Monday, March 17, 2008
8:58 AM

To the Arctic. To Sweden.

10-16 Mar

The thought of catching the northern lights in the Arctic, the very act of crossing the Arctic Circle, and the possibility of suffering from frostbite in the -10ºC or lower temperature simply made the wait unbearable. At the same time, these expectations led to fear of disappointment. In a way, weather and other circumstances had caused that fear somewhat coming true. Pictures of aurora borealis on my second ever blogskin and previous desktop wallpaper had awed me and very much led to a strong curiosity in the grandeur of it all. I somehow know how it occurs. I could anticipate how it looked like – streaks of green light dancing in the skies, like what I saw on Eight Below. And perhaps, these lights look better in pictures than in real life. But, it was the sensation I wanted to experience, the feeling of having the dark star-studded skies hovering above the vast piece of land, with streaks of gleefully dancing lights.

The chance came when there was clear dark sky with stars. We peered out of the windows and doors from our family cabin for sightings of lights, but to no avail. We thought, perhaps the lights in Kiruna town was too bright for us to see anything. We thought, perhaps we’re not far north enough to catch enough of the charged particles combusting in the atmosphere. And there went a perfect chance to catch the lights when we could have, and the next two days and nights were just non-stop snowfall, causing the skies to be overcast with clouds, leading to almost zero chance of catching the lights. So, that had to be the one big regret in this trip.

But the trip was not merely a northern lights trip, but one of exploration and experience in the Arctic. Kiruna, the northernmost city in Sweden, is in fact inhabited due to its booming mining industry. Situated 145km north of the Arctic Circle, it would otherwise had been too inconvenient to live in, considering the amount of snowfall. Tractors were needed to sweep the snow off the roads every day we were there; charging stations were needed to keep the batteries alive; cars needed winter tyres in the 7 months of winter; there is no sunlight for half a month in winter, and no night in summer. Having read and watched so much on documentaries about taiga lands, it’s just so amazing to be here to feel the coldness and dryness in the air and the soft snow that crumbles below your feet or cushions your fall.

What I didn't get to see.

great weather

knee-deep snow

angel wings!

conquered Mount Kiruna!

SMU jump in the Arctic!

cosy bed in our family cabin

the wooden Kiruna church

Stadshuset at Kiruna (City Hall)
It was supposedly voted best building in Sweden.

Snowgirl

The sculptures never get to melt until summer.

Nice cosy little house.

passionate kiss in the sunset. mmm

Our white wedding in the sunset

What was more amazing was how we met not just a fellow Singaporean, but an ex-SMU student from the founding batch, as well as another 3 Germans from Wiesbaden on the same trip!

Luigi and Mario. We had to wear the thick pullover pants which ended up rather useful and waterproof.

buried in snow!

The snowmobile is fun to ride!

Meixiu driving the dog sled, with me as passenger.

5 Lappish dogs per sled.

The snow-covered taiga land.

with Borealis forest.

Nice reindeer (without horns)

which we ate for lunch. (See the wok of reindeer meat pasta)

Never-ending snow.

The sun shines on the taiga land at an angle due to the Earth's tilt, so little sunlight reaches the taiga land. Thus the sun, though bright, is not as intense as what you get on the equator.

Many of the participants speculated that the guide must be a damn rich guy. He brought 21 of us on the trip, each of us paying about 1300sek. The tour is somewhat a self-service tour – we had the chance to bring the dogs out from their cages to the sleds and chop firewood for sauna, BBQ and fireplace. Other activities were done OTOT – ice hockey, ice fishing, cross-country skiing, snow slide, snow trekking and sauna.

heavy axe we used to chop our own firewood.

Nice playhouse!

Bodysurf!

The dogs smell though.

Having done the first sauna wrong, at only about 60ºC, when we went back to Camp Ripan, we attempted to do it right. At 90ºC, you simply could not sit on the wooden benches without a towel, and before 15 minutes is up, you could feel the difficulty in breathing under high pressure and sweat dripping from your forehead and down your shin. Next came the cold therapy. Who needs cold shower when you have snow right outside the sauna house? The first time, we dabbed snow on our legs, then arms, back and head to cool ourselves. Before we started shivering, we headed into the hot sauna again, and the same process repeats 3 times. The second and third time, Yinghao insisted we jump into the snow. So we did in the absence of any onlookers outside the deserted sauna house. The snow melted on our skins, and as we sank deeper in the soft almost-feather snow, it felt so drowsy snow could make good beds.

This drowsy feeling carried on even to the next day, when we headed to the Kiruna Church and the Ice Hotel.

Ice sofa with reindeer hide in the Ice Hotel.

Ice seats.

Ice walls.

Ice beds. Anyway, the internal is colder than the outside, so guests really have to sleep in thick clothes and sleeping bags maybe.

Thematic rooms.

Romantic room. See the heart shapes on the wall?

Somehow we have this thing about adventures in catching flights or trains. Heard about the DB strikes in Germany? Well, the “organized strike” happened on 10 Mar, which happened to be the day we were supposed to leave Germany for Sweden. This meant we needed to catch a train to Wiesbaden and then Mainz, followed by a bus to the Hahn airport. We checked that our train trip will not be affected by the strike, but it happened that it did, and our train was delayed by 1 hour, causing us to miss the shuttle bus to the airport. The next available bus was too late for us to catch our flight, so that meant we had to take a taxi to the airport. After spending some time at the Concierge asking for procedures to claim refund due to the delay, we took a cab and fixed the price at 100eur. Not only did the taxi driver take his own sweet time so as to minimize use of fuel per mile, the best part was that we forgot to request for a receipt as a result of the rush to the check-in counter from the taxi.

Same thing happened at the Ice Hotel. We heard the taxis arrive pretty fast, so we called for a cab after our tour at the ice hotel, but when we learnt that the cab can only arrive 1.5hour later, while our flight was due in an hour’s time, we panicked. Fortunately we had the help of a staff from the ice hotel who gave us a lift to the airport, and arrived at the airport half an hour before take-off. The check-in counter would have closed long ago if that was London. But Kiruna airport had a width smaller than Campus Green, so the check-in counters probably don’t close until the plane doors shut.

Compared to Ryanair, SAS really rock. The flight from Stockholm to Kiruna was my first on an MD and it was surprising stable for its design. Could be the piloting skills too. Ryanair always land so hard I suspect depreciation has to be accelerated.

the MD we took to Kiruna

Huge ice kacang at the airport

Due to the limited flight departure times available, we could only afford 1 full day and 3 nights in Stockholm altogether, and 3 days 3 nights in Kiruna. This turned out not too bad in the end, as Stockholm did not really live up to my expectations as the capital of Scandinavia. I guess, with only 8 million in the whole nation, I can’t expect the city to be too populated or as full of life as I expected. Neither was it as beautiful as I expected.

Old-fashioned key from first night in Stockholm at Colonial Hotel

Estonian gurl and Austrian guy at Lodge32.

Hunny!

View of Stockholm from the TV tower.

Representatives of Sweden - Vikings and reindeers.

Kungliga Slottet (Royal Palace).
The crowd waiting for the change of guards.

At the Vasamuseet, a humongous find - shipwreck from 1600s.
Amazing how its body is so complete after over 300 years.
A pity the warship barely moved out of the port before capsizing due to failed physics.

it took more than 10 years to preserve the ship's body.