, sheltered from the wind, no traffic, and nobody else around. And the car was still warm from the drive.