Celebrating New Year in Swedish Lapland View Full Screen Itinerary

This afternoon you will arrive in Swedish Lapland at Lulea Airport. Here a Sandgrouse Travel & Expeditions representative will be waiting with a paging board. Your driver and guide will wait with you and help make sure you have all your luggage before you depart by private car to your first hotel.

Pine Bay Lodge is only a short 30 minutes drive from Lulea Airport and as you travel out of the regions capital you will quickly find yourselves in rural Swedish farm land. The farmland starts to become interspersed with traditional pine forests as you near the wonderful Pine Bay Lodge. Look out for moose and red foxes on your journey which are often seen in the fields or crossing the roads at dusk - the wildlife in the area is very active during the winter months and can often be seen as they go in search of food in order to survive the cold

Check-in to your lodge, enjoy a welcome drink in the lodges main lounge area. This evening we have arranged for you a hot wood-fired sauna before a delicious dinner in the main cabin.

This morning, after breakfast in the main log cabin at Pine Bay Lodge you will be meeting your snowmobile guide who will be taking you out into pristine wilderness.

Travel in convoy on your own snowmobiles across frozen lakes, through pine forests, along the banks of iced-up rivers and out to remote cabins. Enjoy a lunch in the wilderness with your guide, light a fire using natural materials such as birch logs and birch bark and enjoy a traditional and local hot lingonberry tea before heading back to the lodge for a craft beer by the stove in the lake-side cabin. 

This evening head out with your guide again, this time in search of the Northern Lights. Northern Lights sightings at Pine Bay Lodge are frequent however, never guaranteed. Strap on a pair of lodge's snowshoes or head to a remote cabin via snowmobile sleigh - here there is little to no light pollution and your chances of seeing the Aurora are at their highest. 

Dinner will be served back at Pine Bay Lodge before heading outside to try and see the Northern Lights. 

This morning enjoy an exhilarating hovercraft ride across the frozen tundra at Brandon Lodge the sister property of Pine Bay Lodge. Your host Goran who will take you for a short but entertaining 'spin' just to give you a taste of this exciting form of local transport. The hovercraft here is used to help ferry supplies and people from island to island in the winter months. This service provides vital and much needed transport for the remote communities in the area. Your guide and host Goran will tell you all about how the local people in this incredible archipelago live including many interesting stories of the local Sami reindeer herders who often drive their reindeer into the area looking for good grazing grounds. 

On returning from your exciting morning excursion you will enjoy a lunch at the main cabin before your driver guide will be waiting to collect you. He will be taking you to the incredible Aurora Safari Camp - a rustic, safari inspired tented camp on the banks of frozen lake. This afternoon at Aurora Safari Camp you will be learning how to ice sculpt with a professional sculptor. Huge ice blocks are cut out of the frozen river, leave your stamp on the local land for a few weeks by creating your own masterpiece.

The evening will be spent around the campfire at the heart of the camp. Enjoy swapping stories with your fellow guests and host and savour the delicious local food. Tonight we have arranged a private sauna on the ice for you - here you will be able to relax and unwind in the quiet of the Swedish wilderness. If you are brave enough pop outside for some star-gazing before running back into the sauna to warm up! Tonight you will be sleeping in a traditional Lavvu, a Sami tent which has a log-burning stove at the centre. Throughout the night in order to keep warm you will need to stoke the fire with logs - a really authentic experience and part of the joy of Aurora Safari Camp.

This morning you will waking up in the Swedish forest in your authentic lavvu tent. A magical experience far from normality. Checking out after breakfast and a morning activity of your choice you will be heading on to your next incredible Swedish Lapland accommodation, Arctic Retreat. 

Arctic Retreat is only two cabins, each with their own hot-tub on their own terraces, the cabins are set up to a luxury standard and together you will have the whole camp exclusively to yourselves. Enjoy meals together, hanging out in nature and marvelling at the Northern Lights above you. This is your chance to detox from the stresses of the world - your time here at Arctic Retreat will prove to be very special. New Year's Eve (tomorrow) will also be spend here, far from home in the magical silent Swedish Forest together as a group of friends see in the New Year from your terrace, sauna or hot-tub with a glass of champagne! 

