Dog Sledding in December

Grandvalira is the easiest place in the Pyrenees to drive a dog sled. At the Grau Roig sector, up near the Port d'Envalira, RocRoi runs mushing on marked snow circuits behind teams of Nordic huskies, with a professional musher on every sled. You take the runners yourself on the longer rides rather than just riding along, learning to steer and brake the team through the snow-covered forest, and can go from a short two kilometre loop up to a five kilometre run or a ten kilometre night outing with dinner. It is a genuine winter-sport add-on to a ski trip, run by the resort's long-standing adventure operator rather than a one-off novelty.

Kiruna is the hub of the Swedish Arctic and the natural base for driving your own team of huskies across a frozen wilderness of forest, lake and open fell. Around the town and neighbouring Jukkasjarvi, small family kennels run tours from a single afternoon to week-long expeditions, and the appeal here is that you learn to drive the sled yourself rather than just ride: standing on the runners, braking and steering a team of a dozen dogs through snow-laden spruce and out onto the ice. The season is long and dependable, roughly November to April, with deep cold, reliable snow and the northern lights often overhead on the evening runs. Multi-day tours push into genuine backcountry, camping or sleeping in wilderness cabins, feeding and harnessing the dogs at dawn, and covering real distance day to day. Jukkasjarvi adds the original Icehotel, rebuilt each winter from Torne river ice, as a striking start or end point. For anyone who wants the Arctic at the pace of a working dog team, deep in snow and silence, Kiruna is the place.