Hampstärnsstugan Jan 14 2018

There’s a hiking trail from Umeå to the lake Tavelsjö, the so-called Tavelsjöleden. The first stop after 5 km is the mountain hut Hampstärnsstugan. Today it opened for the first time this season and served waffles and some other snacks.

While Annika and I had used our new cross-country skis the last days (lightweight, slim and fast) we decided to use our sturdy back-country skis today since we didn’t know anything about the trail conditions.

The trail however was almost perfect, we just had to follow the railway-like ski tracks. We would have been much faster with the other skis, but we just enjoyed being outside and of course the warm chocolate and waffles in the stuga.

While we skied round 10 km, most of the families probably came by car. It was fun to watch the small children on their sledges and toboggans dashing down the slopes, even though we had to jump away several times to avoid collision.

I love being outdoors far, far away from civilisation, but it’s great as well to be able to make such short holiday trips just out of town.

Lagom winter Nov 20 2017

It’s probably not the first time, that I use the word lagom in this blog. You could translate it with “just right”. Not too hot, not too cold – not too much, not too little. That’s lagom.

Just now the winter behaves lagom, too. Om Friday evening 5 cm of snow covered my garden, tonight it’s round 20 cm. Not 76 cm as last year, not 2 mm as the year before, just 20 cm. That’s lagom! Even the temperatures are quite moderate, lying round -5 °C.

I didn’t have much time to enjoy this winter, because I’ve worked quite much the last time. Today evening however I managed at least an evening promenade through the near forest, first along some ways and paths, then across country. It was snowing a bit and everything was quite. I could hear neither bird nor car, only the scrunching of the snow under my feet. Today I went afoot but I got my back-country skis from the garage hoping for more snow to come.

Autumn in Skelleftehamn Sep 27 2017

Autumnal colours, blue sky and afternoon sun – this is the golden aspect of autumn. Time to wade into the shallow waters of the river Skellefteälven and make some autumn pictures.

One week after autumnal equinox the sun sets at 18:18 but days get shorter soon. In my dreams the first snow had already fallen. This may turn into reality in some weeks.

Ships and boats in Skelleftehamn Sep 23 2017

Today I planned to make some autumnal pictures in the early evening. I took the car to the small boat harbour tjuvkistan in Skelleftehamn. It felt like ages ago that I had been there. On the way there I saw a ship anchored in the commercial port. I stopped and to my surprise it was a ship from my hometown: The “Seabass” from Bremen. Of course I had to take a picture:

I went on to tjuvkistan and took some photos with trees (and boat navigation lights) reflecting in the sea. Still many boats lay in the small harbour or were on the way from or to the islands, but soon most boat people will set their boats on land before the weather gets too cold.

Hopefully I will have some other opportunities to make more pictures as long the leaves have not fallen down.

21 August: Kungsleden day 2 – Teusajaure—Kaitumjaure (9 km) Sep 4 2017

This article is part of the series “2017-08: Kungsleden hike”.

One of the less adorable things when you’re hiking from hut to hut is going to the toilet. You have to go to the utedass, the outdoor earth toilet, which is always a bit away. You need to slip in your boots or sandals, put on a jacket to stay warm and dry and in the night you even need a flashlight to find the right way. At least the toilet seats are made of styrofoam which isolates quite well. And there’re always some nice outdoor photos pinned to the wooden walls.

After I already took the camera to my early morning loo visit I stayed outside and took some more photos. It was chilly and cloudy but at least yesterday’s rain had stopped.

After a breakfast (Wasa bread with cheese and muesli with milk made from milk powder) we started our day’s march. It was much easier than the day before since it’s only 9 km to the next hut. We had to climb up round about 250 meters through forest until we reached the kalfjäll above the tree line. And finally the sun managed to find some holes in the clouds and illuminated parts of the alpine landscape.

It didn’t take very long until we crossed the river Kaitumjåkka (sami: Gáidumjohka) using the large chain bridge.

