Getting there
The tour travels roughly 110 km west from Rovaniemi to Aavasaksa, a sharp-edged hill in Ylitornio, Finnish Lapland.
On the hill
You make your way to the 242-metre (794 ft) summit, passing Keisarinmaja, a decorative former hunting cabin now used as a café. From the top, panoramic views stretch across both Finland and Sweden — the reason Emperor Alexander II of Russia visited the site in 1876.
Struve Geodetic Arc
Aavasaksa's elevation made it a key point in the 18th-century French Geodesic Mission and later the Struve Geodetic Arc, earning it UNESCO World Heritage status alongside 33 other sites on the Arc. On clear summer nights, this is also one of the southernmost places in Finland where the midnight sun stays visible.
Rivers and border crossing
The hill sits between the Torne River to the west and the smaller Tengeliö River to the east and north. The tour continues across the border to Övertorneå (Ylitornio), a small Swedish locality, to see its old church and surrounding landscape.
