Finland and the former USSR

After a few false starts we finally began our trip south from Muodoslompolo. I didn't mention the northern vistas much in my last post cos I was gushing about the locals we'd met. It's an extraordinary place to be. The trees have this look of malnourishment, and grow more sparsely than I'm used to seeing. The lack of light means it's a real fight for any young plant to really get a foothold, and the low angle of the sun reflects a foreign shade of green from the sporadic growth. Also the sky feels bigger. You can't see it so to speak but there's this feeling of depth when you look upwards that you don't get elsewhere. Perhaps the sky actually is bigger because it's being viewed from the flatter part of our elliptical sphere shaped earth, I don't really know. Any way, we took Oliver's advice and headed towards a town called Roveniemi in northern Finland. Along the way we saw hundreds of Reindeer. It was hard to tell but we think they were probably Sami herds and they looked delicious. As we passed some through some low mountain ranges that are home to ski fields, I again wished we were there in winter so we could play in the snow. -20c in winter though....jebus.

Oliver told us about a really nice cafe in Roveniemi which was so awesome! The barrister made a brilliant espresso and the decor was everything Amanda would want of a cafe. Loads of retro bits and pieces, and some awesome vintage board games strewn about. None of the seats or tables matched. Just how a cafe should me. We also went to Santa's village which was pretty hilarious. The Arctic circle runs right through the middle of the car park. Santa was on smoko which was a shame, but we got to snicker at the ridiculously over priced souvenirs. We spent the next few days driving towards Helsinki, sleeping in Edward in some random roadside spots and generally gawking for reindeer and elk on the road. 

Wicked espresso and hot chocolate

Amanda playing retro pinball

Three days after leaving Muodoslompolo the fear and anxiety of being van less struck again. About thirty minutes south of Jyväskylä we stopped for lunch and I noticed a strong smell of diesel. The pump was once again gushing out fuel, but this time is was severe. I pulled it apart to check the o rings hadn't perished in the cold (they were plastic not rubber) and noticed that the thread on a bolt which attaches the pump lid was stripped. I asked in a hardware store in Joutsa if they could help at all (again, thank goodness everyone in Europe speaks English) and they suggested two possible mechanics. I randomly picked one and we drove round dumping diesel all over the road as we went. This was a long shot. Either the mechanic was a miracle worker, or we had to get rid of the van and get a plane back to the UK. The mechanic was a mint guy. He'd lived in Australia growing up so had perfect English. He wasn't like the other paint by numbers mechanics we'd been to previously and was happy to fix things rather than replace them. After fixing the broken thread he noticed that the welding done by our previous saviour Jönne, had caused the gasket on the pump lid to perish. Not ideal. There aren't many Citroens in Finland so a replacement was unlikely. But Jönne and Äke had obviously endowed us with magical powers of good luck. The mechanic's friend had just replaced the engine of his Peuegot Partner which had a very similar pump to ours. This friend was mint. He rocked up in his dirty ripped corduroy trousers, scruffy woollen jersey and unkempt grey beard and white hair. I love it when people know you can't understand them but the talk anyway. We had a great yarn. I was talking about how awesome Edward was. He was probably on about how shit Citroens are. As he talked the forgotten cigarette in the corner of his mouth dumped ash all through his beard and into my open fuel pump (which are supposed to stay 'operating theatre clean'). Anyway he showed me the pump, it was a little different but the lid would work as a complete replacement meaning the earlier spindle leak problem would be fixed as well as the lid gasket sealing properly. After giving the 'new' pump a steam clean, the mechanic showed me how to take the lid off, swap it with ours and put it all back together. Hey presto, no leaks and all for a very very reasonable €10 (but we had no cash euros so it was €13 including tax to use my card). He wouldn't charge for labour, just the cost of his mates pump (money towards fags I reckon). Not a bad deal. A replacement pump could have been more than €200. Yet another Scandinavian hero.

