Gamla Stan (old town), Stockholm. Cobble stone streets, narrow winding alleyways, brightly colored buildings, tourists, and street cafes; the old town of Stockholm fits the ideal of a classic European city and is a wonderful place to wander around, day or night.
last light at Unstad, Lofoten islands, Norway.
Typical weather during my 10 days on the Kungsleden trail. View from near Tjaektja hut, looking north up the Alisvaggi towards Alesjaure.
The landscape is totally amazing and beautiful, despite the weather. Barren rugged mountains with rivers and waterfalls everywhere. Most of the northern section of the trail is above the tree line.
(working on some small netbook, so not too sure about the color. Hope its not too bad.)
Arrived in Stockholm on the 15th of September and then flew north to Kiruna the and onward to Abisko the next day. Spent 10 days of mostly rain and snow hiking the northern section of the Kungsleden trail – too late in season to complete whole trail, have to wait until next time. Next headed to Stamsund in the Lofoten Islands, Norway for a couple weeks of hanging out before heading down the Norwegian coast to Trondheim and across into Sweden. Walked nearly 20km down a snowy road trying to hitchhike, but it didn’t go so well. Finally caught a short ride in the late afternoon and ended up camping in the forest on the edge of some town. temps dropped to maybe minus 10-12 at night, not so fun in my 0 degree sleeping bag; got up at 6am and thawed out in the train station waiting room for a few hours. Next spent a few days wandering the streets of Stockholm before flying to London and taking trains and buses to my current location: Hay-on-Wye, Wales – the “town of books.”
Raining today, so getting some needed computer work done…
My New Website is finished. let me know if you run into any problems or something looks funny for some reason…
The last week has been busy, busy, busy trying to get everything organized. Been working on a long overdue website update, should be online tomorrow (fingers crossed). And for the bigger plans, I’m heading back to Europe until Jan next year.
Monday I fly to Stockholm then travel the next day up to Abisko (up in the arctic circle) to hike the Kungsleden trail – 270 miles/440km. Should be an adventure this late in the year. Hope I don’t get caught out in a bad snowstorm – the temps are barely holding about above freezing during the night at this point. Should take me about 3 weeks or so, depending on if I make any side excursions to climb some mountains or not.
In lake October I’ll catch a flight from Stockholm over to the UK. First stop will be Wales and then up to Scotland for a couple months (not the best time of the year, but at least there are no midges in Nov/Dec). Towards the end of December I’ll fly to Norway and up to the Lofoten Islands to experience the ‘polar night.’ Then at the end of Jan and after many days of cold, back to sunny California.
The Blog here will probably be on the quite side for a while, but I’ll try and put in a word or post a quick pic when I can.
Lake Crescent, Washington.
I had been up long before sunrise, photographing out on the coast. As the sky lightened into another typical gray morning I noticed a faint bit of coloring which I thought a bit odd. I didn’t make much note of it the time but as soon as I came across this sight, it popped back into my mind as I recognized that it had been smoke. Only one thing turns the sun that color in the middle of the day. Not sure where the fire was, but there were numerous fires in the area at the time.
Rialto Beach, Olympic national park, Washington.
Netarts Bay and Cape Lookout state park, Oregon
Heavy, drizzly clouds around 6am on the second morning of the trip. Was amazingly quiet, only a few birds screeching in the distance.
Long Beach, Vancouver Island, British Columbia.
Probably the only interesting clouds of the whole trip. Last day on Vancouver Islands while heading back to catch a ferry to the mainland. Just happed to stop by the beach to check things out and it looked pretty cool. Brutal contrast though, with the sun in and out of the clouds. And windy.
Kungsleden Trail Hiking Guide