This is the season where the golden October starts to loose its colours. The first ground frosts occur and many birch trees have lost their leaves. Now it is the rowan and willow trees and the grass and moss that shows autumnal colours.
Four pics I took on an after-work hike two days ago and four I took today.
It won’t be long before the afternoons are so dark that the light posts make sense — and maybe I’ll be able to ski there as early as next month.
Annika and I are on holiday and spent this week to travel around northern Sweden by car, mainly to visit friends. Some stopps: Kusfors, Arvidsjaur, Nattavaara, and Gällivare.
We took a short stop at the jar museum in Burträsk. Not to visit the museum, but the small flea market. If you travel in Sweden and love browsing at flea markets, look for the sign “Loppis”.
In Kusfors we visited friends and got Smörgåstårta for lunch. This dish is very Swedish. While its “architecture” resembles a layered cream cake, the taste is savoury and contains ingredients like ham or cheese.
When there are meadows or pastures in Northern Sweden there are full of flowers in summer. Here you can see for examples dandelions, butter cups, campions, and cow parsley. This patch is by our friend’s house.
Reindeers are typical for Northern Sweden and you have to watch out for them when driving a car. This fellow however is stuffed and stands in the display window of a grocery in Arvidsjaur.
There are many lakes in Sweden and in summer these lakes always come with mosquitoes, especially in the evening. Luckily they are late this year and I could take this photo without being eaten alive.
We are spending the night at Renvallen Camping near Arvidsjaur. The camping ground is an old farm and some buildings such as this log cabin are pretty old.
If you think, your car is too clean, use a Swedish gravel road in rain. The back of you car will be plastered with brownish-grey mud that even the strongest rain cannot wash away.
Yes, I wanted to take a bath at Sandviken in Gällivare, but my motivation went near zero, when I stood there in the steady rain looking at the shallow water with its gravelly ground.
If you like burgers, you should give Fat Tony’s in Gällivare a try. Both atmosphere and food are great. And if you are there, do visit the bathroom.
Just around the corner from Gällivare lies Dundret, a solitary mountain. When the rain stopped Annika and I took a hike there together with our friend Sascha and his malamute Roxy.
Stuff standing around in car garages has always its own aesthetics. The reason, why we needed a tyre dealer on our trip will be told another time (although you already may guess it).
On Monday we passed Nattavaara. Alas, the summer café is closed on Mondays. On our way back it was open and we stopped to ate cake. Different volunteers come up for short stays to run the café and bake cakes. Most of them are from Switzerland or Germany which strongly increases the cake variety in the region.
Some of you may know, that I live in two places. In Tromsø in Norway, my “work home” and in Obbola in Sweden, my “home home”. Travelling is not so easy, since the distance is 940 km by car. Normally I take the bus Tromsø—Narvik and then the train Narvik—Umeå, but I happens frequently, that the Swedish train does not operate this route. Yesterday for example I took the plane. It’s like travelling through different worlds.
Friday 11:00 – I am taking a promenade in the forests nearby. While the snow in the forests will soon be soon, the mountains will stay white much longer.
Friday 17:00 – I am sitting in the airplane to Stockholm, now watching the snowy mountains from above until it gets cloudy below.
Friday 21:00 – I am waiting for my plane to Umeå, one of the last planes for today. Less and less people are present and the shops are closing.
Saturday 08:00 – I am home home. Compared to Tromsø everything is much greener . The weather is rainy and everything outside is soaking wet.
Let’s face it. I am a lousy skier. My technique is mediocre when I ski uphills and reduces to ε > 0 when I ski downhills. With the lack of technique there is empty space for panic that settles in when I’ve got too fast. But I do love skiing so I do it anyhow. And that’s a thing I’m slightly proud of.
Today I wanted to used the beautiful winter day to do something with skiing. I take the car to the neighbouring island Kvaløya with two destinations in mind: Kattfjordvatnet or Finnviksdalen/Krabbelvdalen. On the bridge to Kvaløya I make up my decision: Finnviksdalen/Krabbelvdalen. More possibilities. So I turn right.
At 10 o’clock I start my tour from the car park by the road 863 and head in the usual direction. Well, that didn’t work, the mountain stream is open. So let’s take the bridge by the car park. That works. I have to cross another mountain river but that is easier, since it is covered with ice floes easy to cross.
I realise, that I already have made up my mind: Going up the mountains to Kraknesaksla (335 m) or to the Jerremaš (467 m). It’s the mountains massif behind these trees:
I check the avalanche situation in the Varsom app. Looks good! So I continue the tour although I am surprisingly bad prepared: I have forgotten the sun blocker and something to drink. The sun has come out and I use my anorak hood to protect against the radiation although it is a bit too warm. And water I can drink from the next stream, although I do not get a lot using only one hand for scooping.
