GB Day 9:

Šalmmejohka-Pålnostugan

Sunday 18 July 2021

Today Kim woke up to another bloodbath. But other than that we took it easy in the morning. We saw an elk cow with a calf almost right away. So cute!

Pretty soon we came to our first river crossing - Vákkejohka, pretty deep - up over the knee and a bit up on the thigh. The terrain was then very hilly in the beginning with wet valleys and lots of stones. Slowly but surely we made our way upwards to about 800 m. We passed between Guollejávri and Ávrrukvárri and continued north to be able to pass north of Goaivojávri. The weather had a hard time making up it's mind between rain and sun.

Here somewhere it was just halfway, but it felt like we were almost finished for the day for some reason. The terrain was wet potato patches and partially very rocky.

It was a bit tricky for Kim to get over the creeks here, and on one of them, Lukas were throwing stones into the creek to give Kim something to go across on. He then lost his toothbrush too, but saw that it was gone and was able to find it.

Some time after renvaktarstugan in the south of the national cairn (Rr274) we had lunch, and in the middle of the lunch the rain came back.

On our way towards the pass between Lullehačorru and Boarrásačohkka we passed a few other wet creeks and then climbed some steep altimeters. Up in the mountains, in the fog we saw some really beautiful lakes and on the way down it started raining again.

Down towards the tree line it was really, really steep, and both Mikael and Kim slipped once. But it was nice to walk among the trees for a while, until we were about 600 m from Nordkalottruta. We then had to climb along high cliffs and walk through steep hills. At first we thought we could pass between the lake and the national border south of Rr272, but we found the lake crossed into Norway, so we had to make our way around it in the tough terrain. Luckily the outlet was very narrow, so it was easy to cross. We then climbed the last way up onto Nordkalottruta and walked the 2 km or something to Pålnostugan where we slept right away, dead tired.

Today's:

Favourite: The view from Lullehačorru

Distance: 33.0 km

Start time: 9:29

End time: 22:32

Ascent: 814 m

Descent: 1228 m

Totals (from Treriksröset)

Distance: 191.1 km

Ascent: 4698 m

Descent: 4836 m

Snickers eaten: 9