So after flying from Kiruna back to Stockholm, taking the train to uppsala, and going straight to bed, it was time to get up at 5.30, take the train back to Stockholm, and Board another flight bound for Ostersund - This time in the middle of Sweden, and towards the Norwegian Border. Our destination was Vemdalen and the 10 days which follow on from here will never have justice done to them by a humble blog, but its worth a shot. The place lies about here:
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So with a car load of freshly acquired food for the fondue feast that night and a dog resting on my shoulder slobbering consistently, we headed to what would be our home for the week or so. Myself and my partner in crime Kim, stayed at a ski lodge run by a bloke by the name Tim. And although not technically a kiwi given that he lived there for years, named his dog after footrot flats, and is good mates with half the all blacks, he more than deserves the title. So on the first night we were thrown right in with a dinner fit for a king. We shared the table with a few of the locals who were to become fellow locals to ourselves, a bloke who travels the world racing his hot air ballon (which was parked outside) and a bloke who flew in from oslo, Norway to join in the festivities. And with food that good, courtesy of Tims history of resturaunt management, it didnt matter that we couldnt understand all the swedish flying around the air cos we were far to busy eating.
The next day soon came and it was time to 'head to work', which involves taking the snowmobile 10km through the woods and up the mountain to Timmerkojan. Now by definition this mountain shack is a cafe, but we're not talking the type that you park your audi outside of, head into to order your decaff skim double moca chai latte and sit down with your laptop and your morning paper to check on your stocks. no. This is the type of cafe where you pull up on your snowmobile on a days exploration - or your cross country skis as you traverse the mountains adjacent skifields to have a hot meal prepared on gas by candle light, and the ony 'paper' in sight is the stuff found in the outhouse 200 yards away through knee deep snow; Where the only sight out the tiny blizzard beaten windows is the peaks of the distant national park, and the only sound when its quiet is the sound made by a dead mute man who's mouth has been gagged. This is the other side of Sweden.
There is of course one other way you can get to Timmerkojan, and thats if you get a lift behind Perra's Vesla. If you can picture the best bits of a tractor, a snowmobile, a tank, and a volksvagen and you have a piece of machinery you can tow skiers to the top of the piste with and pretty much drive wherever you please. Until it breaks down. So if it wasnt the snow scooter it was the vesla that was the preferred mode of transport up and down the mountain each day. If youre in need of a good dosage of manliness i suggest you find one of these things.
Then if you really want that cup of hot chocolate, and I mean really want it, then you kit your plane out with skis and fly - this was the original plan of our pal from Norway but due to weather conditions he kept the wheels on his plane (or rather, he chose another plane of his which had wheels on it) and flew to the local vemdalen airstrip, where we went with the airstrip owner to pick him up and take him home. He did however do a nice little flyby on his way back home to Norway the next day:
Then there was of course the mandatory day spent snowboarding, where I got the honour of a local lass taking me off-piste at nearby Bjonrikke. As we stood at the top of the forested mountain side she turned to me and simply said "just don't hit any trees", fairly self explanatory, before I followed her down through the woods and after a wicked ride, out into the valley bottom below. The day then got even more interesting when the board I had borrowed from a local dude conveniently died after the binding snapped. No worries, after a bit of manipulation it was good to go again, however after it happened for the third time I gave up and rode the rest of the day with one binding. Although not recomended I am living proof this is possible, and the lesson here is: be sceptial borrowing a board that hasnt been used in a season or two to aoid any surprises..
So we soon adopted the lifestyle which consised largely of snow mobiles, snowboards, the vesla, and a-grade cuisine and after going shopping at nearby ski resort for some more winter kit we were settling in rather nicely. Getting to know the locals and our way around the villiage was like forging a home away from home and with a sprinkling of kiwi influence on top one couldn't ask for better. But there is one day that I will elaborate on because its fair to say this day was a day like no other..