Roadside fuel pump leak investigation - not good apparently

So we were back on the road within a few hours of first striking trouble. Music cranked, sun shining, and a general happy-go-lucky vibe filling Edward to the brim. That evening we finally made it to Helsinki. We couch surfed there with a lovely guy named Jussi. He lives in the northern suburbs in a nice studio style apartment. Helsinki is pretty nice. Not too big but plenty going on. It didn't feel quite as touristy as Copenhagen or Stockholm, probably as it's a bit more of a mission for Western Europeans. We stayed a few days, hopping around on the reasonably priced public transport system and checking out more markets and thrift shops. We went to possibly the best vintage collectibles shop in the world. It had some seriously amazing stuff with seriously amazing and out of our league price tags. I really wanted to buy a mint condition bass melodica but €50 would have seriously have dented our budget. Helsinki has plenty of classic touristy things to do as well. The Olympic park from the 1950's looked pretty awesome but was closed for autumn, as was the kooky looking Linnanmäki theme park. We did get to take a small ferry out to an archipelago that was once a important defensive position for the city. There was a dry docked U-boat there and some awesome forts and cannons. 

Lots of expensive retro goodies

Dry docked U-Boat

After a few days larking about in Helsinki we took the ferry to Estonia. This was pretty interesting as there were so many drunk Finns heading over to grab some cheap liquor and head back again. In the lounge bar a mustachioed, skullet sporting ageing rocker was banging out the hits on acoustic guitar. He had made some terrible backing tracks for these covers and sang everything in a voice which was a cross between the douche from Creed and the douche from Incubus. Once he'd had enough we were subjected to an hour of karaoke. Finnish folk songs were murdered by techno beats and heinously drunk vocalists. After the three hour crossing we made it to the self proclaimed land of cheaper fuel prices. 

It certainly was cheaper than Finland, but Polish petrol
prices put Estonia to shame

Ferryman plays Roxanne by Andrew Straight


In Tallin we couch surfed with a great guy called Peeter. He was in his forties, so he had some pretty interesting stories of growing up in a Soviet republic. When he was 10 years old he was delivering papers for pocket money and was questioned by the KGB about some anti-soviet pamphlets that had been circulating. Scary stuff. He was awesome to stay with and showed us some great old soviet buildings around the town. In the 80's the Soviets built a giant concrete concert hall that looks more like a bunker than a place of culture. It hasn't been used for a long time and now is basically a giant canvas for street art and a garden for stray weeds. 

That big lump of concrete in the background is the concert hall

We watched the Rugby World Cup Final in an Irish bar in the town centre. What a rush!!! There were so many French guys there and I felt for them. They were hurting pretty bad at some of the calls the ref made. Again there were a few embarrassing over enthusiastic New Zealanders in the pub. It's a shame, they really put out an awful image of our country. The French guys were all patriotic and fired up, but respectful and open minded even when fifty fifty calls weren't going their way. The Kiwis however were swearing, yelling racist obscenities and generally being real dicks. At half time it was pretty tense inside but everyone was in a social mood, except the one eyed All Blacks club in the corner. One particular meat head came inside after a cigarette and had to pass through the area where the French supporters were watching the game. With a sinister smirk on his face he yelled (language disclaimer Mum), "Fuck off you fucking French pricks. You're gone. Fuck off!!!!", and casually found his way back to his seat with his proud girlfriend clinging to his arm not realising she was being used as a human shield. My blood boiled. I was dumb founded and confused. What a dick. I look back on this moment all the time and wish I had have given this guy a piece of my mind. After the game had finished, with the win tainted by this dick head's outburst, I went up to a couple of the French guys and tried to apologise for what that guy had said. They were really cool about it and brushed it off as sport induced madness. What cool guys. If someone had yelled something similar about the All Blacks I'm sure there would have been a fight in that pub. Why are there so many goons in the world?

I shaved my face for the first time since the rugby world
cup started, while we were in Tallin. This mo lasted five
minutes. When did I get a Buzz Lightyear chin?

