Saturday, April 23, 2011

Spring Break - Dog Sledding!

Spring Break is called Ski Holiday in Finland. The government divides the country into three regions for the purpose of assigning each a week during which to take the break. That way, schools and universities are on the same schedule, making it simpler for families to take vacations.

We started the break by attending Teijo and Eerika's wedding (see "A Wedding!"). After that, we were happy to stay around Tampere. It is traditional to go skiing during this holiday, but we spent our time going to movies and the library, taking walks, visiting an art gallery and reading - basically taking it easy.

Kate's favorite painting at the Willa Mac gallery.
It's by Taneli Stenberg (see links, below).



The week started with a wedding and ended with dog sledding! Bryan was recuperating from a sinus infection and the flu during the break, but he bolstered enough to go along with the girls and me for the memorable experience.


Erki owns and runs the dogsledding company. Here he and Brooke and some of his dogs are on frozen Lake Pyhäjärvi.
Kate's haiku:
Dogs barking, "let's go!"
We are pulled on ice and snow
The wind whipped our cheeks.

After our time on the lake, the dogs really wanted to be pet. They had been so eager to go once they were all tied together. When the run was over, they were mellow and affectionate. Going dogsledding was not inexpensive, but it was worth every cent. A lot of people go to Lapland in northern Finland to have this experience, but we were not able to do that. If you are around Tampere in wintertime and would like to try dog sledding, I'd recommend Gegwen Getaways (see links below).



Links:

The dog sledding operation near Tampere: http://www.gegwen.com/index.php?p=0&l=en

The Willa Mac art gallery, shown in the photos above (it's lovely and free!): http://www.mac-art.net/english/index.htm

The artist, Taneli Stenberg's website: http://www.tanelistenberg.com/

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