Learned Traveller

I can't face all the tests and potential for quarantine that are required for a trip abroad at the moment, so I haven't been away this year, except for a couple of weeks recently in Scotland. There was quite a lot to see - I went hiking in Torridon, which I feel has some of the most dramatic mountains in the UK, went overnight to the Isle of Lewis to see the Callanish standing stones, followed the geology trail at Coigach, spent a day on Handa Island seeing all the birds, and took the minibus out to Cape Wrath.

With so many other people choosing to stay in the UK for their holidays, it was really busy. Hotels were really hard to book, and I think had hiked their prices significantly. Restaurants were hard to get into. So I just camped, and cooked on my stove. It made for quite a cheap trip.

While camped out in the wilds of the Sarek National Park in Sweden last year, my mind started wandering, and the product, some six months later, is a novel. It's entitled "Criminal Conduct" and is about a man who goes hiking, but someone is keen to see that he doesn't finish his hike, and goes to extreme lengths to prevent it. It's available on Amazon for Kindle, and as a paperback. 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0924VYJYK

Well I was unduly pessimistic back in March. I have added another trip. It struck me that it ought to be possible to visit Sweden. So I headed back up to Lapland, this time to the Sarek National Park. The only problem was that I would have to self-isolate for two weeks once home. But the Coronavirus infection rate in Sweden was very low and I decided to take a chance on the UK government removing the requirement while I was away. Plus I lobbied the embassy in Stockholm a bit to do something about it - https://www.facebook.com/Britishembassystockholm.

Early September is autumn in Lapland and the scenery in Sarek, particularly Rapadalen, is absolutely stunning at this time. I walked from Suorva down this valley to Aktse and then along the Kungsleden to Kvikkjokk. Before I got onto the Kungsleden I was seeing 2-3 other people a day - once I got on the Kungsleden there were more people. It was quite cold, and I had snow on my tent one morning, but mostly the weather was fairly settled.

I found time to do a couple of sketches. It's not easy sitting down to do this when the intermittent sleet keeps putting a hold on things, but I was happy with what I achieved. I also looked for some wildlife, finding some moose and quite a few birds. Supposedly there are bear, lynx, wolf and wolverine in Rapadalen, but they are incredibly good at keeping themselves hidden, so I didn't have much chance with any of them.

I also climbed one mountain, Bielatjahkka, at 1573m and the views were wonderful. Climbing mountains here is difficult because so often the tops here are in cloud and I have no interest in getting to the top to see nothing. So if you get a good day you just pick a mountain that happens to be near you, and Bielatjahkka was the one for me. Plus there was quite a lot of fresh snow above about 1600m so higher mountains could have been tricky.

I arrived in Kvikkjokk after eleven days of hiking, sat down with a beer, and got on the wifi. Bingo! The government had removed the quarantine restriction! I couldn't have been more pleased.

I went canoeing the next day in the delta around Kvikkjokk, which was fun, and then after that got on a bus, overnight train and plane back to England. 24 hours door to door from the mountains of Lapland to home.

The people I spoke to in Sweden considered the Coronavirus outbreak to be over and the atmosphere regarding it was very relaxed compared to in the UK. Anders Tegnell, the physician who held out against widespread lockdown measures is considered something of a hero, and I even saw someone wearing an Anders Tegnell t-shirt. You don't get that with government advisers in the UK.

Anyway, don't let Covid force you to give up on holiday plans - there are still some great things you can do.

Photos here.

I've now created a map showing all the destinations featured on my website. https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1e1gqkR3dxxA575789oeGRAL4hGuJWB9U&ll=25.044020190619968%2C12.563729711691622&z=2.

At a time when, like a lot of people, the most travelling I am doing is trips to the supermarket, it seems incredible, really, to have been to so many places. I don't think I'm going to add much, if anything, in the rest of 2020.