Trying to forget the guy that had ruined what should have been a very fond memory, we took a nice (and free) walking tour of the old town and then went to a crazy thrift market. There were literally tonnes of Soviet and Nazi era souvenirs. I was really tempted to buy a Russian red cross satchel from WWll but the price was a bit hefty, and it was quite possibly fake. Amanda picked up some sweet badges with made in the USSR on the back. Tallin is a very cool city but according to Peeter it has lost some of it's charm in recent years due to a huge influx of tourists. I hope it hangs on to what it has left of its quiet and cool style and doesn't go completely down the Brugge route.

Some old prison in Tallin

Sweet Soviet badges - that dragon is eating a horse!!!

Our next stop was Tartu, about 200km south east of Tallin. Oliver had suggested we go to Tartu saying it was like Tallin's cooler and less well known younger brother. We stayed with this wicked German guy called Lars. He works at the uni in Tartu and was a blast to hang out with. He had played in several bands back in Germany and used to do band promotion and booking work. He was also right into film photography and had some awesome vintage cameras, so we all had lots to talk about. Tartu is similar in vibe to Dunedin. Out of 100,000 residents 20,000 are students. We had an awesome time walking the streets, checking out some hand craft stores and sifting through rows of early 20th century wooden cottages. Lars and his mate Jodi took us out for a few beers at some cool local pubs. We tried a local pub snack that I'll be trying to recreate back home; black bread with garlic or "praetud leivad küüslaugu-hapukoorega". So so good. We had such a good time in Tartu that we stayed an extra night and enjoyed a classic Estonian tradition; piping hot sauna!

praetud leivad küüslaugu-hapukoorega - say it really fast five times

Amanda and I bump into Lars other on our way out of town -
Check out the awesome wooden cottages in the background

Sad and bored captive bears

After exchanging music with Lars we carried on south and camped in a national park in northern Latvia. When we woke we realised the car park we were in was for a large outdoor zoo with bears, wolves, and lots of other local animals so we decided to have a look around. It felt a bit wrong seeing all these great animals in their natural habitat, but fenced in and unable to roam completely free. In saying that some of the pens were more like paddocks and howling with the wolves was pretty bloody cool. I don't know what we were talking about but they were happy to chat. Having fixed our animal addiction for a few days we started heading for Riga and went though a small village with an abandoned paper mill. While I was making myself a coffee Amanda went to check it out. When she came back we decided to investigate more and got some cool snaps. This was our first introduction to the beauty of derelict old buildings, and we soon become obsessed.

Abandoned paper mill

Impromptu trampoline in the abandoned paper mill

Soviet lunch

In Riga we couchsurfed yet again. This time with a nice couple, Arnis and Liega. They were very hospitable and had some good advice on abandoned buildings to visit. On our first day in Riga we drove back to the national park to see a bunker that Lars had recommended. We wanted to go on the way down but it was closed. Basically it's a giant underground complex built to keep the Soviet leaders of the Baltic states safe in the event of a nuclear war. As a cunning ruse those sneaky Soviets built an old people's home above it and it's still in use today. We walked into a reception area that smelt of broccoli and anti bacterial soap, there was even some old geezer hanging out in his jarmies. After losing a very tough game of get to the front of the queue (seriously there are no rules in the Baltic countries, just spread accross the front of the service area and try to be next to get noticed) Amanda finally managed to ask about the tour. The only guide was Latvian so we just tagged along at the back and made up our own narrative. The no photography rule was apparently rather elastic so we joined all the Latvian tourists and got a bunch of cool snaps. At the end we got to try some traditional Soviet food; basically soggy pork filled pasta with sour cream and dill. It was quite shit. Luckily there was some slightly berry flavoured sugar water to wash it down with. I got to wear a soviet gas mask which was pretty buzzy. Party on Darth.