Today is New Year's Eve. Wake up in the surroundings you've been dreaming of visiting for years. Swedish Lapland is prestine, pure white winter wonderland... Step outside your cabin and stretch, breathing in the amazing clean air! Today you will be enjoying on-site 'slow' adventure with either some gentle Nordic skiing through the forest on trails or snow-shoeing your way out for a fika with hot coffee and cinnamon buns by a fire side sat on reindeer skins. 

This evening you will enjoy a special home-cooked meal with something extra special arranged for New Year by your hosts. Outside, if you're lucky will be the Northern Lights dancing above your cabins. After dinner, catch a sauna in the private traditional looking wood-fired sauna cabin just close by before plunging into your hot-tub to see in the New Year with some quality champagne in hand (Northern Lights overhead!). 

After breakfast and saying your farewells to the host and staff at Arctic Retreat, your private transfer will take you the world famous Treehotel in the village of Harads.

This is where you will be staying tonight. Treehotel is truly unique and some of the world's most sought after hotel rooms can be found here suspended in the silent pine forests. Your hosts Kent and Britta will welcome you with a show of typical Swedish hospitality, before showing you to your room in the forest and around the Treehotel.

This evening you will have dinner nice and early. Usually a locally sourced, traditional home cooked meal made by Britta herself. The food Britta prepares is second to none. Home-cooked that'll rival some of Scandinavia's best restaurants. Expect, Bear, Reindeer, Arctic char, Moose and many more local delights! 

Today you will be leaving the Treehotel and heading early this morning after your breakfast north with a private transfer. The journey is up to 4-hours with some stops but you will be passing through some of the country's most beautiful landscapes. Look out for moose, red fox and other widelife as the wintery landscapes of Swedish lapland slide by the window. 

You're heading for Icehotel - on arrival at the world famous hotel you will be able to enjoy a lunch, and quick tour of the hotel, with a new design each year calved almost entirely of ice from the river it is a real marvel and a treat to be able to see the skill and craftmanship that goes into this hotel annually in order to create it. 

After your tour you will leave the crowds at Icehotel. A short transfer away is Fjellborg Homestead. Here you will meet your teams of enthusiastic husky dogs who will be excited about meeting their new guests and helping them get to their remote cabin in the wilderness! The dogs will sense the plan, and be barking and yelping, at this point the buzz of excitment is high! Soon you'll be sliding through the forest silently with nothing but the sound of the dogs panting and your sleigh on the snow... Magical moments await as you glide for almost 20kms out to your exclusive-use luxury cabin. Fjellborg Arctic Lodge is regarding by many now to be the ultimate, all-inclusive Swedish Lapland lodge or cabin to stay at. This is truly a previlage to stay here. On arrival, once you have made sure your trusty four-legged friends are all sorted and checked-in, you will be able to check into your fantastic cabin! A really cosy home from home in the wilderness. 

Today you will wake up at your luxury all-inclusive Swedish Lapland cabin with an array of amazing experiences ahead of you. The main experience today will revolve around the reindeer. Reindeer are big business up in this part of the world and play a huge part in the culture. Sami herders have been working with reindeer for thousands of years and lifestyle and traditional values remain today every present in the minds of many people across all of Lapland. 

You'll be working with the reindeer on site, helping the owner of Fjellborg thrown in at the deep end but with expert guidance and tuition. Get to know the life of a reindeer herder and understand these beautiful animals before an afternoon relaxing in your sauna. 

Dinner tonight will be a final farewell to Swedish Lapland! Enjoy one last amazing evening in this incredible region of the far north. Savour the night skies after dinner with a hot drink - perhaps if you're lucky the Northern Lights will appear as a send off and thank you! 

This morning is your last in Swedish Lapland. After a sumptious breakfast you will be checking out roughly around mid morning. You will be either driving your team of huskies back through the woodland or zooming home on powerful snowmobile 'snowscooters'. Once back at the Homestead a transfer vehicle will be awaiting to take you to Kiruna Airport where your return flight home departs from. Thank you for visiting Swedish Lapland, we hope you've had one of the most amazing New Year trips in your life - we're sure you have!