ADVENTURE

The stories are written in the snow. At some point, a brave reindeer broke away from the others — and from the hoofprints you can see how far it got. I like to imagine this creature in the early hours of the morning, a lone reindeer, tentative and curious. What made it change its mind and return to the safety of the group? Big oval prints like snowshoes tell us that elk have been here. A mile away, there is a more sinister tale — a trail of paw prints, the size of my hand, disappear into the forest. A lynx. I think of this muscly feline slinking silently through the snow, following its prey into the trees. 'This isn't good,' says Benny Jonsson, a local herder. 'We will have lost reindeer in the night. If we follow the prints, we might find a dead one.' I cling to the back of his snowmobile and we move off. 'Look, more lynx prints,' he says, pointing at the ground between bushes. 'A mother with cubs.' We follow them for a while, but they get tangled and don't lead us to a body in the forest.

Benny is a Sami reindeer herder. The Sami, northern Europe's only indigenous people, live on land they call Sápmi — an area of the Arctic that spreads across Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. There are 20,000 Sami in Sweden, maybe twice as many in Norway — although there has never been a census — and reindeer husbandry is the foundation of their life. In previous centuries, small groups of families would move with the seasons, living in tipi-style structures while they hunted, fished and gathered herds of wild reindeer. These days, the communities are more settled, moving their reindeer over shorter grazing distances.

At the sameby (Sami village) at Idre, near the border with Norway, a community of around 30 Sami live in modern houses. They have 4x4s and mobile phones, and herd their reindeer using snowmobiles and walkie-talkies. And yet their traditions and culture remain strong — even if they are under threat. In the 19th and 20th centuries, the Swedish and Norwegian governments tried to force the Sami to assimilate. The language was banned and settlers were encouraged on to their land. Today, there are efforts to repair the damage and protect Sami culture — the language is taught in schools, and the Sami have been given fishing and hunting rights that Swedes do not have. But there are still battles, particularly over land. Today's threats come mainly from mining and logging corporations — and from tourism.

This is what the Sami of Idre are facing. We've driven north from Stockholm to our hotel in a ski resort here. The resort wants to expand, but this could cut off the reindeer migration routes that have existed for hundreds of years. Holiday homes, roads and golf courses have already had a negative impact on reindeer husbandry in this area. On top of this, Swedish companies have turned the Sami into little more than curiosities, offering tours replete with reindeer rides and people in traditional costumes selling handicrafts. If tourism was going to have an inevitable impact on their lives, the Sami felt they should try to control it themselves and offer a more genuine experience. The Idre community, then, is the first to host tourists, and we're among their first visitors.

The chief of the Sami village is Jorgen Jonsson. He is shorter than his brother Benny, a little rounded, with pink cheeks and sparkling blue eyes. He is always smiling. On the first day, my sledge is pulled by a snowmobile driven by Mattias, Jorgen's nephew — many of the Sami here are related. We follow Jorgen into the forest. During the winter, the 4,000 reindeer are brought down from the mountain, where they graze all summer, to the shelter of the forest.

This means that there isn't much herding to do. The reindeer eat lichen from the forest floor, digging away at the snow with their hooves to get at it. Their herders — four full-time men — go out on snowmobiles early each morning to see where the herd is and make sure it hasn't strayed too close to the road. A 4x4 on these unlit roads will easily take out a reindeer.

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