Check out the awesome records that Stallin's mates had been
grooving to twenty metres underground

Arnis hangin with some toy dog in Lennin Bar

I don't remember exactly when we realised that I'd left my satchel, along with both of our passports, in Lars' apartment in Tartu. That was a real ball buster. We contemplated driving all the way back to pick it up but Arnis suggested using a bus service to deliver the bag. Lars, the hero, took the satchel down to the bus station and tried to hand it off to the bus driver who didn't want a bar of it. In Lars' words he 'found the most normal looking English speaking couple' and convinced them to help out some strangers. How very nice of them. We met Brodie and Narissa at the Riga bus station and helped them find their hotel. This was a bit like a scene form the amazing race; I had no idea what I was up to but pretended I knew Old Riga like the back of my hand. After they had settled in we all went to this awesome pub called Lenin Bar that Arnis had shown us the night before. They have some awesome beer and inside it looks like a Soviet era sitting room. We shouted Brodie and Narissa a few rounds for being awesome, and we talked a bit of smack. Apparently they rifled through our bag before agreeing to drop it to us, just in case we were tricking them into being drug mules or something. Fair enough I reckon. Good on them for cracking on with the mission though.

Creepy hill of crosses in Latvia

We spent a couple more days in Riga being classic tourists before we headed for Lithuania. On the way we had hoped to find an abandoned nuclear missile silo, but the GPS coordinates we found were completely wrong. We did find some interesting abandoned buildings though. After a couple of nights camping in random spots in Lithuania, we went to Vilnius. We stayed for one night with a couch surfing host, Migle, in her tiny Soviet era apartment. She shares her bedroom (which is actually the living room) with her 12 year old daughter. They insisted that we should have the fold out couch and Migle slept on the floor. What amazing hospitality! The next day they took us to a cemetery to see the thousands of candles that were lit for All Souls day. 

Migle's dog, Debe -
He was crazy and excitable

Migle made us potato cakes with jam to eat
with some delicious beer. Awesome hosting.

Feeling rather peaceful we moved on to meet our next host Rasa, a friend of our mate Silvia. Rasa and her boyfriend Povilas took us to to a mint underground craft beer bar and then we went back to their apartment to sample his many different flavours of moonshine. It's fair to say we were both a little ill the next day. Povilas had mentioned that moonshine on it's own won't give you a hangover. I believed him and agreed that I would have to try each and every flavour. He had about ten bottles lying about, each containing a different fruit or herb soaking in a sea of 120 proof moonshine. About halfway through the samples Amanda had enough and decided to go to sleep. A quick drunken bed building mission and she was happily comatosed. I popped outside with Povilas and enjoyed a very tasty (but according to my own rules forbidden) cigarette. It's fair to say that when I awoke I was ill and feeling bloody sorry for myself. 

A popular thing to do when you get married in some European
countries is put a padlock on  a bridge and throw the
key in the river. Something to do with everlasting love,
or a cunning ploy by padlock companies?

A week or two inside the Arctic Circle

When you are travelling it's inevitable that some places you visit will leave a much bigger impression than others. We really only picked Muodoslompolo as a long term stop because there was some volunteer work available, meaning we could stay for a week and hopefully see the northern lights. There were a few other options of places to work in the north but Oliver in Muodoslompolo seemed like the kind of guy we'd get on with. I'm so glad we chose to volunteer with him. 

Amanda took this doozy of Oliver and Mini using her Dianamini
film camera - Say no to hipstamatic iphone camera aps, use film. If
you see a square photo on this blog it's from Amanda's Dianamini

Olivers house

Reindeer, potatoes and lingon berry jam

Oliver moved to Sweden from England a few years ago, bought himself the old community centre in Muodoslompolo and has been chipping away at making it into his home. It's a gloriously massive building and he was happy to have two extra pairs of hands to knock out a few jobs. I spent my first few days helping Oliver construct a storage area for his heating fuel while Amanda was busy doing some gardening and sanding. The weather was really mild; we were there around the autumn equinox so had a pretty normal daylight to dark ratio. But there were a couple of wicked frosts and some awesome clear nights. So for about a week we were helping out around the house, taking frequent trips to Muonio in Finland for supplies, and meeting Oliver's awesome friends. We ate a fair bit of reindeer meat, which is like venison but even more flavoursome, drank some great beer, and worked on our baking skills. I adapted a vegan brownie recipe (to be full of butter) which was a glowing success and Amanda conquered the art of swedish style cinnamon pin wheels (Kanelbullar) as well as smashing out some pretty awesome loaves of bread. 

