Live from the Arctic Circle...
By Christer Lampinen on 12/24
re: 'We are now using the new website'.
Entries from our many visits to and around Sweden.
Kalle just installed a webcam at the Arctic Circle in preparation for Walpurgis Night, a holiday celebrated on April 30 where people light huge bonfires.
The camera faces North toward the center of Juoksengi and will be left up after the celebration. Now everyone can see for themselves how long (and short) the days are way up north!
Today while driving to Luleå, I spotted a guy standing at the edge of an opening on a frozen lake, fishing! Naturally I had to pull over and take a photo.
That is when I noticed that the swans had returned. There were several standing along the edge of the ice and others floating around in the water.
As I stood there two of the swans began to flap their wings and prepare to fly away. I was able to capture them running across the water and taking off. Then they turned toward me and made a beautiful pass. The sun behind me lit up their wings against a fantastic blue sky.
Today Kicki and I entered two ice fishing contests out on the Torne River in Juoksengi. The ‘Juoksenginappet’ and the ‘Polcirkelnappet’.
The day started at 11:00am down at badstranden, ‘the bathing beach’. It was a beautiful morning with a few clouds and just little wind. Two hours later it was time to weigh the fish and award prizes. Kicki and I were 0 for 1 so far, so we just watched and ate grilled korv, ‘sausage’.
After the prizes were handed out everyone took a short walk or drive down to isvägen, ‘the ice road’, literally 800 yards south for the next contest.
By now the clouds had thickened and the wind picked up considerably. If you hadn’t guessed, that means it was COLD!
Well Kicki and I stuck it out for another two hours, along with many others, but again we came up short. Really short. we were 0 for 2 for the day, and really cold. There was another weigh in and prizes were handed out.
It was fun to see everyone from the village out enjoying the bright spring day, even if it did end a little cold and gloomy. In fact, as I write this at 9:00 pm, it is just getting dark and beginning to snow.
Well we finally went to Pullinki to play in the snow.
Pullinki Ski is the closest, (um… only) ski area close to us. It’s less than 10 minutes north of Juoksengi, in Svanstein.
Our friend Victoria and her son Jordan just moved back to Sweden from New York, so before they headed down to Stockholm to live, we all went to Pullinki for the day.
The weather was perfect. The sky was beautiful. The sun was nice and high with few clouds and no wind at all. The kids had a great time too, well… most of the time.
