Bearhill Husky — Attraction in Rovaniemi sub-region

Nice smooth pickup and drop off from outside the cafe collection point.

Welcomed by guide on arrival, really nice woman from Czech Republic. Relief brake then overall and boot fitting. Straight into safety briefing/sled function demonstration. Then off to your pre prepared sleds and dog teams, so far so good.

I was positively buzzing for this mushing experience but it was soured somewhat by a guy possibly the owner giving me grief at the start about not listening to safety briefing. He grabbed hold of the side of my sled and I almost came off at launch. Turns out he just wanted to tell me off for releasing the break, which I did only do because I was second sled and the lead sled guide had gone and I was holding up the line. My dogs either didn’t go or they did but brake was stuck in the ground hard. Regardless the guy was rude and kind of took the shine off the experience for me, not good customer service from the owner, he kind of gave off a vibe of not wanting anything to do with the people who have paid a reasonable amount of money to mush his dogs. Maybe he just doesn’t like people. He didn’t really speak to anyone at the end either.

Anyway after we hit the trails the mushing experience was fairly positive and the dogs performed well. I was on a single sled with 4 dogs pulling me, I’m a fairly heavy guy around 17st and they had no problems, I helped on hills running or one legging off over the side. They are not so easy to steer the sleds but the trails are well cut out in such a way you’re almost on a train track so at worst you bounce off the side. Speaking of bouncing off the side someone on our tour managed to break a sled at the rear of the group so our snowmobile support guide fetched a replacement, this meant a reasonable delay waiting for it to be sorted. Off we go again, some lovely views and great mushing with a mix of open frozen lakes and tighter woodland sections. This was a fairly long experience which is what I was looking for but you would probably want half day or less if you are considering taking kids along.

Lunch was at a nice little camping spot, I opted for the vegetarian option a lentil soup of some kind followed by a vegetarian hot dog. A hot juice drink was also offered with a coffee at the end. The food and drink was a little bland and weak tbh especially for the tour price of just under 500euros. It was nice to have a break anyway and some photos and time with the dogs. I own an Alaskan Malamute back home myself so I know how they are.

Off for more mushing heading gradually back to the start at the Bearhill kennels, which are sizeable with many dogs and pups to see. The lady on the single sled behind me managed to crash into the back of my legs with her lead two dogs. I wasn’t injured so didn’t make a big fuss out of it and well it’s most people’s first time including myself. She only did it once so that was good. It’s a fairly steady slow pace on most on these tours but that’s ok it’s not a race after all. Gives you a chance to look around and take some of it in rather than staring at a red spacer rope.

Nice little walk around and talk by the female guide at the end. Others didn’t really get involved with the tourists much at all. Beautiful drive back to city pickup point. My experience was 3 stars at Bearhill on this occasion, that could potentially be 5 stars if they modified the way they talk to paying guests and the food/drink was massively improved. It’s a good tour don’t get me wrong but it isn’t a 500euro tour in my...

All in all this Call of the Wild Husky Safari was a good time for us. We had never done anything like this, and Bearhill made this a very easy on-boarding experience. There are some details they do not mention in the activity description that are notable, most important being that you might be technically “driving” the sled, but you are not taught voice commands. They aren’t needed because the dogs seem to be well trained on this particular route the safari is on. This is NOT a bad thing; absent the need for voice commands, the driving instructions are a mere 10 minutes of explanation, and really just about anyone can do it - just breaking and stopping. I recall there being eight sleds total among the entire tour group with two humans per sled (each gets a turn at driving).

Something else that wasn’t quite clear is that when they say they provide winter outdoor clothing gear, they MEAN it. I could have shown up in sneakers, jeans, and a sweatshirt and that would have been fine, for all the gear they provide. Don’t waste space over-packing for this. They’ve got you covered with high quality stuff.

There are lots of beautiful photos on the website showing the tour and the beautiful shots of the dogs and the forest. Something that is omitted, though not necessarily a deception, is that if you book an “afternoon” safari in the winter months, almost the entire experience is in the dark, as ours was. This didn’t mean it wasn’t fun! We had a great time. But there aren’t many photo opportunities and video is quite useless in the dark. Pay close attention to the sunrise and sunset times of your safari dates. I wouldn’t call this a bait and switch, but the advertisement and marketing visuals bore no resemblance to our experience.

In summary, I would recommend this “dog sledding with training wheels” safari for anyone looking for a new experience. After this, I’m looking forward to some more extreme husky / dog-sledding excursions where there is more control, skill, freedom and time, such as a two night camping journey I read about once. Thanks to Bearhill Husky I now know a lot more what this...

RUNNING WITH THE PACK PACKAGE We recently returned from Rovaniemi and my wife booked this in advance and was really the only excursion we wanted to do whilst there. We did research and noticed Bearhill seemed very ethical and showed great care towards the animals.

We had an afternoon session (1400hrs) and the meeting point was close by, easy to find and we didn't have to wait long. When we arrived we were hosted by Joanna - who was great and really informative and passionate - and were shown where to go and told about what would be happening. We were split into two groups to go out on the sleds and when it was our turn we were seated and covered with blankets.

We had two layers on and a snowsuit as well as two pairs of socks and liners with our mittens and could only really feel the cold on small parts of our exposed faces. We would however recommend ski goggles or sunglasses though -

The ride was fantastic and our musher Nadine was brilliant too! The area was out of the way and the dogs obviously loved their job. After the ride we went into a cabin and just spoke with Joanna about the dogs, the job and she answered all our questions. When the second group returned we all went outside to meet the dogs up close and could buy treats for them from workers (they were €5 per pack, Royal Canin). We had a good amount of time stroking the dogs and giving belly rubs and were not rushed.

Once this was over, we were shown to the kennels where the dogs live and could see they were well cared for. We saw some newborn puppies - they kept everyone away from the puppies as it would have been bad for them and the mother which we thought was good to see - and also got to hold a 4 month old puppy too!!!

We were also told about Blitz the famous Siberian Husky in a Netflix series.

This excursion was fantastic and a must have booking for anyone going to Rovaniemi in this season with snow. We would...