Leaving the river behind us we descended again through green birch forests …

… and arrived at the Kaitumjaure huts at 14:45. I cut up some logs and chipped wood for the sauna but it happened to be so crowded, that Annika and I left it soon. Katrin and Andi didn’t even managed to enter the sauna and the water for cleaning was still cold.

But even without a hot water “shower” day two felt much better than the day before. Now we looked forward to the next day that finally would lead us to the treeless kalfjäll for several days.

Back to the toilets: If you think that using the utedass is quite uncomfortable to use in summer, you won’t like it in winter either. Then you sometimes have to dress like for an arctic expedition just to reach it without hypothermia. Check the second photo in the article Kungsleden ski tour: Singi – from blizzard to clear sky to get an impression.

From winter to summer in seven days. May 21 2017

I hardly can remember the intense snow fall a week ago, when I look at a day as today.

Today in a nutshell: sun, shorts, temperatures between 15° and 22° C, sandals, blue sky, t-shirt only, ice cream.

It looked like early spring with only some of the birches starting to come into leaf but it felt more like high summer with today’s temperatures.

Annika and I have been in the “Arboretum Norr” today, just five days later as last year. Last year we could see many different species of flowers, this year only some, mostly Tussilago and Alpine Penny-cress, the two flowers that use to bloom first in the season. No wonder, April and May has been colder than last year. But today warmth attracted many butterflies, such as this European peacock.

And Tussilago is a beautiful flower anyway.

103rd February May 14 2017

Today morning was the 103rd February. It has been so cold and snowy the night and morning that I refused to call it 14th May.

Some random photos, taken between 6 and 7 o’clock where temperatures had started being above zero again:

Gåsören in the distance, half hidden in the snow

It took the sun some time to melt away the late snow, but this evening most of the snow was gone and I was content to call today’s date 14th May again.

Winter is finally gone. Winter is gone? Well, if you’ll look at the photos below you see that most of the lake Rudtjärnen is still covered with ice and that due to the cold temperatures this evening even the open parts starts to freeze over again.

But hey, that’s part of Spring, too. So I just say: winter is finally gone! Am I right? We’ll see …

A short detour near Ånäset Mar 20 2017

On my way back from Umeå to Skelleftehamn this morning some of the birch trees were covered with white frost. At the departure to Ånäset I turned right and followed the frozen gravel path. The sun was blocked a bit by a layer of clouds but sometimes it could break through and lighten the wintry scenery.

Winter on the Vesterålen Mar 1 2017

This article is part of the series “2017-02: Northern Norway”.

I’m sitting in a small mobile home in Nordnes near Røkland, Saltdalen, Norway. This morning Annika and I left Haukenes on the Vesterålen, where we had visited friends for some days. It had been gorgeous days, not only because it’s always fun to visit friends, but because of the fabulous winter weather we got those days.

Arrival

Last friday we left the Hurtigruten ship in Stokmarknes that we entered in Vardø two days before. My friends told us that there hadn’t been any snow one week before, but since then almost half a meter snow had fallen and snowfall hadn’t stopped yet.

Saturday

It snowed another ten centimetres the night and it continued snowing in the morning.

Sometimes the Norwegian weather forecast is right and so it was this day: As predicted it cleared up and promised to be a nice and sunny day later on. Annika and I took our skis and joined J. and B. together with Frits, the dog, on a ski promenade right behind their house . J. and B. returned after a while, we continued through the forest to the boggy valley Dalmyra over which we returned. Two small streams we had to cross with our skis but they were narrow enough to be crossable without problems.

Back again I looked at the snowy mountain range of the Lofoten that you can see from my friends house. The sinking sun changed colours of the snowy peaks every moment, from bright white to pale yellow, to “peach”, to orange, to colour shades I’m not able to name.

Sunset lighing the Lofoten island Hinnøya

Sunday

Another sunny day awaited us. Annika and I planned to ascend the Hovden, a mountain, not high (285 – 323 m) but steep. So we left home our skis and took snowshoes, first to hike on snow covered ways and paths to Marka, were we went up the Hovden. Phew, that was quite exhausting.

Annika went back while I continued a bit, first along the waymarks, then using my GPS.