The terrain descends a bit, I cross a ski trail. Then it ascends and I am skiing uphills. Mostly I zigzag because I do not have climbing skins with me either. That is working better than excepted. When I look down behind me I get a bit nervous. Every metre I climb up I’ll have to ski downhills later. Did I mention, that I am a lousy skier? I think so.
But I feel always so rewarded when I am above the timberline leaving all trees below.
I pass the small cabins by the two small lakes whose name I do not know …
… and head to the mountain top Kraknesaksla. Since I have been above the timberline I have beautiful views on the sounds east of Kvaløya. First Sandnessundet, then Kvalsundet. That’s so fascinating, this together of sea and mountains. Down there – the island Tromsøya where I have my “work home”.
At the cairn on the summit of Kraknesaksla I have to put of my skis. Too icy and too many rocks. But what a view!
I continue my tour. For a while I can see the Kvalsundet, …
… then I leave the eastern slope behind and head to the next mountain. While I have been alone for a while I now can see some other skiers in the distance. The weather is constantly changing and so the light. Sometimes it is cloudy that the snow is without any contrast at all. That makes it impossible to tell if the ground slopes up or down. And then, minutes later, the sun comes out, the sky is blue and I can “read” the snow again.
I reach the top of the Jerremaš (also called Austeråsfjellet) but here I’m not alone. Three skiers are sitting by the cairn enjoying the sun. So – no photo here. Anyhow I’ve got quite thirsty again and decide now to take a break. Now comes the part where I have to ski down and it wouldn’t have been so hard because the slope is not so steep and there is plenty of space. However more clouds have been gathering and it even started snowing a bit. Visual terrain information: not available. Colours neither.
Hmm, I don’t like skiing downhills in these weather conditions. When I finally reach the first sparse birch forests I am relieved, because now I can estimate how steep the slope is. Slowly I continue skiing down, passing another stream that is mostly snowed over.
After more zigzagging down I reach Finnviksdalen, the other valley. This looks pretty different from Krabbelvdalen because of the prepared cross-country ski trails. There are also more people around. From now on it is a bit more about skiing and less about taking photos. The last ones I make show the trail and the hexagonal cabin where skiers use to take breaks.
I however am very thirsty and quite exhausted and so I continue to the car park where a bottle of water awaits me. 17.5 km skiing and – according to the Runners app – 603 metres in altitude later todays skiing has ended. As always: I’ve never regretted being outside and this was another example of having a great day.
The following events: buying sushi and a coke · driving home · eating · taking a hot shower · taking a nap · being pretty lazy · talking to Annika on the phone · editing today’s photos · writing this blog article.
These are no black-and-white photos. It is normal colour photos in a wintry landscape of black and white. When it is as cloudy as on Annika’s and my ski tour on Friday and Saturday, then the bright colours seem to have vanished from the landscape. The snow seems to be white, the clouds seems to grey, the rocky mountain parts to be black and so do the many birch trees. But if you look closer, you see that snow hardly ever is of pure white. Here, it might have a green shade; over there, a blue tint; and in an hour, a hue of purple.
And suddenly it looks wintry again in Tromsø. About 30 cm of snow fell in the last two days. Yesterday I walked home from work, today I took the skies.
It is so much fun to ski through the wintry forests on the top of the island Tromsøya even when the snow is as warm and sticky as today.
This article is part of the series “2025-02: Finnmark”.
After the gorgeous cross-country ski tour in Saariselkä yesterday Annika and I want to use our backcountry skis today. We take the car a bit south to a place called Kiilopää. Here there are not only cross-country ski trails but also “Nature skiing tracks” suitable for backcountry skiing (though you do not need any prepared track at all for this type of skis). We follow the cross-country ski trail a bit and then turn left, where a path marked with blue crosses leads through the forest.
Slowly we gain altitude and the forest becomes less dense.
You can see the almost barren, rounded mountain peaks of the Lappish tunturi. Twice I take a detour to take some pictures of the solitary snow covered trees.
We reach the mountain shelter Niilanpää and we are not alone. Small and larger groups of skiers, many of them with pulka sleds are on the track, around or in the hut.
Since the small shelter hut is occupied we continue our tour, that now slowly descends to the forest again.
