It’s taken me a while to get round to writing this post as it’s been a crazy month in the Brown household but I’ve finally got time to sit down and tell you about our trip. As those of you who follow me on twitter will know, we were lucky enough to win a day trip to Lapland for Zara and myself. Firstly, huges thanks to Spud and Spike for mentioning the competition on your blog – if you hadn’t mentioned it then I wouldn’t have entered :)

The prize that we won was a Lapland Day Break from Transun. I’ve always said that I wanted to take Zara and Oscar to Lapland at some point whilst they were young but I certainly hadn’t planned on taking Zara at this age, she had only just turned 2 and a little too young really but I entered the competition on the off chance and we won so off to Lapland we were going :) Expecting it to be a very long and tiring day we decided to pay for my husband to join us on the trip to make things a bit easier to manage and I didn’t want him to miss out on the experience. So it wasn’t an entirely free trip for us and by the time we’d bought a fast track passport for Zara, a one day passport for my husband (we realised his had expired), paid for my husbands place and then bought lots of warm clothes for Zara, we had spent quite a lot of money – whoops!

And so at 3:30am (yes 3:30) Thursday 22nd December, our day began…..Luckily I have a very good friend who was happy to come around and look after Oscar for us as he really was too young to come with us. We were due to fly from Doncaster airport at 7:30am and so needed to leave our house by 4:30 at the latest to get us down to the airport in time. Zara wasn’t overly impressed at being woken up at 4am, dressed and put in the car in the middle of the night bless her but we managed it and after a hasty goodbye to our babysitter we were off. When we left our house at 4am it was a rather mild 11 degrees centigrade! Warm for December and very warm compared to the predicted temperatures in Lapland.

Mum it's the middle of the night!

After a 2 hour drive down to the airport, we checked in and made it through security. Zara was a little bewildered by everything bless her but charmed all the security people and we even managed to get her carton of toddler milk through security so she could have her evening bottle on the flight home. :)

Once on the flight we were relieved to have 3 seats together so Zara could sit between us and Zara loved the flight. She has never flown before so I was expecting it to be traumatic but she enjoyed it. She loved her in flight meals and looking out of the windows. Even now she says “airplane fly high though the sky, mummy on airplane, daddy on airplane, zara on airplane, oscar not on airplane” bless her :)

Clouds Mummy! (it was hot on the plane hence the lack of top!)

After a 3 hour flight we landed in Lapland and were quickly through security and loaded onto coaches. It was around 1pm and still light though it was just starting to get dark. It didn’t feel too cold but with darkness falling we were warned that the temperature would drop fast and it was predicted to be around -15 by the end of the day! Zara loved the coach (another first for her!) and as we zoomed across Lapland for around 25 minutes we were entertained by christmas music on the coach.

Big girl on the coach

Our first destination was the “suiting and booting” building where we were all equiped with thermal snowboots and snowsuits. Luckily Zara had her own snowboots as they didn’t have any small enough for her but we found a snowsuit that fit her at least. Once we were all suited and booted we were back on the coach for a 5 minute trip to the activity area.

All wrapped up against the cold

Once we arrived at the activity zone, Zara had her first experience of walking in the snow as we had a tour of the area and were shown where all the facilities were. I think Zara found walking a little bit too cold on her feet so after her first initial walk she opted for the preferred choice of being carried by Mummy or Daddy.

Mummy and Zara

When we first arrived at the activity zone, there was a rush for the husky dog rides and the reindeer rides and quite long queues for them so we went and booked our timeslot to go visit Santa and then decided to go and have lunch in the restaurant in the hope the queues for the activities would die down a bit once the initial rush was over. Lunch was served in a cabin and was buffet style – vegetarian option was soup, pasta and a mushroom sauce, chips and bread which went down very nicely. After filling up on food we then decided it was time to brave the queues and try out some of the activities. Our first choice was the reindeer sleigh ride, there was no queue for this whatsoever by the time we got there so we bundled into the sleigh. Zara absolutely loved the reindeer ride and she snuggled up inbetween my legs and smiled the whole way. Daddy was in the sleigh in front of us.