Like any good day, this one started out with a head-sized bowl of porrige before getting a ride on the back of the snow scooter up to the top of the hill (on these wicked purpose built sled roads with their own roadsigns and everything). Then in the morning with the scooter at our disposal and a wilderness to explore we went for a bit of a wee ride. I had been asked by a local bloke who runs a website to take some photos of the area to put up on the internet, so we headed up to the highest point around to get some shots over looking the mountains and the national park. I then checked my GPS to see the altitude of where I stood and it read 998m - I mean c'mon what do you call that? I just want another 2 metres! Not to worry - 5 yards away stood a 2 metre high cairn pointing majestically up into the sky, as if placed by the hand of fate itself. So naturally I scaled the pile of rocks (that marks the highest point in the range) and triumphantly held my GPS out with the determination and steadfastness of a Sir Edmund Hillary, as it read 1000m. Now, I was content.
So time for the next challenge. Our local man who runs snow kiting lessons at Timmerkojan thought it would be a grand idea on this day to get out the parasail to give it a crack. Firstly the vesla (tractor/tank) was used to flatten a bit of a track for the snow mobile, because with fresh snow overnight it would simply sink into the powder otherwise (much like what happened when one tried to walk anywhere - no you really didnt want gto be in a hurry with snow this deep). We then tied the parasail to the back of the sled and did a round of paper scissors rock to see which one of us lads would go first. Luckily I drew second - and I say luckily because none of us had actually been pulled by a sled on a parasail before and didn't even know how to hold the harness up, let alone how to steer away from the side of the mountain and to keep the sled below from flipping. So with a guinea pig in a fit of nervous gestures ready and the rest of us untangling the lines so that it looked "she'll be right" enough, it was party time. Ill let the photos do the talking from here.
What a sweet day. But it wasn't enough becasue that was just the day, what about the night? Well one day when he was a bit bored, our man Tim built an igloo. As you do. Complete with a glass window, letterbox with a newspaper, a chimney with no fire, a TV antenna, and some flowers out the front. Then snowed in one day he thought it would be cool to dig a 12 meter tunnel going into this igloo. Of course there's no power for miles to run a TV so the obvious solution he decided was to put a battery powered blue flashing light on the inside to fool any passerbyers that we were inside watching TV. The only slight flaw in the plan of course being that on a mountain in the middle of nowehere at night one doesn't really get 'passerbyers'. But like I say, only a slight flaw.
So we headed down the hill, packed the sled with a couple of sleeping bags, a thermos, all the clothes that we owned (and some we didn't) and a guitar, and headed back up to the igloo as the sun cast its last effort of light across the snow covered landscape. And then we were alone. With not even the winds subtle cry as company it was just Kim, Myself, and an igloo. The first step, as you all Im sure know from igloo sleepingg class, was to carpet the inside with reindeer skins - as many as I could haul through the snow tunnel. The snow tunnel which got narrower and narrower as it went along, so you naturally lost at least one boot and one pant leg before you reached the end. The next step, after you put on every piece of clothing you can fit (this by the way was excellent practice for those times you over pack your luggage and have to wear everything on the plane so you're not over the luggage weight limit), is to carpet yourself with reindeer skins. And then you're good to go. Of course with the air getting to -20 degrees I leanrt these steps don't keep you warm, but they keep you alive so thats good enough for me. And thats good enough to say I would definately do it again. We were the first people to actually sleep in this igloo and after Tim did a bit of reseacrh we also learned we were the first people in Vemdalen to have ever slept in an igloo so it made it just that much more worth it haha.
With one of the locals birthdays during our last few days and feeling somewhagt patriotic, kim and I thought it would be the decent thing to do to make a pavlova birthday cake for our pal Greggir. I won't say here what actually happened to our pav during the cooking process, but we'll just say that what you see here is a 'pavalova extra'. And it tasted good (in the end) so thats all that matters surely.. So our second to last night was spent chillin with the locals and eating 'pavlova extra' out of tupaware containers and champagne flutes as there was a slight shortage of bowls in the flat.
The very last night however, was spent with the same style we arrived here into - a banquet of fondue, this time up the mountain where we had forged a new, albeit temporary home. And as for the rest of the experience, like blasting through the woods at night on a snowmobile having absolutely no idea of where you are except ''really close to that tree there'', there's only one way to describe it: rather than reading a page on the internet, go and do it.
Thanks Tim and Flippin for the amazing hospitality; the scooter, the goretex, the translations, the stories aboutthe all blacks we don't hear about, the works . Cheers Kim you're just a legend. And thanks Malin, Perra, Greggir, Raggi, and all you other dudes for giving Kim and I a stay we'll never forget, we'll see ya in New Zealand.
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