Day 13 Trip on an icebreaker

Today I had an early start as I was going on a day trip to Sweden. I had booked a cruie on the Polar Explorer icebreaker. It was a 1.5hr drive to the border of Finland and Sweden turn a further 30mins to the port. We boarded and wandered around the ship. There must have been 100-150 people on board. The bay connects to the Baltic Sea and is frozen over in winter. We didn't drive very far, always within sight of our port.

After a while we stopped & the crew setup the ocean swim. Each group had an allocated time to be in the changing room to be suited up. My group was last so I was able to go into tut offee and walk around a little. We only had to remove our shoes & coats as were were donning sexy orange survival suits! The crew got us in them then we made our way down to the ice where other crew members put us in the ocean. All you can do it float on your back like a big giant orange upside down turtle. You could tell the water was cold but you couldn't feel it much. I think the water would have been 0c as it was frozen before we smashed through it. When the crew called us in we manoeuvred to the edge of the ice and the crew pulled us out. It was fun. I took some videos on the GoPro and will post then on YouTube when I can. Once everyone was done we headed back to port. I stayed in the wheelhouse with the captains as it was warm & had a great view.

Then we drove to a Swedish fisherman's village for lunch. It was a buffet overlooking the river. We had salmon, Swedish meatballs & potatoes. I didn't eat the salmon obviously but the meatballs were great. The restaurant is on the Swedish side of the river and across the river is the Finnish side of the village. There is 1hr time difference between the countries so as the restaurant owner says 'it is a time machine because you can look into the future by 1hr'. The river is also one of the best spots for salmon fishing with over 100,000 salmon passing by every summer.

Then we headed back to Rovaniemi. I bought a kebab which is as long as my arm almost!! Tonight is my last night here, tomorrow I am uo early to catch the 6am train to Helsinki.