14th
of February 2002
Flight to Ivalo
It's seven O'clock in the morning and the turbo-prop
airliner of Czech Air is leaving Vienna. Our journey to Lapland begins.
One short stop in Prague and after some hours we are rally on Finnish
territory. At the airport we are waiting for Bernhard, our third men at
our Lapland adventure, who is coming with the plane from Budapest.
Two
hours before the start of the last Finnair-flight to Ivalo - the northern
most airport in Finland - we bought us stand-by tickets. Arrived at the
gate to look if there are free seats at the plane, we were noticed, that
our plane has a failure and that we have to wait for another plane.
Instead
of a MD-80, we got now an Airbus 321, which is much more larger and this
was good luck, because I think we wouldn't have gotten a seat in the
smaller plane with our stand-by tickets.
The
first noise we heard when we landed in Ivalo was the scrunching sound of
the snow under the plane tires. When we went out of the plane it was
snowing and a cold wind was blowing. The airport building is really nice.
It's really nice decorated and I think it's the only airport in the world
with an open fireside with a real wood fire inside.
In front
of the airport a bus was already waiting for the passengers to Saariselkä
and Kiilopää, where our nice youth hostel is situated.
A little
bit tired we went to bed - happy that we were the only guests in the
sleeping room of the youth hostel.
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