Beer and cheer at Butlin’s
Wish brew were here? It’s sausages and steins season at Butlin’s resorts this autumn with the launch of Oktoberfest.
The Bavarianthemed breaks will feature as new Big Weekenders in October with beer tents and oompah bands in Skegness on 7-10th and Minehead on 14-17th.
Prices for three nights start from £91 per person and include accommodation, access to all venues and live music.
Also new for 2022 is the Replay Weekender with music from the 80s, 90s and beyond, with different stages for each decade. Headliners include Louise Redknapp, Heather Small, Scouting for Girls and Toploader. Minehead will host on May 20-23, Skegness on June 24-27 and September 16-19, and Bognor Regis on October 14-17. From £65 per person with accommodation and live music.
A spokesman said: ‘’Our Big Weekenders are all about getting together with friends, letting your hair down and having a great time.” bigweekends.com
Bag a bargain from Virgin Atlantic 6
with returns to the US from £325 and the Caribbean from £322. Savings are also at Virgin Atlantic Holidays with up to 16% off packages to destinations including The Bahamas, Las Vegas and New York. Book by January 25 at virginatlantic.com, virginholidays.co.uk and its own sauna, which I didn’t know I needed until I had it.
The resort has a couple of restaurants with various forms of reindeer, moose and fish on the menus, a shop, a frozen lake, lots of trees and not much else.
Nearby is Salla Wilderness Park, where I enjoy a relaxing reindeer sleigh ride. Our guide, Salla-born
Timo, takes us through the woods at a gentle pace.
As the sun rises, bathing the spruce and fir trees in a beautiful red light, my reindeer, Martin, trots along. Timo tells us how to control our reindeer using noises similar to the creatures’ own alarm calls and waving our arms.
But in truth, there is little one can do to make a reindeer do anything it doesn’t want to do. When Martin spots some grass poking through the snow he stops and no amount of hissing and flapping can distract him. But there is no rush and the scenery is beautiful so I do not worry.
A short stop at a blazing fire pit warms our bodies, and another to feed the reindeer calves warms our hearts.
After a filling lunch of fish soup, I take on the challenge of snowmobiling at Arctic Circle Safaris.
Safely togged up in warm overalls, thick mittens and helmet, I clamber on board the two-seater, hit the starter button, turn on the headlight and gently press on the accelerator lever with the
My reindeer trots along as sunrise bathes trees in a beautiful red light
thumb of my right hand. The caterpillar track underneath jerks forward and I’m off. The route is icy and bumpy.
Being relaxed and trusting the machine is key to snowmobiling, I found. At first I fought with the steering as the two skis at the front bounced over the tracks.
My worry was that I would either career off the trail into the deep snow or topple over sideways going round a corner. But my fears were unfounded.
The trick to steering is to gently guide the handlebars, and the slopes are never too steep to throw you from the machine.
Once I relaxed, the two hours flew by.
Never going faster than 18mph, we motored up and down the hills. Halfway through we stopped at a cabin where we grabbed a hot chocolate and cinnamon bun in front of a log fire surrounded by candles and lanterns.
The final half hour took place in the pitch black with my high beam cutting an unbelievably atmospheric path through the dark and lighting up the trees. If it had not been so cloudy we may have been able to see the Northern Lights.
Snowmobiling is incredibly noisy, which is out of place in Salla. The next day we took a hike into the silence of the Sallatunturi Fell.
The area is part of a newly designated national park. The 39 square mile Salla National Park is a key part of the area’s booming eco-tourism industry.
There are hundreds of miles of hiking, biking and cross-country skiing routes crossing the ridges, ravines, ancient forests and marshes.
It is so remote and unspoiled the air is said to be the purest in the world (it is so clean that scientists have to check their machines are working). We walked in the silence through the picture-postcard snow-covered trees, with the only sign of non-human life a bright white willow grouse.
There is plenty of wildlife in the area – but at this time of year, most of it was either operating below the snow or had heard us clomping around and fled.
At the top of the fell, the wind was blowing hard, and snow and ice whipped off the ground and really stung my face.
It must have been a “feel like” -24C up there and I was thankful for the thermals as I tightened up my hood.
There is a wooden sentry post-style outlook for visitors to look over the border into Russia.
Sadly, there was too much cloud to see further than a few dozen yards.
After a tentative walk back down, I discovered the deep joy of having a personal sauna in my apartment.
As I sat sweating at 83C, the cold melted away and my muscles relaxed.
Not a care in the world. I may as well have been a million miles from civilisation. Oh, I was...
This was Salla, the memorable middle of nowhere.