Snowshoeing in Rovaniemi: which trip to book

Visit Rovaniemi, the city’s tourism organisation, listed more than ten guided snowshoe trips in or from Rovaniemi when we read it, and most follow the same shape: you are collected from your hotel, driven into the forest, walk for an hour or two and stop at a fire. The trips compared here differ where the shape does not.

Four trips, four reasons to choose one

Nordic Unique Travels is the least expensive of the trips that lend an overall and boots. It leaves at any time between ten and half past two, and ends with pork sausages and hot blueberry juice by the fire.¹ Wild About Lapland walks through old forest and up hills, with two start times a day, half past eight and two, and keeps its groups to eight people.² Johka describes its walk as relaxed and suitable for all levels, with a hot drink by an open fire; its page lists no winter clothing among what is included, so ask before you book.³ Porovaara, at 139 euros the dearest of these, walks on its own reindeer farm, where the area is privately owned, and you feed the reindeer lichen before sausages at the fire.⁴

With children

Wild About Lapland’s child rate covers four to fourteen, but its snowshoe trip takes no one under six. For a family booking well ahead, its terms matter too: cancelling more than a week before costs a tenth of the price, and a day or less before costs all of it.⁵ Johka’s child price starts at three. Nordic Unique Travels publishes no child price, and asks that children under twelve come with adults paying the full price. Lapland Welcome’s forest trip is meant for twelve and over.⁶

On a very cold day

None of the other pages we read mentions a temperature limit. Soul of Lapland does: below minus twenty it moves its walk from the Lehtojärvi hills to a private island with a heated log cabin rather than cancelling, at 125 euros a guest for at least two.⁷

Where to book

ToTheNorth, the cheapest trip here, is sold on the booking platforms, and a wild lunch in a teepee is in the price; it takes no one under eight, and winter clothing is marked as not included.⁸ Wild About Lapland charges the same on GetYourGuide as on its own site, and there it can be cancelled free of charge until a day before.⁹ Nordic Unique Travels costs 105 euros on GetYourGuide against 79 in its own calendar, so book it direct.¹⁰ Johka costs the same on Viator, where the booking cannot be refunded or changed.¹¹

For a day that mixes snowshoes with a fishing hole, see ice fishing in Rovaniemi; for frozen waterfalls, Korouoma canyon from Rovaniemi; and for the rest of the week, things to do in Rovaniemi.