The last 2 weeks were characterized by trail-openings, sledruns north to Aittokoski and south to Ruunaa with the first group of the Ruunaa-Week. Once more we enjoyed the beautiful sledrides with all kind of different conditions! Everything was part of those 2 weeks: fresh snow, wind blown trails, minusdegrees up to -18C, then increase of temps to a bit over 0C, followed by a drop of 15 degrees again. This means: the trails are different every time: one day with soft powder, then wet sticky snow, then ice trails again, every day is different. The best thing in the last few days was a great sun smiling on us from blue sky!
During week 3 Gabriel guided a winterweek-group on daytrips, Petra does the snowshoe-hikes in the Änäkäinen area. In addition Julian and Helena guided 2 groups over the Bears Trail. A special mention here about a guest of 83 years of age, who completed the whole week successfully and took good care of his 6-dog-team on all the tours. You are never older than what your mind feels! In the now ending week we drove the first Ruunaa-Trail since a long while and it was a success as well. First the route north to Aittokoski felt like a holiday also for guide Simone. Then the trip south, guided by Gabriel, over mountain Hovivaara to Ruunaa, along the spectacular Koskikierros-loop and back north again to Eräkeskus. Guests, dogs and guides had a lot of fun and lots of good experiences and memories. In the same week, Moritz was out on Bears Trail with Liah as snowshoe-guide in the Aittokoski-area and as cabin-keeper. Julian and Stefan (dogrides) and Petra (snowshoes) took care of the daytrips with the winterweek-group. A first feeling of highseason to prepare us mentally to the following fully booked weeks.
From the trail side: almost all trails are open by now. The "Little Swamp", Zimmermann-Trail, Mountaintrail are driven on a regular base and kept open. Only the Änäkäinen - Kaksinkantaja-Trail is not yet open, but due to massive overflow on the lakes there is no way to open that stretch at the moment. And yes, the Kuohatti-Trail is missing still as well, but Gabriel will take care of this after a week well-earned holiday, to get it ready for the first GoWest-Week of the season.
Soon the most busy weeks with the most kilometers to run will start for our dogs. With up to 5 groups out on different trails, we are happy to have all dogs motivated. Most of the B-dogs have now done the distance to Aittokoski already and are eager to support the A-dogs for those runs. We look very much forward to many more happy guests and appreciate of course also all those nice feedbacks after returning home or via mentions/likes on social medias. Thank you so much!