Oy Levi Ski Resort — Attraction in Tunturi-Lapin seutukunta

North Pole Arctic Circle

Levi Ski Resort Great! Cold! Good ski fells. A must to visit. For the bucketlist.

Restaurant Steakhouse Pihvipietti Just outside the more crowded center street of Levi at 5min walking. Great atmosphere in a traditional log cabin. Very friendly waiters. Exeptional Reindeer Meat. Wine is as expensive as the rest of Finland. Reindeer Meat Steak with hunting sauce and Garlic Potatoes a beer and one glass of wine for about 100€. But you could add fresh saladebar buffet for a additional 20€. It’s a favorite of both locals and those in the know : a reservation is recommended.

Panorama hotel. A dedicated design hotel with beautifull views on the Levi fell. Comfortable spacious room, a modern design bathroom, floorheated with thermostat. Large in-room storage. Large modern bed and thick bedding. A sauna on the 7th floor with scenic view over the piste. A gym at -2 floor close to the enormous ski store lockers with easy acces to the skipiste. Restaurants with great wide view on the slobes. As close as possibly can to the skilift that connects to both Levi and the +/- 50 km of well prepared pistes. A nice trail through the forest near the hotel to a hut with open camp fire at 200m is worth the effort. It is a real pity the bar on the 7th is closed as it has a beatiful view.

Restaurant Niliporo The best Sami traditional food of Levi. It is Set in a old school dressed 24 seat limestone clad housing directly at the main street near the Front Piste. Stuffed animals and Sami tools on the walls not unlike a traditional dorfswirt in Austria. The main dish is reindeer. The filets are butter soft. Their Reindeer Tapas a must delicacy. Wine is as expensive as the rest of Finland.

Snowvillage / The Icehotel near Yllas. Beautifull but hard to get on a picture, there is just so much to see.

Reindeertour via Lapland Safari. A nice short tour on top of the Levi fell, from Panorama Hotel an easy walk in the direction of restaurant Horizont. Not seen the Northern Lights, ce ca. It is perhaps too close to Levi with too much light pollution from the city bouncing on the clouds. With rather annoying snowmobiles too close. Which really destroy the Zen of the tour. I would rather choose a location at 40 miles into nothingness. walk over the frozen lake. Or snowmobile into the wilderness. If the Northern Lights is your thing.

Hidden hide of Santa tour. For kids a trip back into the good Santa fairytale without modernism. A must for young and old. Telling anything really would spoil the trip.

Husky Tour to Wild Motion We really enjoyed our 10km husky tour. 5km or shorter really is too short. Lapland Safari tour brings you with a bus and you have 40 min to enjoy the beauty of Lapland and the National Park until you arrive at the Husky Farm. Husky...

TL;DR: The first impression is deceptive!

But lets start off with the positive aspects:

of course the many and diverse slopes

illuminated slopes (even looks quite nice)

friendly helpers at almost every anchor lift

no big ski school groups with children blocking the whole slope (and no nightmare of children blocking the anchor lift for 30 minutes like in Austria or Italy)

a reliable and very helpful app that has a 3D map of the whole resort with extras like bus lines, weather and opening times of slopes and lifts

But now for the negative aspects...

a LOT of slopes are very icy which is why I really wouldn't recommend most of the slopes (even the blue ones!) to beginners or people who just dont like it

the whole ski resort has a major problem: the valleys and slopes are connected VERY BADLY! This leads to waiting times up to 30 minutes (and I've heard people waiting even longer) which is more than annoying at -15°C...

many slopes and lifts are regularly closed up until February because they are not artificially illuminated. Some of them are essential to get to other points - very bad planning there! And theres no reduction in the ski pass price either...

two of the major lifts - the world cup gondola and the south toulihissi (a chairlift) have nearly ALWAYS a waiting time of at least 30 minutes!

there are so many anchor lifts! A few of them are longer than 1km and so the balance of lifting and skiing is 2:1 (plus waiting times, yay!) and again, temperature is a real problem here!

So, to summarize my experience - yes, the ski resort is very big and meets almost every wish you could have, but please dont underestimate the FRUSTRATION and freezed body parts...

We have been to Ruka a few times so I may be a bit biased to Ruka...

Levi is a much bigger town to what we are used to there are a lot more shops/restaurants so you have more choice.

The skiing options are better however the Zero point to South point do not link very well unless you are a very confident skier. You have to use the t-bar lift which is a killer on your legs to keep on the smaller slopes, the chair lift does not link on these easier slopes. The ski bus is €3 per day whereas it is free in Ruka.

The kid area is very good and the button lifts are good for beginners to practice on. There is a wood hut with a fire and free warm berry juice and facilities to heat sausages etc.

The toilet facilities are good and clean here too.

There is also a little sledge area with free sledges.

There are very little facilities at South point so you stand around freezing. It's needs a good cafe in the building.

There are a lot of smokers in Levi, odd comment I know, but it was really noticeable here for some reason.

We averaged 5 miles of walking each day coming to and from the slopes. The lockers are ridiculously expensive, €79 for a week. We just lugged our equipment which was a pain. Majority of the accommodation isn't located near to the slopes so there is some walking expected.

We paid to go up the gondola, €5 each and we walked along to the cafe in the woods. This was a really lovely trip and one I'd recommend.

You can also feed the reindeer at the K5 hotel. If you go through the reception you can buy food for €5 per bag and go out the back to feed them. Saves paying for a trip!

All in all Levi was nice and I'd go again if the price was right it just didn't have the magical...