Saturday 15th January - A Day of Travel

I woke naturally at 6:30am and pulled my clothes from the end of my sleeping bag where they'd ended up. They were a little cold, so having them up around me for half an hour warmed them up nicely. The next stage, taking off my thermals and putting on clean thermals and clothes was an interesting experience within my sleeping bag. What? No way, was I getting out into -4degrees to get dressed!!

Collecting up my things and returning my sleeping bag, I then dashed across to the lounge to use the bathroom. Here I stayed and chatted with some of the other guests. Mostly everyone slept well and we shared our travel experiences to date. There was a lovely couple from Oslo and another couple from South Africa who'd been skiing in Sweden prior to coming up to Kirkenes and doing some sightseeing before they head back to South Africa in a few days.

Breakfast was in the restaurant, a simple buffet. Our driver this morning arrived and enquired about our night. He then posed a question. How cold do we think it got last night? A few numbers were tossed around before he enlightened us that the minimum temp overnight was a chilly -33 degrees! But not to worry it had warmed up since and was now only -29!! Crazy people. So, very happy to have been inside a warm -4 degree hotel room, hehehe.

We went outside to feed the three reindeer around the lavvo as the moon rose and the sun began to lighten the sky. Apparently, either today or tomorrow the sun would rise above the horizon for the first time in 6 weeks - a day to mark in the calendar. I didn't stay outside very long, because surprise, surprise it was sooooo cold.

Back at the Rica Arctic Hotel I bumped into my good friend Ulf. Ina, from South Africa, and her husband collected their backpacks from the luggage storeroom with me. I was great to see others loaded up with backpacks too. Ina was lovely, I will look her up on facebook when I'm home and she offered that if I was ever in South Africa to look her up and I'd be welcome to stay with her. How lovely!

As it was Saturday there is only one bus scheduled to head out to the airport, so I boarded this bus at 9:20am and spent the morning waiting at the teeny-tiny airport before the first of my three flights for the day.

At boarding time, we walked out onto the tarmac and up the stairs onto the small plane. It was free seating, so I took a seat next to the window. No one sat next to me, which was fine, I could leave things on the seat and look out the window as much as I liked. Which I did, to take photos of the sun as it and we rose higher in the sky. The sun was a beautiful sight to see. To give you a better idea on how small the plane was my seat with in the middle of the plane and I looked under the propeller. The plane only seated 40. But it was the smoothest flight I had on all of my flights. I thoroughly enjoyed this flight.

We landed smoothly in Tromso and I had only a 30 min wait before we boarded the next plane to Oslo. This plane was long and skinny, and seated about 80 passengers. Sitting towards the front of the plane was great, but no window seat.

Next stop was a 3hour wait in Oslo before my flight to Helsinki. I had to collect my luggage and check it in again. I spent my time reading through my Lonely Planet guide, deciding on a hotel and some of the sights I might check out during my 4 days in Helsinki.

Unfortunately we were delayed about an hour as our plane landed late and then once we'd boarded we had to have the ice removed from the plane before we could depart. By this stage it was 6:30pm, and I wasn't feeling great, so I had to work at maintaining a non-nausea feeling. I relaxed, closed my eyes and listened to my ipod for most of the journey. However, I was most relieved to land in Helsinki. Three flights in one afternoon - not something I will do again.

Traipsing through the snow, I headed in the direction of the Hotel I'd chosen from the Lonely Planet guide, asking a local for directions. I kept walking and walking but didn't find it. Rather tired and hungry by now I hailed a taxi. The young driver very helpful, notice my Qantas tag and asked, hopefully, if I was from Australia but not Queensland. WOW the floods in Queensland really were making news worldwide. Funnily, the hotel wasn't very far from were I was. The taxi driver stopped the meter and continued to my hotel - so lovely.

Without a reservation I went up to the sixth floor of the building and into the reception of the two star hotel - Hotelli Finn. They had a double room, charging me for a single for the first night and I booked my four nights here. It was simple, but that's all I need. After dumping my things and grabbing just my handbag I ventured out to find something to eat. I was starving! Well it was after 10pm (9pm in Norway). Before long I had a full tummy and was relieved to be in bed.