It’s fantastic, we have now officially got a Facebook computer magazine in Sweden and further more it was almost sold out here in Skutskär where I noticed it.
I feel almost violated. Yes, of course we have photoshop magazines, Linux magazines, PC magazines, Mac magazines and so on but Facebook!
Come on guys.
I love mountain hiking but I have not had much time to do it in the last few years so when I heard from a friend in Walesthat is also keen on climbing and mountaneering I thought that it would be brilliant to go hiking in one of the most beautiful places I know.
Now the Sälen Highlands is not a very remote place, actually it is smack in the middle of one of the most touristy parts in Sweden (for outdoorsy tourism that is) and therefore all the trails are well marked and some are even properly paved with blacktop to minimise the wear on the sensitive terrain. But even so, the last time I was there it was breath taking beautiful and the trip is just a long trip of nicely shifting landscape.
I am therefore planning a nice and not to strenous trip where slow walking, stopping to admire the view or taking a photograph or even just sitting in the sun is well planned. And of course, after setting camp it would be very much possible to go on a night hike to one of the peaks, I have planned this for day 2.
All days have been divided into two stages of about 2-3 hours of walking, suitable between breakfast and lunch or lunch to dinner. But I think we will actually make good time the first stages so there will definitely be time to get the binoculars out and view the surroundings.
Expect altitude cooking about 1 km MSL which should not really have that much impact on the cooking temperature. Water boils at 96°C at this altitude.
We are starting on the south end and walking north the first day, then west the second day and north again the third day. We are passing the following peaks:
Not all peaks are climed to the top, but these are: Köarkarsfjället, Källfjället and optionally Stor-Närfjället.
Day 1: Högfjällshotellet to Källfjället summer farms
| Distance | 8 km | Altitude variation | +230/-205 |
| Highest | 892 m | Lowest | 736 m |
| Peaks to climb | 2 | Difficulty | Easy |
The entrance is well marked with a portal and information sign about Kungsleden (the King’s trail). It starts here and ends up in Abiso in Lapland, a thousand kilometers from this place… it is a grand trail and not a lot of people have walked the whole thing.
We start by walking the well paved road up the Köarskarlsfjället (grouse mountain) 1.5 km where we will pause and perhaps make tea and coffee and admire the view. Best view is to the east and to the North. After that there is a descent towards Östfjällsdalen (east mountain valley) and the Östfjällstjärn (East mountain tarn) where there is a hut that can shield us from wind and rain if necessary. This is a good place for lunch and a good place to refill water for the second stage.
The second stage starts by taking us west 1 km through a more wet area and then takes us through a birch forest up again on the peak of Källfjället 900 meters above sea. Again if not too windy a good place for a snack and a beverage before descending down to the old Källfjället summer farm. A number of scattered old houses here. We will set up camp here likely tent is the best option, the hut open for wanderers can be a bit crowded this time of year.
Day 2: Källfjället summer farms to Närfjällstugan
| Distance | 10 km | Altitude variation | +300/-170 |
| Highest | 890 m | Lowest | 663 m |
| Peaks to climb | 2 | Difficulty | Medium |
First stage is going through Synddalen (sin valley), crossing Syndalsån (the sin valley river) on a small bridge. The river sinks down in a large ravine called Lördagsgraven (the saturday grave) but we are taking the other route, preparing to ascend the Syndalskläppen mountain. Just before the ascent is a wind shelter which could work for lunching in, but if we want to lunch out we can give it another hour and ascend to the top of the mountain before doing lunch. I say it depends on the weather. Some spectacular views from the top is guaranteed if it is not too cloudy.
Second stage is a descent again into the next valley called Lägerdalen (Camp valley) but we will not set up camp here but walk through the valley and then ascend about 100 m or half-way up the Stor-Närfjället. Here is another hut and a good place to make camp. Plenty of water both in the valleys and in on the mountain here.
After setting camp in a suitable spot we might want to do some evening hiking shedding the backpacks and just get straight up to the peak. It is about 1,5 km so it is not that far.
Day 3: Närfjällsstugan to Görälvstugan
| Distance | 9 km | Altitude variation | +100/-400 |
| Highest | 885 m | Lowest | 410 m |
| Peaks to climb | 0 | Difficulty | Medium |
Fiurst a small ascent but we will miss the peak of Granfjället (Spruce tree mountain) mountain and just pass by on the east side. Then we will follow the ridge to the north and start the descent down to Granfjällsätern where there is a nice hut we can stop for lunch. This is probably one of the most beautiful parts nature wise.
