Our new wheels

Well we're back from Finland, and the trip was FANTASTIC. So glad we decided to go for it.

I will post on it, but for now here's a pic of our new wheels! We bought this off one of the Chefs who just left (and who is also Finnish, so we met up with her 3 days later back in Helsinki!!)

Its not the latest aston martin, but it will get us about the place!

I've put some photos of Finland trip up on Facebook if anyone wants to check them out! Will have to wait for photos of Aurora Borealis til I can get them from Nean coz she was the only one with a camera good enough to catch them properly - it will be worth the wait I promise!

Korvala; Finnish Lapland

The bus stop at our beloved Korvala

Weirdos...

Ice hole fishing!!

Reindeer sleds!

Husky sledding!

An exhausting attempt to snow-shoe

Mish's arctic project; the giant snowman

4 on a frozen lake

Ice hole swimming in said frozen lake!!!

Forest Skiing!!!

Our lovely cabin

First steps on the snow

Backpacking on our many train journeys - FREEZING!

Helsinki

At the Aussie bar with our (Finnish) Kinloch colleague Paula

Nean and Mon got on like... well... two crazy people!

At our hostel

There was much craziness

Our hostel; an Olympic stadium!

TRYING to ice skate

Hostels!!!

Christmas markets in the centre of Helsinki

Mish and Mon ("Team M") try out traditional herrings

Smells like Christmas

Look at the lovely Xmas tree and decorations that Hamish made!!! We found a small fake tree in the spare room of the caravan, and were given some xmas lights, so our kiwivan is now nicely xmas-ified and feeling festive.

Check it out!!

FINLAND, LAPLAND, ARCTIC CIRCLE, XMAS!!!

As you know, we are heading to the home of Santa for Christmas!!

This is where we will be staying;
http://www.korvala.fi/?deptid=23279 (In the red cabins)

We will be flying to Helsinki on the 20th Dec and staying there for 2 days to experience the capital and the xmas markets and festivities there. Then on the 23rd we will travel to Turku which is apparently the oldest city of Finland and is also a 'christmasy' town where there are lots of great markets and festivities. Then that night we catch a night train up to Rovaniemi which is the capital of Finnish Lapland, and is also in the Arctic Circle. From there we catch a bus to our cabins at Korvala. We spend Christmas there in the snow (and the dark!) but with activities such as husky sledding, reindeer sledding, ice-hole swimming and fishing, skiing and tobogganing and snow trekking and such, who cares about a little less daylight!!

The Boreal forest, our playground

Huskies!!!

Reindeer!!!!!!!

I hope you will all have BBQ's and salads and think of us while you drink in the warm sunshine, as we will probably be eating tinned spam in the Arctic!! :)

xxxx lots of love :)

p.s I have now taken to adding most of my photos to Facebook as I have done something to my blogger settings and things dont work properly on here anymore (hence the weird font and mis-aligned things). So check out photos on Facebook from now on!!

A wee bit chilly!!!

Hello!!! It's a chilly -1 degree here today... was -6 over night and even the water in the caravan toilet bowl was frozen!!!!

Apparently we are forecast for 20mm of snow in the next 2 days, and we had a little bit overnight.

Freeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeezing!!!!

Uncertainty

Dear everyone
How are you????? Starting to really feel the homesickness now... miss you all!

Anyways, just wanted to let you all know that the season here at the hotel is really winding down now and we're not too sure whether we'll have work for much longer. Hence we are currently in the market for jobs, and will either start new jobs very soon before we leave for christmas, or start right after we get back at New Years. The point being - please don't post anything to Kinloch Lodge from now on, in case we aren't here to receive it :)

Hope you are all doing well,
lots and lots of love,
Renelle xxx ooo xxx

A perfect day with Saucy Mary

Yesterday we were so lucky with a brilliantly sunny day, so we decided to go out and enjoy it - by climbing a mountain.

We climbed Beinn Na Caillich - the mountain that stands over Broadford. It's very steep and known to be dangerous unless the weather is completely perfect - any cloud at the top can make things very difficult. We knew there was still a little snow sitting on the top but figured that this would be the last chance we'd have to climb it before winter really sets in.

Beinn Na Caillich from the road to Broadford

Mish and the mountain

The steep road upwards



Snow near the top

It turned out to be quite a challenge. There's not really any path, so the first half of the walk is pretty much just fighting your way through the marshy heather. The second half of the walk is like climbing up a very steep and massive pile of boulders. But we were absolutely ecstatic when we finally made it to the top, and had an amazing view of both Skye and Scotland. Words cannot describe it.

Hamish and the Cuillin mountains



View of Kinloch Lodge from the top of Beinn Na Caillich

At the top of the mountain is a cairn that is said to be the burial place of the Norwegian princess known as Saucy Mary.
Me on the cairn

Hamish, the cairn and the little stone house thingee at the top

Mischief

The hardest part of the trek was actually the descent, which was really hard on the knees. We were pretty shaky by the time we got down!!

More snow!!

Woke up this morning to this view;

Snowflakes greeted us as we walked across to work, and we worked breakfast through the floating snow storm outside! It was so neat to watch, and needless to say all the staff (well, at least us non-scottish staff) are all terribly excited and hypo because of the snow (there was much dancing, singing and general bounciness). The sun is now out and its a gorgeous day here (after many cold rainy days). Apparently its quite early for there to be snow here, so I guess we're in for a cold winter!

The craziest part of this all is that we are pretty much right by the sea - snow down to almost sea level!!!!

Freezing cold in the caravan at the mo!

Thankfully, we are staying in Lord and Lady MacDonald's place for a few days where its nice and toasty.

More photos to come!
xxx Love R

Mud Trekkers

This is Kinloch Lodge from across the other side of the loch.

The other day Mon (Aussie who also works at Kinloch) and I went off on an adventure for the morning as we had half a day off. We walked down the road to the small town of Isle Ornsay and decided to walk across to the lighthouse there. No small feat let me tell you - but luckily we had come across at low tide, the best time to cross the spit of mud between the 'mainland' of Skye and the little island thingee that the lighthouse is on. It was a glorious, muddy hike, and we were very proud to have conquered it (a lady we asked for directions said it could not be done at that point in time, and certainly not without 'wellies').

Our challenging path

Victory!!

Me at the Isle Ornsay lighthouse

We stopped in at the local pub for a coffee on the way home, and met spitting bar guy. He spits into the sink while customers are there. Its weird.
The hotel at Isle Ornsay where spitting bar guy works.. :S

In other news - we are going to Finland for christmas!! Spending christmas itself in lapland, right up in the arctic circle (a real white christmas complete with reindeer, huskies and ice-hole-swimming!!!) and also a couple of days in helsinki and turku. Yay!!

Other than that, not much else is new - working lots at the moment which is good for the bank. Hope you are all well!!! Nobody has emailed me for a while - are you all still alive?? xxxx R