19:40 Abisko Tourist Station
Clean, warm and cozy – my feelings this evening comprised into three words.
Woke up in a soaked tent, had a lazy morning hanging out at the cabin in Abiskojaure and getting an interview done with one of the cabin hosts.
The 14km to Abisko are a really easy hike and the weather was hugely better than the last days, almost to the point where I regretted heading for the mountain station.
Yet the prospect of checking in a backpack containing wet equipment and dealing with the stuff back home was motivating enough to finish the tour today.
Arriving in Abisko I got the last available room in the hotel part and could get all my stuff dried out inside the facility. Ignoring the eminent restaurant I dined on my last portion of dehydrated ground beef for this tour, enjoying the comfort of doing my dishes in hot water from a faucet.
Looking back at the tour of 2017, it has definitely been one of the best ever, though the weather has been way worse than most years.
From a subjective point of view, the ketogenic way of fueling has been absolutely outstanding for comfort and performance and, regardless of test results, this is the way I fuel my hikes (and, frankly, most of my future life).
The abundance of energy, mental clarity and resilience combined with wonderful sleep and lack of hunger during the day makes it an ideal fit for me and I cannot recommend enough that You try it out.
Let me just end this with a huge shout out for my sponsors, Ketonix and Nourish Balance Thrive, I’m incredibly grateful for the support and there’re no words to endorse their products enough.
I definitely continue to use them!
That’s it for this tour, I hope You enjoyed tagging along just as much as I enjoyed completing it.
Stay tuned for a few shorter tour suggestions building on my hike, as I want to make the area accessible to more people.
And remember, Lapland is still here next year and I´ll be back!
Planning to lead a small group of people through some beautiful nature on week 1 so let me know if You’re interested. More on this later!
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Peace // Claes
Again I met some really nice people and enjoyed a pleasant afternoon and evening, it felt great to arrive early and I even got an extra meal in today to refuel a little extra before the last few days of my tour.
Met some people on the trail who treated me to some really nice salami (I think it was Italian), and this was the only piece of food I ate between breakfast and the dinner later.
Right now it’s again too rainy to go out and make a video for you, so I hope I can do my ‘Day 24 video’ tomorrow morning. The clouds quickly squeeze away the last daylight from around here.
I got started just after 10 this morning, for the first time with a rather moist tent in my backpack. The 10km down to Hukejaure were as easy and smooth as anything can be up here, wind still rough and cold and a few pretty decent rain showers hitting me on the way.
After coffee and a chat with the cabin host I started taking care of my equipment, wet rain gear got hung up to dry, socks and underwear washed and shoes cleaned and dried. Then some wood chopping and water hauling for the sauna before I fired it up and spent well over an hour just relaxing in the heat. Wow, was that good after literally being cold for two days and nights!
Olle, the cabin host had gone fishing and was successful, bringing home a huge trout. Having half of it himself left the other half to be shared between myself and two other guests at the cabin. Around 100g of super fresh trout file fried in ghee became an awesome starter for my dinner!
Not much more to report from this day, it’s a tired and very content hiker sitting here in his tent ready for a good night’s sleep. Air is pretty warm and it is quite, no wind shaking the tent and no splashing from raindrops falling. There’s been a few nights since I had an equally peaceful evening!
What a wonderful morning, I woke up after 9 hours in the sleeping bag by the sun warming my tent. The night has been rather chilly and my breath has left some condensation on the outer tarp that is now drying of in the sun and light wind.
I got going just about 10am and the first 8km to Kaitumjaure cabin were done with in little over two hours. Kungsleden is not that inspiring to hike as it is very eroded, yet it is fast and the surroundings are really beautiful!
At the cabin I didn’t get much information about the area I was looking to hike, I did get another interview for ‘
Turns out that just about a km from the cabin I find a trail leading west up to the summit of Sanarcohkka. So I followed that trail until I was well clear of the tree line before turning northward and returning to follow reindeer tracks.
The wind that kept my camp free from mosquitoes last night and this morning increased steadily throughout the day. Coming from northwest and being rather chilly it made this day feel a lot more like early fall than late summer. Also I saw some yellow leaves on the birches already so it seems Lappland got a quite short summer this year.
What a beautiful morning! I’m sitting in my tent with the abside open on the leeward side, facing the sun. The rather chilly wind from behind drives away most mosquitoes except for the very bravest, and the sun gives a nice warmth to the morning hours!
Plan for today is to go all the way to Saltoluokta as the weather could hardly be better and I’ll get an early start.
I have to admit that the first hour or so was a struggle… Lots of vegetation, wetlands and pools of standing water to be avoided and really no straight line to follow despite my efforts of aiming at the high point. In these situations it always feels like the forward progress is frustratingly slow and it becomes a mental game besides the physical struggle with the uneven ground and getting hooked up in the vegetation all the time.
The rest of the hike to the eastern end of Bietsavvre was pure joy, mixing grassland with rocks and some occasional bushes that I’ve got increasingly better at avoiding!
Unfortunately the cafe in the Sami village was closed and so I continued almost immediately along the trail down to Saltoluokta. The six km trail was super easy to follow and after a slight uphill slope merely downhill, after just under an hour I reached the fjällstation and checked in for a camp site. Sara at the reception was kind enough to help with recharging my Ketonix battery and the power bank over night, turns out she’s been following LCHF earlier and got of it during guide training.
Another day starting with rain, it began pouring down again sometimes during the night and continues throughout the morning with short breaks in between the showers.
Hiking through the valley following the lake was easy and none of the rivers required a change of shoes crossing. Soon the ascent towards the ridge started and half way up I decided to go far west instead of the shortest route up. It was just an idea I acted on, and what a view i got, both of the valley i just hiked through and the area lying in front of me. Marvelous, just marvelous!
one more river without getting my feet wet, where I once again met Carl and Fredrik.
The evening turned out beautiful also weather wise, with only a few drops of rain coming down and the sky looking rather clear for now. Let’s see what tomorrow has to deliver!
Almost like a clockwork I now sleep for six full sleep cycles per night and wake up rested after around nine hours. It’s just amazing and I really hope to get used enough to this rythm that I can keep it up once home again.
started and the slowly motor on in the direction of Sarek.
Anyway, all in all it has been another amazing day up here and I had a lot of time to contemplate life in general and some things specifically. It’s just amazing how simple life can be when we’re close to nature and far from the (so called) civilized world. When I’m fed, warm and dry I really don’t have much need for anything else out here. So how come I ‘need’ all that stuff back home to consider myself happy? I don’t know for sure, yet my best guess is habits. And habits can be changed by will!
As I got to bed a little later than usual I slept till around 07:30, waking up rested and feeling great. Soon thereafter I heard the first helicopter fly in over my tent and realized that I could very well could have had my sleep disturbed by civilization even in this remote area.
blue sky and a slight breeze blowing just enough to keep mosquitoes down most of the time.
The trail I chose to start by ascends from behind the ‘Kyrkokåta’ and leads up the hill. Though unmarked, its very easy to find and follow and soon leads through a birch forest you definitely don’t want to fight your way through outside of the trail.
Passing the lakes on the plain before ascending for the last part of today’s hike, I found a beautiful, sunny spot, with wind, where I had a decent break. This time I tried PF mixed in cold water, which worked great, and I didn’t feel any adverse effect in my belly like after the nuts yesterday. So, from now on I’ll add the nuts to my fat coffee in the morning and up the fat intake that way. Then I can stick to PF during the midday break and boast energy without getting slowed down.
At some point after my map was printed someone set up a reindeer fence in the valley and I had to follow it for some time before I found a part that was slightly folded and I could get through without causing damage.