Second stage after lunch is passing through the forest until we meet and cross Görälven river. There is a place we can stay there as well waiting to be picked up.
Use terrain or satellite image for more details.
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We have just bought the full season one of prison break. So we have our midsummer celebration ready, and I am also planning a 3 day hike in the Sälen highlands together with friends coming over from the UK. So nothing really fancy here actually :)
Went running again again at Järvafältet. One of my harder runs for a while actually, it was raining and I was not sure how to dress properly. I mean, I know what to do generally, if you are hiking you use an outer shell, a warm sweater and a moisture transport inner layer that keeps you dry but when you go running or do other high pulse activity the outer shell rather acts like a plastic bag, meaning that even if the rain does not soak you, your own sweat will in an hours time or so.
Gore-Tex or similar functional garments don’t have the capacity to transport enough water vapor, especially not when it is raining on them and so it seems that wool is the way to go. Keeps you warm even when it is wet. Functional t-shirts and fleece sweathers would also work, especially microfleece, they transport loads of moisture but keep you warm even if they are soaking wet.
And then there is the wind. Someting more tightly wowen in wool would probably be best as a middle layer. So a functional tee, a wool warm layer and a microfleece sweather, together would probably be a better combination than what I was wearing today.
I had just a runner’s jacket and trousers, a functional tee. Socks and underwear as usual in cotton.
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Above you can see the route I was running today.
More info on the run here.
There is actually a lot of Swedish people who could not answer straightly why we celebrate the national day. Face it, we aren’t the most nationalistic people, we are getting more multiculturalistic every day — which I think is a good thing done properly — and it is also the day of the Swedish flag. We have not have war in a century, we have never really been occupied in modern times, except the Danish who we warred with for a long time ago and they never really occupied the whole country.
Until 2005 we actually did not have a proper national day. We had the day of the Swedish flag. However a proposition was made and put in front of the government stating that many people who came to Sweden found it strange we did not have a national day and so it was made into a national day, a national bank holiday, remains the day of the Swedish flag as well.
To give it a proper holiday the Swedish unions and the merchant associations sat down to discuss how to make it without losing too much money on it. It was not possible to create a new holiday said the merchant associations and so a trade was proposed, changing the Whitmonday into an ordinary day and instead making the 6th of June a proper bank holiday, which it wasn’t before.
The day has been called the ”Gustaf Vasa day” when Gustav Vasa was elected king of Sweden and the Kalmar union finally ceased and Sweden became a sovereign state. This was 6 june 1523. The Kalmar Union was a union between the kingdoms of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, established in 1397. It allso encompassed Finland (part of Sweden at the time), Greenland, Faroe Islands, the Orkney islands and the Shetlands. After Sweden left the Union Denmark and Norway remained until 1536 when it was finally dissolved. The union was formed in Kalmar in Sweden and thus the name.
The connection with the day is fairly loose. Most Swedes enjoy it as a day off mainly, it’s not celebrated by far as much as the norwegians do on their 17th of May. I have never been very nationalistic so I am not very bothered about this.
I am fascinated by the recent advances in the science of the taste buds that we all have. Compared with our smelling sense the taste sense is very different apparently (but they do work togheter to create the experience we call taste when eating, anyone eathing whilsh having their nose congested on the common cold knows this well).
But scientists are very interested in the pure form of taste. So far they have defined the following types of taste buds: bitter, sour, sweet, salt and umami. Umami is something that people like me did not learn about in kindergarten it’s been added later on and is interesting that as recently as this we are discovering a whole new set of tastebuds.
Umami is found in meat, mushrooms, strong cheese and monosodium glutamate (MSG) which is the pure form really. All these are connected to certan genes in our genome to be expressed as alleleles and there are variations amongst the population. There is one gene that controls the sweet tastebuds, one for the salt receptors, one for umami, one for sour and a whopping 30 genes for the bitter taste buds.
The reason for this is that bitterness has in our evolution been a strong signal for unedible plants. We are wandering people and when finding new types of plants the bitterness signals has served us well in telling the edible from the unedible plant life. Over the long term humans developed more and more genes adding to the sophistication of the sense of bitterness helping us cope with what was found when spreading out of Africa.
However it is not failsafe, there are things you can’t eat that will not signal bitterness and since most modern people readily confuse sour and bitter taste it will be difficult to just suddenly start trusting it again. Our food is also much more spicy and complex today compared to what we have eaten before which makes it probably harder for the receptors to help us.