I just love being above the treeline in Norway, where the view is wide and includes snow covered mountains and solitary trees just as blue coloured open fjords.

I descended the top and came to the small lake, where I took a break with water and „Kvikk Lunsj“ chocolate.

The descend from the lake was far from being optimal, I chose a very steep passage and it took a while and some concentration until I was on sea level again, were I walked back to my friends house, first on a minor road, than across a snow covered bog.

Monday

I might bore you, but even this day the weather was fantastic. Annika and I followed a tip of J., took the car to Sandnes and skied to Årneset, a place by the bay Årnesbukta. Here’s a cosy cabin were you can seek shelter, when weather is bad and a row of beautiful sandy beaches. I never ever skied along sandy beaches and open water and I really enjoyed this ski premiere.

Tuesday

Our last day on the Vesterålen and guess what: Weather was great again! Anyway I was quite lazy, so Annika and I didn’t use skis or snow shoes but the car to drive round the southern part of the island Langøya on which my friends – now our friends – live. Some impressions:

Arctic impressions at one of Langøyas shore

That was our last day on the Vesterålen. Thank you, J. and R. for your hospitality. I hope, you’ll visit us in Sweden someday. You’re more than welcome!

Tomorrow we’ll continue our return journey, first 40 km to the Norwegian—Swedish border, than round 380 km home to Skelleftehamn.

Sport Jan 15 2017

I do ski tours with pulka in Lapland, I paddle in the wintertime, people following my blog must think, that I’m quite sporting and athletic.

Hahaha! Hahahahaha! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!

I’m not kidding. My weight is way more than average, my condition is poor and some of my muscles show less activity than a sloth hanging in a tree.

The good thing: It’s possible to change substandard fitness and that’s one of my big issues for 2017. I started to exercise daily – not much yet, it’s more to get used to it than to optimise training – and I started to do cross-country skiing. Kind of real cross-country skiing.

Normally when I ski I take my fjällskidor – my nordic touring skis – and go my own way through nature. This is great for outdoor experiences but it’s more like going for a walk than like something you could seriously call “sport”. On the other side I have to admit that I found skiing in a readymade cross-country ski trail always quite boring.

Well, it’s not boring any longer when you try to be faster. Beside of my poor condition I realised that my ski technique is quite basic, too. That’s why I started cross-country ski school in Skellefteå this week. Hopefully they will help me improving my technique. Of course we have to train by ourselves between the lessons.

There are worse things than practising skiing when the weather is as fine as it was this weekend: Blue sky, hardly a breeze and temperatures round -15 °C. Perfect conditions! So Annika and I tried some ski trails in and round Umeå. I really liked Olles spår, which is round 10 km and extremely easy terrain. When we arrived yesterday morning we looked at the parking place. It was stuffed with cars and skiers seemed to be anywhere – waxing the skis, warming up, preparing. We learned that there was a competition on Olles spår but that we could use it anyway. And so we did.

I tried to use better technique and to be faster as usual, which was both exhausting and refreshing. For the first time in my life I had the feeling I would do some cross-country skiing instead of taking a promenade just with skis attached to my feet. Anyway, most of the people were twice as fast with half the effort.

Much room for improvement …

Today we looked for ski trails round Strömbäck-Kont which I like for the beautiful scenery. Anyway we didn’t find a good one. The first place didn’t have a ski trail at all, the second place had one, but it was quite poor, since there was much less snow than in the town of Umeå. So we continued to the forest Stadsliden, and checked one of the trails there. Really nice, too, especially since it is in the city zone of Umeå. There were many skiers too but it never felt crowded.

And now to something completely different: The Baltic Sea starts to freeze over again. I had been ice covered before this winter but strong winds broke the ice cover apart.

I had a look in Skelleftehamn this evening and could see the moon was reflected on a thin layer of blank ice covering the Baltic Sea. The same view in Strömbäck-Kont some hours earlier: Ice covered rock coast and a thin layer of fresh sea ice – less than two days old – stretching from shore to the horizon.

So: no paddling tomorrow, it’s winter.