The famous reindeer are American inventions: the eight names come from a Christmas poem printed in New York, and Rudolph from a department store's giveaway booklet. Nothing about them is Finnish. The reindeer you meet in Lapland are real working animals, and every one of them belongs to a herder. The easiest way to meet one is the short sleigh ride behind Santa Claus Office, which needs no booking; for time with a herd rather than a ride, go to a farm.
The reindeer everybody can name and the reindeer anybody can meet have almost
nothing to do with each other. The names were made up in the United States. The
animals live in the north of Finland, and each one of them has an owner.
That is worth knowing before a Christmas trip, because a child who has sung the
song will want to know which one is Rudolph.
Eight names from a newspaper in Troy
The eight names come from the poem that begins “‘Twas the night before
Christmas”. It first appeared in the Troy Sentinel, a newspaper in New York
State, on 23 December 1823, with no author’s name on
it.1
Two of the names have moved since. The first printing had “Dunder and Blixem”,
Dutch for thunder and lightning, which later became “Donder and Blixen” and in
the end the German “Donder and
Blitzen”.1 Dasher, Dancer,
Prancer, Vixen, Comet and Cupid have kept their places since the first printing.
None of the eight has a Finnish name, and nothing in the poem places them in
Lapland.
Rudolph was an advertising job
Rudolph arrived more than a century later, and for a commercial reason. In 1939
the Chicago department store Montgomery Ward gave away an illustrated poem to
children visiting its shops, and the character was written for that giveaway by
an advertising copywriter, Robert Lewis May. In that first season alone the
store handed out roughly 2.4 million
copies.2
So the most famous reindeer in the world began as a free booklet. The song came
later still.
Tripadvisor ratings, 18 Rovaniemi operators
Highest first
Snowtrail Safaris 5.0
Nordic Odyssey 5.0
Nordic Adventures 4.9
Arctic GM 4.9
Book Lapland 4.9
Bearhill Husky 4.9
Arctic Attitude 4.9
StayLapland 4.8
Wild About Lapland 4.7
Wild Nordic 4.7
Lapland Winter Park 4.6
Safartica 4.5
Nordic Unique Travels 4.5
Apukka Resort 4.4
Lapland Welcome 4.3
Arctic Circle Snowmobile Park 4.3
Arctic Circle Husky Park 4.2
Raitola 3.4
<44.04.55.0
Ratings read from Tripadvisor. The shaded compartment left of the divider holds any score below 4.0. We record the score only; review counts and review text are not part of our comparison.
Every real reindeer has an owner
In Finland, reindeer are not wild animals that happen to wander past. The
herding area covers 122,936 square kilometres, 36 per cent of the
country,3 and it is divided into
54 herding cooperatives.4
The Reindeer Herders’ Association puts the rule plainly: every reindeer is owned
by someone, and the ownership is marked on the animal’s ear. There are around
12,000 of these earmarks in use.5
That changes what you are looking at. The reindeer standing by the road outside
Rovaniemi, and the one pulling a sleigh at a farm, both belong to a herding
family, and the cut in the ear says whose.
Meeting one near Rovaniemi
The quickest meeting is at Santa Claus Village. Santa Claus Reindeer, a
family company, runs sleigh rides from its yard behind Santa Claus Office: a
400-metre ride of about six minutes from 30 euros, and an 800-metre ride of
about ten minutes from 50 euros. No booking is needed; you buy a ticket and wait
your turn, and small children ride in the sleigh with an
adult.6 The page does not say
whether those prices are per person or per sleigh, so ask at the counter.
A herder leads the reindeer, and the ride is at a walk. That is the right
expectation to set for a child who knows the song: this is an animal that
pulls a sleigh through the snow, not one that flies; the flying happens on
the Santa trackers on Christmas Eve.
What to say when the child asks which one is Rudolph
The honest answer can still be a good one. None of these reindeer is Rudolph,
because Rudolph is a character from a story. These are the reindeer who
actually live in the north, and the herder who looks after them is the person
to ask for their names.
This page is an independent guide, written from published sources. We have no
connection to Santa Claus Reindeer or any other reindeer operator.
Is it all right to tell a small child these are Santa's reindeer?
That is a family's call, and a gentle story does no harm. The one thing worth avoiding is a promise the animal cannot keep: a reindeer pulling a sleigh at walking pace through the forest will not fly, and a four-year-old who was told it would may notice. Saying these are the reindeer who live near Santa, and letting the child ask the herder the rest, keeps the story intact without setting up a disappointment.
Can we spend longer with reindeer than a ten-minute ride?
Yes. The same company that runs the short village rides sells safaris from about an hour, starting at 120 euros on its own page, and several farms around Rovaniemi run visits where the time goes on feeding and listening to the herder rather than on the sleigh. The reindeer farm guide separates those two purchases, and the comparison of farms sets out which one publishes what, including who refunds when.
Is a farm visit better than the ride at the village?
Different rather than better. The village ride is quick to fit into a day that is already at the Arctic Circle, and nobody has to plan anything. A farm is a trip out of town, usually with transport, a longer talk and a warm drink in a hut, and it suits a family that wants the animals to be the point of the afternoon. If the child mainly wants to sit in a sleigh behind a reindeer, the village does that without a morning spent getting there.
Lapland Handbook is written by its editorial staff in Rovaniemi. Every price, age limit and group size in a comparison is read from the operator's own page and marked "Not stated" when the operator does not publish it. Each guide names who should not book, and names the operator that suits each kind of group, whichever it is.
Rovaniemi's winter tours do sell out – December and the week around New Year first, and the small-group ones before the rest. Booking here goes straight to the operator at their own published price, and the code LH10 takes 10% off it.
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