Compare with the sense of smell, we have about 300 genes active for receptors of various smells, and we got about 700 dormant ones. Dogs and cats have many more still active, we have lost them, perhaps because taste is more effective than smell when it comes from differentiating between the edible and the not edible.
Scientists are also investigating if there are certain taste buds dedicated for recognising fatty acids or lipids and possbily metal as well. They have not found conclusive evidence yet but its very exciting. It is not too far-fetched to reason why we have the senses we have when it comes to taste:
There are also other receptors on the tongue which is not all about taste, for example we have a receptor that activates if the food we put in is above 43°C and tells us it is very hot — with about a 7°C margin before we actually do scold ourselves. Another different receptor is activated when the food is colder than 26°C, not certain what this does yet the studies continues.
Certain chemical substances are activating the hotness receptor also, it reacts for ecsample to capsaicin, the well known substance of chili peppers, and the mind reacts as if the food is actually hot even though it isn’t. Contrariwise the receptor for cold food is activated by menthol. So it is definitely no coincidence that we think of menthol as cool and chili as hot.
And there is a strange receptor that is activated by certain tastes that we experience as sharp, such as horse radish, garlic and brussel sprouts. In humans there is no connection between this receptor and temperature, but in snakes this receptor is activated by infrared heat higher than 26°C. This maybe serves as a possible way of avoiding bushfires long before they can be felt by other means.
Several of these receptors ties into our pain system and we humans we like to tickle those a little now and then, it makes things interesting and therefore we continue to invent interesting dishes in the kitchen, eat chili, garlic and so on.
One thing I have thought about is that the possible alleles (variances in the genome) for the genes expressing these functions in our body is also a reason for that some people does not like certain food stuffs while others are crazy about them. For example if you have a weak umami receptor perhaps you are not so crazy about a bloody steak?
Can you tell I am somewhat fascinated by this subject?
Names to goole are
Went to the beach today, to Ängsjö, a really nice place about 5 km north of where I live. I sometimes run there and then finish off with a bath and then run back home again but not today.
It was however cold in the water, barely 13 C and it was not something you wanted to stay in for an extended time. In fact it felt a bit like ice was still on the lake…
The picture is from this winter when I went on a photo trip to Ängsjö. I realized I did not have any summer pictures so I will have to remedy that next time I go.
Usually the water temperature is fine this time of year. But this spring has been really cold and not sunny enough, some years the temperature is fine even at the beginning of May. But it’s been a mostly miserable spring though it has had its advantages. It’s much easier to go running when the air is a little cool. Heat is a bit of a problem for me really so taking a dip in 13 degrees water is quite refreshing…
I love Swedish summer, nature and everything about it really!
I have had a break from the running for nine days but today I took myself out again and it was terrible. Can’t believe how fast you loose the hard earned condition but I also know by now it comes back rather quickly, a coupl of more runs and I should be going great again.
I had to take a break because I have this muscle in my right hip that started to act up. It has done that before and always when I increase the distance or the speed of my runs. Usually I can match it around with putting some short distance runs between the long ones but this time it did need some proper rest.
I am not certain whic muscle it is but I have been to several physicians a few years back and they agreed it was not the actual hip that was the problem but a muscle that is a wee bit too short to actuate properly when I am running. Stretchning it works a bit but in the long term strengthen it by running slow and careful is what will help.
But today I was at it again, a nice 6,5 km run in 8:15 tempo, felt really slow for some reason but it actually isn’t – not compared to my usual speed on this distance. But anyway, it’s getting better and I think I will get a 10 k run in before the end of the week again. But a slow one. And a bit of walking if necessary to calm things down.
Five of us set out on the photo walk arranged for by fotonen.se to Eldgarnsö and with cameras at the ready we got quite a few pittoresque Swedish summer pictures there. We had vary varying weather but not rain to speak of, and the landscape on this island is very interesting and varying, from naked cliffs down by the waterline to pine and spruce forest to oak and other such nice trees.
It also boasts a farm in the middle of the island and some other houses where people still live and this makes for open fields and a very nice general area.
See all photos here.
See a slideshow here.
Found this at the book store last Friday but wanted to translate it cause I thought it was just ”kawaii” :)
HOUSE RULES
– If it’s on the floor – pick it up
– If it’s out of place – put it back
– If it’s dirty – wash it
– If it’s hungry – feed it
– If it’s sad – love it