Amanda's fantastic Kanelbullar - even the locals were impressed

We were really lucky to see the the northern lights a couple more times during our stay. One night was really spectacular. Bright green, almost blue, fingers of glowing light were sweeping in long arcs across the northern horizon. We sat outside for a long time ignoring the sub zero temperatures and gawking at the visual delight of excited particles emitting photons 80km above our heads. It's hard to get decent photos with pocket cams, especially when all you want to do is gawk. One night, as the outside temperature hit -7C, we were sitting in the sauna drinking beer and sweating in the sticky 70C heat. When the heat became too much to handle we'd pop outside and steam for about ten minutes until the bite of the frost finally penetrated our red hot skin. Repeat twice, then rinse and sleep like you've never slept before.

Oliver has some amazing friends around Muodoslompolo. I met Jönne when I was outside pulling nails from some wood and he pulled up in his hearse. This buzzed me out a bit until I looked in the back and saw it was full of tools and other bits and pieces. He asked about my van and I told him about the fuel pump issues we were having. After a quick gander he assured me it was quite fixable and suggested we pop around to his place that night and he'd have a look at it. So later in the evening we took what was left of our very cheap, and not very delicious, border crossing beer and nursed Edward over to Jönne's place. He had some astounding nic nacs and memorabilia around his house; my favourite was a soviet moon globe from the 50's. The 'dark side' was black as there was no way of photographing that side in those days. Awesome. Anyway with a quick tap of his mig welder he had (as a not so rigorous idle test showed) fixed the leaky pump, so we retired to his upstairs sitting room and drank our cheap beer.... and then some of his delicious beer. It's exciting to meet someone who hordes amazing stuff and isn't afraid to get things out and play with them. Jönne's 1930's gramophone still works and his acetate first pressings of 30's big bands still sound incredible. He also has an mint vintage Bang & Olufsen stereo. We listened to some incredible records and marvelled at the euphoria induced by pristine analogue audio. Jönne told us stories of travelling in a home made camper around eastern Europe. Back then the USSR was in full swing and he gave us a interesting insight into what it was like being a tourist the in the communist states. I can't remember exactly but I think he even drove all the way to Iraq. Basically Jönne is my hero on a hundred different levels. Nowadays he makes little wooden birds for a living. You can check them out here. We saw them in loads of different tourist shops in Finland over the following few weeks. Just before we left he gave Amanda his old Kodak Box Brownie camera from the 50's because he was stoked to find someone that would use it again!!

Jönne getting it done

Gramophone + acetate jazz and swing records = Bliss

We were also very privileged to met Äke. He helped run the community centre before Oliver purchased it, and they have been great friends ever since. Meeting Äke was like meeting a jolly and wise wizard from some ancient fairytale. Like a mix between Geppeto and Gandalf. He lives with his wife in a beautiful house nestled next to a wooded area, surrounded by log cabins that he has built from scratch. Äke used to make amazing knife handles out of wood and reindeer antlers. They had stunning intricate carvings of reindeer and elk and must have taken many hours to make. His rheumatism has slowed him down a little but he's still very active and it seems like there's always someone around that Äke is giving a hand to. We visited him many times during our stay. His coffee is strong and zippy, and the treats delicious (pikelets with cloud berry jam were a hit). Amanda wishes Äke was her Grandfather.

