Today we are downhill skiing in Ruka. As we wind our way along the narrow forest road away from base camp, the snow is deep around us and hangs, in precarious swathes along the tree branches. We see a break in the clouds and wonder if the weather, at last, is turning. It lasts for a moment and then the clouds meet once more and the brief ray of sunshine is lost. It takes about 25 minutes to get to Ruka. The town centre is very small and offers the usual range of ski resort shops and restaurants. As we step out of the minibus I can see that there is a white-out. I am not sure whether it’s worth going up but also not sure what I will do in Ruka for 5 hours if I don’t. A couple of skiers who have just come down give me an update - it’s limited visibility at the top they say, but the snow conditions are good. First I check the quality of the equipment in the hire shop, the skis are nearly new and the edges are sharp so I decide to take the punt. It’s the first time I have been on downhill skis for nearly five years and as we walk to the first quad lift my arms are already tired from carrying the skis and so I am glad to clip them onto my boots. I’ve also forgotten that skiing means having five foot planks stuck to your feet. I don’t feel at all confident. The evening before my companion had asked me if I could ski and I had said yes, and we chatted about where we had skied and told the usual anecdotes about the successes and failures of various runs we had thrown ourselves down. I wished now the term ‘double-black diamond’ had not been uttered. Pushing myself along on the flat I approach the gates, fumbling for my electronic pass and find I cannot stop and clatter into one of the posts. I smile weakly at my friend. I don’t feel happy or secure on the chairlift and regret now not doing my boots up tighter. As we slowly glide upwards I am too nervous to take in the beauty of the countryside around us and appreciate the way the snow sparkles in the sun, which has finally emerged from the clouds. As we approach the top, the retaining bar slowly raises and wriggling to the edge of my seat I get ready to push myself off. The chair slows, I am slow to move, the others are faster and in the jostle I lose my balance and fall in a great clumsy heap to the ground. My companion looks at me with a faint look of pity. In a moment of clarity, I realize it is for herself, not me.
Because my boot clips are open and I am on a slope I can’t get up and so ensues an embarrassing, human version of Bambi-on-ice. I manage to get up at last and bend over to tighten my clips and to gather my composure. In the meantime my companion checks out our route on the piste-map. Over there, she points. I nod and meekly follow in her tracks, glad I have hired a helmet. It is one of those strange peculiarities of mountain weather that it can be a white-out one minute and glorious sunshine the next. It can be snowing on one side of the mountain and clear on the other. As we take our second chairlift, my ski legs slowly start to engage, the mist slowly lifts and when we reach the top the view is stunning. Not one of those machismo Alpine views which is one huge craggy mountain in front of you and another one beyond it, and another one beyond that. What surrounded us, here at the top of this mountain in northern Finnish, not far from the Arctic Circle, was a vast expanse of flatland that gently rolled away in all directions, generously scattered with lakes. The sheer sense of nothing between oneself and, well, whatever was on the horizon felt strangely liberating. “Let’s have a photo” I say.
My first run down is rubbish. It’s a blue run which leads into a red. My balance is poor; my weight distribution from ski to ski on the turns is sloppy. I am nervous of any kind of speed. My companion has streaked ahead of me and I see her at a bend, waiting, leaning on the poles she has stuck into the ground. I feel like deadweight. Drumming up some confidence I push myself into a hard turn just before I reach her and feel the snow spray up in a satisfying arc around me. “if you want to go on”, I say, “do”. She shakes her head and smiles. On the next bit I run through the exercises that are drummed into you time and again at ski school reminding myself. “Lean into the slope, transfer weight to the down-hill ski, bend the knees, plant your poles”. By the end of the second run that sluggish gray matter that is my brain, is beginning to remember and my body is beginning to respond. I hum the Blue Danube by Strauss, exactly like I used to in my first few years of skiing and start to feel some rhythm creep in and my body begins to relax. This time, at the bottom of the slope, I am not far behind. The village is just below us now and with its traditional Finnish architecture and twinkling Christmas lights I expect to see Santa wander across the square. My concentration kicks back in as I see my friend take a sharp turn to the left. I catch a glimpse of a number and a colour as I follow. So……. we’re taking the black. She is still down before me, but I take some little solace in the fact she is fifteen years younger.
Later, at the reindeer farm we visit, we are sitting in a large hut around an open fire eating reindeer sausages which are delicious. It feels slightly discourteous, though, given we have just finished being introduced to their mates. They are an edgy lot these reindeer and might I say it, slightly difficult to predict. You get the sense they might pretend to be domesticated when it suits, but really, they pretty much do what they want. They are big beasts, with thick wiry pelts and antlers that are, well, deterring to say the least. There are 250,000 reindeers in this region of Finland which is home to a lot fewer people – only 15,000 in fact. The reindeers roam, but they are not wild, each one of them has a small pattern clipped into its ear to show who owns it. They all run together over the winter and then the farmers work together to find them and bring each of their herds in for breeding and slaughter. As I sit there, chewing contentedly in the darkness, lit only by the flicker of the flames, I run my hands across the reindeer pelt I am sitting on. I had been thinking about what souvenir to take back from Finland, and now I know.