On the reindeer sleigh

Now with a two year old who doesn’t like the cold, we had to choose our tactics wisely as if we were outside for too long Zara got upset. Luckily there was another cabin which serves biscuits and hot drinks all day and this proved to be a valuable resource. It also had a roaring fire in there and so between rides this is where we hung out. We probably spent most of the day in here to be honest as playing in the snow and tobogganing weren’t really Zara’s thing – trying to keep gloves on a 2 year old is impossible and she really wasn’t impressed with getting her hands cold.

Hot chocolate and gingerbread for mummy!

and gingerbread for Zara (she wasn't impressed with hot chocolate though!)

After warming up, we then ventured out for a husky dog ride. This was definitely Zara’s favourite activity of the day. She loved watching the dogs running past with the sleighs and when it was our time to get on a sleigh she was so excited bless her. We zoomed around the frozen lake and I was very surprised at just how fast they went. Unfortunately I don’t have any photos of the dog ride, we have a video but I haven’t had chance to download it off the husband’s phone yet. After the dog ride we popped into the souvenir shop to warm up and we couldn’t leave without buying Zara a husky doggy of her own to take home.

A husky doggy of my own!

Finally it was time for us to go and meet the big man himself! Now I wasn’t expecting a lot here – Zara has never met Santa before and she doesn’t really like strangers so I was expecting tears but it was a day for new experiences and we couldn’t go all the way to Lapland without trying to see him at least. In order to find Santa’s house in the forest we had to go on a snowmobile ride to get there.

A very tired and cold Zara gets her helmet on for the ride

All smiles :)

On arrival at Santa’s house we were greeted by an elf who helped us off with our helmets and showed us in to see Santa himself. At this point Zara decided that she didn’t want to see Santa and she refused to acknowledge him. In fact she refused to go within 6 feet of him and so the lovely photo of her meeting the real Santa for the first time looked like this – lol

Hmm at least we will laugh about it when she is older!

After another snowmobile ride back to the activity zone we headed back over to the hot drink hut to warm up. By this time it was extremely busy in there as pretty much everyone was now crowded in warming up whilst waiting for their coaches back to the airport. But we found a space and sat down to drink more hot chocolate and eat more gingerbread biscuits until it was time for our coach ride back to the airport.

Heading back to the coach

Back on the coach with Daddy

Once back at the airport, we had an hours delay for our plane but we were very happy to be finally on board and on our way home. As soon as we sat down we gave Zara her evening bottle and within about 15 minutes of take off she was….

Fast asleep on the plane home with her new friend

Zara slept pretty much the entire flight home but she did wake up just as started our descent into Doncaster and promptly threw up everywhere. Huge thanks to the flight stewards who came to our rescue and helped to get everything cleaned up so we could get fastened back in our seats for landing. I guess a long day, lots of biscuits and strange food and the cold took it’s toll on her. Though after throwing up she went back to sleep and pretty much slept all the way home :) We finally got back home at 1:30am – 22 hours since we had got up and all 3 of us collapsed into bed after sending home the best babysitter in the world!

Overall we had a lovely time. Ideally I wouldn’t have taken a 2 year old, it is cold and it’s a long day and they can’t really appreciate the whole Santa experience but we have some wonderful memories from our trip and Zara still tells everyone about the flying high in airplane and doggy ride. Will we go back? Yes I think we will when Zara and Oscar are both older and able to cope with the cold better.

Points to note if considering visiting yourself:

Take plenty of hats and gloves – handwarmers are essential!

There weren’t any baby changing facilities (not surprising as it’s not really designed for toddlers) so be prepared to change nappies on the cold floor!

Ideally wait until your children are old enough to handle the cold before taking them – I’d say aged 5-6 would be a good age to visit!