This ski tour was a recommendation of our friends C. and M., who know this region well. As they supposed we use a shortcut through the forest. This old forest is beautiful. It is not very dense but has a lot of beautiful, large trees that make the forest a nature exhibition. After round 1.5 km we reach another cross-country skiing trail where we turn left to reach the shelter and grill place Sivakkaoja.
We could grill sausages, everything is there, but we decide to only take a short break and then finish our ski tour. One of the reasons: at the parking place there is also a hotel with a café that serves sweet pastries :-) .
We follow the prepared trail eastwards. The grooves made for cross-country skis are too small for our broader skis so we use the skating track (without skating) in the middle. After some kilometres through the forest we are back at our starting point again. Distance today 12.8 km. Time for a pastry and something to drink!
I’ve never been in the region of Saariselkä before and really like it. The nature is beautiful, it is not too crowded and there are many possibilities for different types of winter sports. Today – the day after this tour – we will leave Saariselkä, but I can imagine that it was not the last time being here.
Today we take the car to Kuuriuru, Finland. Tomorrow we plan to continue to Råneå in Sweden. From there it is “only” another 300 km to our home in Obbola in Sweden.
After quite some travelling in the last weeks I finally arrived in Obbola, Sweden, my “home home” yesterday night. Today it started snowing a bit and I wanted to go outside to take a break from home office.
I went to the coast by our house where parts of the bay were frozen.
I haven’t been running for four weeks, so let’s go …
I put on my running shoes from Icebug. They have so many spikes that you can run on bare ice. I start on the doorstep and turn to take the trail called Spåret. This will give me a lap of round 5 km. But it was not so easy as expected. A lot of trees lay across the trail. A reminder of the storm three weeks ago.
I can go round these obstacles but soon give up running for another reason. Some parts of Spåret are bare ice but the thin layer of fresh snow glues itself to the soles of my running shoes making the spikes useless. After I slid several times I decide to stop running and go home. Total running distance: 0.78 km :-D
When running does not work, let’s go …
This takes a bit more preparation. But finally I have found the paddle and the waterproof bag for the mobile phone and am dressed in my survival suit – Teletubbie style.
I drag the kayak to the shore and then through the shallow water. Slushy ice is swimming on the sea surface. To my surprise another layer of ice is grounded.
Then I walk on the ice. Will it hold or break? I don’t know yet, but I do know, the water is shallow here.
The ice holds. When the icy layer gets thinner and softer I enter the kayak. Sometimes I use my hands to push myself forward, sometimes ice claws, sometimes the paddle. Anyhow it seems to take ages until I finally reach the open sea.
To my surprise I meet two other kayakers. That have never happened to my here before. They found a better place to set in their kayaks. Will winter paddling get popular here?
Anyhow, I haven’t planned a longer kayak tour and so I only round the small islet Lillskär and then head back to shore. First there are soft ice floes that I can paddle through.
Then I reach some fast ice. It is too thick for paddling and too thin to bear the weight of the kayak with me inside. I exit the kayak and “walk” it while breaking the ice with my knees. The ice gets thicker and I can kneel on it without breaking through. Now I crawl on my knees for a while until I can finally stand up and drag the kayak ashore. On the photo you can see the different stages.
Finally I’m ashore again. Total paddling distance: 0.91 km. :-D :-D
But it was fun!
After a period of warmer weather it got colder the weekend and on Monday, 28 October it started to snow. After work I took the bus to the lake Prestvannet and walked home. Some snow showers passed through making the landscape brighter. Most small paths are still wet and some are pretty muddy but apart from that it looked so nice with the first cm of snow.
The next day more snow came at temperatures round zero. After work I walked back pretty the same route (there are zillions of small paths leading through the hilly forests and over some overgrown bogs.) New snow depth: 6–7 cm. That makes a difference, at least visually.
Yesterday I took the bus home, today I walked again. It is 31 October, the last day of the month. The temperature is slightly below freezing and the now snow is fluffy. New snow depth: 15 cm. As the days before I pass the lake Prestvannet that starts freezing over at the edges. It is fun to plunge through the snow but as long as I leave the main tracks – and I do – I’m still glad about my rubber boots because under the clean white blanket of snow there are the same mud puddles as three days before. On the broader gravel paths however the first people have started using their skis.
Fun fact: the photos #2, #7, and #15 show the same motive. From open swampy water to frozen and snowed over in three days.
#routinedetox
Are you a photographer? Do you know the feeling that you are stuck taking the same pics again and again? Without evolving? I know it for sure. So I decided to do a bit of “photo routine detox” here and there. This is the first detox session, shot on 20 October this year.
This session’s rules:
These are the results.