Äke, coffee, pikelets and cloudberry jam - perfect

After our week long stay in Muodoslompolo, it was sad for us to say goodbye. Oliver took off for a trip to Finland for a few days and we stayed for what we thought would be one more night before heading back south. But when I tried to start the van the next day it took some serious encouragement and polite reassurance. I assumed starting it in sub zero temperatures was the problem but when I lifted the bonnet my heart snapped a little. The fuel pump was leaking at an all time high so we had to abandon our plans for heading down through Finland that day. It was a real downer for us. We had no idea why it was leaking so bad but thought that maybe the cold nights had possibly caused the already perished seals to be completely ruined. We thought about abandoning the rest of our trip and flying back to the UK. No one in Sweden had the fuel pump we needed, and not many people anywhere else in the world had them either. Äke to the rescue using his magical skill of turning up at just the right time. I had the bonnet up and was trying to remove the pump seal to take it over to Finland and find a replacement when he pulled up and saved my freezing hands from losing any more blood. He towed me to the nearest garage (just a cool 15km away) and kindly translated for me, explaining the problem to the pessimistic mechanic. After a weekend of waiting they decided they wouldn't touch it with a 50 foot pole. Edward was just too old and not worth the effort. We contacted Oliver who said we could stay in his house as long as we needed to figure out a plan, even though he wasn't there. THANKS OLIVER! So we spent a few days trawling the internet looking for pumps that would fit our van but really had no luck. Oliver kept in touch and was kind enough to send some ideas our way. A couple of depressing days later we finally found a pump on ebay UK that looked like it might work. I got stuck into taking out the old one and (magical timing again) Äke popped round to see how I was going. Then Jönne drove by and stopped to talk to Äke. I swear these guys are part of a secret league of extraordinary gentlemen who are at all times waiting at alert level 4 to rescue people from every day mishaps. Jona pulled the pump apart and spotted ruptured O rings on the throttle spindle. Another twist of fate (or magic) and Äke pulled a box of various rings from the back of his truck. Sorted. No leaks. No problems. Jönne came around the next day and welded the broken bolt back in place so we had a semi permanent fix. Elation ensued. We were pretty happy that Edward would be on the road again. By this time Oliver was back so we stayed another few nights to hang out and watched the All Blacks world cup semi against Australia.

Mini changed my long held negative opinion of cats

Now that the van was running we decided a quick sprint into Norway was worth the short 400km round trip. We headed for Kautokeino, a small village near where Finland, Norway and Sweden all meet. We couch surfed with a nice couple there. Gerlinde and Berndt were so lovely. They both work for the Sami theatre in Kautokeino where they put on plays and musicals in the traditional Sami language. They have even toured to India with the show. Berndt had some wicked guitars lying about; my favourite was a bass ukulele with rubber strings!

Ice meets liquid in Kautokeino - The sun never got much higher than this

Confident in Jönne's repairs and having spent yet another 'last' night in Muodoslompolo, we finally said a sad farewell to Oliver, Holly and Mini. We will have to go back one day and experience Muodoslompolo in the grips of the northern winter, do a bit of cross country skiing and lay in the snow after scorching hot saunas. When I grow up I want to be like Jona, and when I grow up even more I want to be like Äke.

Goodbye kittys!

Oliver is looking for more volunteers to give him a hand around the place. If you're thinking of a trip to Lapland (and if you're any where near Europe you MUST go to Lapland) you should definitely go and stay with Oliver. You'll never forget your stay there. Get away from the expensive tourist traps and let Oliver and friends immerse you in the Lappish pace of life. Click here to see his profile on workaway.info

Northward - Forests, ten o'clock screams and reindeer

Counting myself lucky that I didn't get caught stealing a shower from the sports club in Copenhagen, we made our way north to Helsingor to catch the ferry to Helsingborg in Sweden. We could have gone over the big bridge from Copenhagen to Malmo but, even though bridges are awesome, ferrys are exciting and motorways are boring. On the way to Helsingor we were pulled over by a policeman who I assumed was going to ticket me for only having one head lamp working (they have to be on day and night in Scandinavia). He went to Amanda's window, naturally, and was surprised to find we were from New Zealand and were planning to drive all the way to Lapland. He said good luck and wished us well. There was no mention of the busted headlamp. The ferry crossing was uneventful and Helsinborg was nothing special. There was a distinct lack of internet cafes so we resorted to grabbing a coffee at McDonald's and hooking up to the wifi for an hour or so to check future travel plans and couch surfing arrangements. This turned into a filthy habit for the rest of our trip; they are just so easy to find, and always have internet. But the coffee is so awful.

