Husky safari & snowshoeing holiday in Finland
How this holiday makes a difference
Environment
This is a very special tour, as the guests take part in making the trail traditional and environmentally friendly way – with snowshoes. In the old days, sled dogs did not have smooth ready made trails to follow but they fought their way through deep snow. This might sound harsh but the dogs do really enjoy it!
In the beginning of the season we start to do our trails by walking them through with snowshoes. After that, the dogs have a path to follow and the sledge packs the snow harder, making eventually a trail as good as it was done with a snowmobile! This kind of trail-making may not be effective measured with a modern scale. However it is a lot of fun and makes a strong bond between us and the dogs, as this is really something you could call teamwork. On this tour you get to be part of this team. On snowshoeing days you will use the dog trails but also open some new paths. After you've returned from the snowshoe tour, you have the possibility to experience the same trails again, this time with a team of dogs.
Our dogs do eat a lot, so it is important to pay attention on the environmental affects of our dog food. Although well-being of the dogs is the most important factor in this case, we refuse to import our dog food from overseas. At the moment our kibbles come from Sweden, but we are actively seeking a finnish dog food that would meet our nutritional requirements. Our dogs also eat a lot of bones, raw meat and fish. Meat products are not transported from far away, as we get those from local hunting clubs and slaughterers. Fish is usually caught by ourselves, or then we get the leftovers from local fishermen's catch.
Outdoor lunches are enjoyed on fireplaces which are maintained by Forest and Park Service. Such fireplaces are in free use for everyone. We are doing co-operation with Forest and Park Service and we pay a certain amount of money when we use these places. This money goes for maintaining the fire places and other infrastructure in nature protection and recreational areas.
By avoiding the use of motor vehicles we want to do our share to reduce emissions and noise pollution. This is one big reason why on our sleddog tours we have decided to use public trails and to open our own trails with green methods. Customer transportations from/to the airport are done by a local taxi driver when a public transportation is not available. We would like to use public transportations more, but the connections are poor and do not meet well with the flights. However, when using a taxi, we try to organise common transportation with the hotels and other program service providers in order to cut the costs and emissions.
Community
A tour done together with many local small companies. For accommodation we use private small hotel and local private rented cottages. The snowshoe part with this tour is done in co-operation with another local nature tourism company. This way the money spent for this holiday will stay in the area, promoting the co-operation between us and our local partners.
On this tour you have a chance to face the local people as all of the guides and the hotel staff are locals living here the whole year round, not only the busiest seasons. By using local work force and subcontractors we do our share to help people to be able to make their living in this beautiful area and to reduce people moving to cities searching for work.
The food we serve is strongly based on local ingredients (meat, fish, berries, mushrooms, vegetables) which we get very locally, avoiding long transportations. Fish and meat comes from local fishermen and hunting clubs, berries and mushrooms are picked by ourselves or locals who earn some extra-money during autumn time by gathering the nature goods. Potatoes and other vegetables are being bought from a local small farm. If we don't bake the bread ourselves, it is bought from a village bakery.
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