Our last Danish in Denmark

Once we left Helsingborg we felt like (to quote Reon Murtha) we were on the track proper. Hundreds and thousands of pine trees lined the smooth and straight single laned roads that regularly dipped through small valleys with lakes on either side. Nearly all the houses were red with white trim (a throw back to when red paint was cheap because of all the iron ore mining). It was pretty easy to find camping spots as the country is so sparsely populated. We'd spend our days easing ever north and taking walks in cute little towns, and our nights cooking awesome one pot meals on the gas hob and playing cards or board games in the back of the van. We visited Öland, an island off the south east coast of Sweden. There are tonnes of stone age and iron age ruins here and we spent over a day roaming around checking everything out. When night fell we found what appeared to be a pretty normal camp spot in an area called Trollskogen (Troll's Forest). We went for a stroll in the dark and it was spooky as hell. The knobbly old oak trees look like Ents and I swear they were watching us. When we woke the next morning the sun was rising over the Baltic sea and streaming directly into the back windows of the van. It was surreal. 

Eskjo

Runestone -  Öland

Mushrooms on Öland

Our camp site near Trollskogen

After Öland we made our way to Linköping where Emma, another friend from Dunedin, was home for a few months visiting her parents. We stayed there for a few nights and got treated to some amazing Swedish hospitality. Fish bake with apple sauce was a revelation. As was lingon berry jam with cheese! We had to check out IKEA and their amazingly cheap coffee and hotdogs (although the dogs were about the size of my pinky finger). Emma took us to Gamla Linköping (Old Linköping), where we got shown the workings of an old printing press by some enthusiastic old timers, then for a walk through an amazing local forest. We even got to meet some local horses. Emma and her parents were amazing hosts and we felt quite at home.

Amanda and Emma in a forest

 I will buy a horse one day and ride him around like a train in the night. 

We said a fond farewell to Emma and family and then spent a couple of days in Stockholm, camping in a huge park near Saltsjö-Duvnäs and catching the train in to town to avoid parking and congestion charges. We didn't plan to see anything in particular and just roamed the city for two days. We watched the All Blacks destroy the French in a packed Irish bar, again avoiding all the chest thumping racist code heads chugging pints and making dicks of themselves at 10am in the morning. After the rugby Amanda went looking about while I busked for an hour or so on a big tourist alley. I got a pretty good response and made a few kroner. Stockholm is really lovely but riddled with tourists and so bloody expensive. We found some nice parks to relax in the awesome autumn sun. I think it must have been around late September by this stage so we had to start adding layers to our summer attire to keep out the fresh northern air.

Our sneaky Stockholm camp site, next to an abandoned forest hut

The green arrow is the camp site and the red marker where we got the train each day

Our friend Nick lives in Uppsala, just north of Stockholm, so we went and stayed with him for a few nights. He was pretty busy with uni so we showed ourselves around the town and generally chilled out. He lives in a large student accommodation complex so there's lots going on, and awesome (free) commercial laundry facilities nearby. It's the little things, aye. Every night at 10pm every student in his area screams out their windows. It's called the ten o'clock screams and cracked me up every time I heard it. I took this recording of it.


10 o'clock screams


We planned to go out drinking one night so had to take a bike ride into town. Two bikes between four slightly drunk people meant some awesome old school doubling went down. It was pretty crazy. Our bike was an old hack that Nick had fixed up and was a bit of a beast to ride but it was hilarious. Back pedalling to brake is awesome, especially when there's two of you going down a huge hill towards a busy intersection/pedestrian area. It was a grand laugh. When we got to town, all the pubs were shut for some silly reason, but the student bars were open. No student ID meant no entry so we missioned back home to Nick's, getting a little lost on the way and generally fighting to keep the two of us upright on the old bike.


There are some cool op shops in Uppsala, but we didn't really have a need for vintage clothing. We did find an awesome thick woollen blanket which was going to be essential as we progressed north. Just before we left Uppsala I noticed a bit of diesel on the ground under the car. I thought I'd have a crack at seeing if the seals were all okay and tried to undo a bolt on the injector pump. It snapped straight off. It turns out it was made of gravy. We managed to get it back together with the tiny bit of thread that remained and went to the nearest mechanic. He was the first Scandinavian we'd met who didn't speak English, because he was actually Turkish. With the clever use of google translate he quoted us 8000 kronor (about $1600nz) to sort it out. No thanks mate. We tried a few other places and none of them would replace the small bolt we needed, they all wanted to put a whole new fuel pump in. Money grubbing bastards. It was still working, but the fuel pump was literally held together by a thread. So after a day of deliberating and staying at Nick's place another night we decided to risk it all, gaffer tape the bolt to the pump so if it came off we could find it again, and leg it the 1200km to Lapland in the North. 

Gaff fixes everything

I saw an Elk just north of Uppsala, but Amanda missed. I made a bold promise that we would see another before getting to the far north. Elk (or moose if you're North American) are hilarious looking and sometimes get drunk on fermenting apples and try to climb trees.


The journey north took us three days. We avoided driving after dark so we didn't hit any elk or reindeer on the road. Everyone in Sweden has HUGE mother fathering spot lights on their cars to see animals from 200m away. We had one headlight with a range of about thirty metres. The first night after leaving Uppsala we stayed just north of Sundsvall, and the following morning took the scenic route along the Höga Kusten (high coastal route). Endless hours of easy driving roads breezing through never ending pine forests. Our next camping spot was a little south of Lulea next to a small gated village. It was a nice spot right near the water and we spotted some red squirrels in the morning. While I was making coffee an old local came down to check out what we were up to. He didn't seem too phased, maybe a little suspicious. We had a brief chat with him, and he continued on his way. Around lunch time we stopped in a rest area next to some flooded huts. I have no idea why they were there.

Morning wake up north of Sundsvall

Breakfast sunrise

Buzzy flooded huts

Later in the day we finally crossed the Arctic circle, which was pretty exciting. Somehow the fuel pump was still holding together so I did a dance under the sign and wondered if anyone else had danced there. We saw quite a lot of reindeer on the way, grazing in some tasty green fields by the road. At bout 5pm we finally made it to our destination. After keeping our eyes peeled for elk all day we saw one just as we got to Muodoslompolo and my promise held strong. 

Happy and free Reindeer

Blue team GOOOOOO!!!!!!!

A month earlier we had signed up to a website called workaway, and organised a stay in Lapland where we'd be volunteering in exchange for food and accommodation. Out host, an awesome English guy named Oliver, needed help to renovate his massive place. As soon as we had arrived and unpacked, Oliver took us to a restaurant in Finland where we had some deliciously huge pizzas with smoked reindeer and other exotic goodies on them. They were AMAZING! When we got back to the village we had a tour of Oliver's gargantuan house and met his Norwegian tree cat, Holly, and her kitten Mini. Our accommodation was bunk room style cabin, separate from the house and attached to a sauna! Really nice place. It felt like being on school camp.

Holly the Norwegian tree cat and he amazing tail, 
with Mini the half Norwegian tree cat/half one-eyed-cat kitten

The stars were amazing up there and on our first night we were lucky to see the Northern lights. They were not too active, but it was still bloody incredible. There was also an uncanny amount of shooting stars, maybe one every thirty seconds or so. I have never seen a sky that impressive. Tekapo comes close, but the sky in Muodoslompolo is HUGE. You feel like you are above the atmosphere. Every now and then a shadow would pass silently over us. It was a snow owl checking us out, in super stealth mode. Complete silence on the top of the world. Surreal.

Some faint aurora action over our cabin; not the last we saw of the Northern Lights