Stormy weather and stormy emotions 🌪️

Summary of January 2024

January was chaotic.

It had a little bit of everything. First, I spent New Year's Eve COMPLETELY alone which is the first time in my life. I spent it at work, on my own, which felt strange.

In January the weather was crazy, first a few days of REALLY cold weather, down to -35C. I had just brought up the skis that I was renting for the season, so I tried them out together with some friends here. After that, it didn't take long until the weather switched to plus degrees and stormy winds. And the weather kept doing that - switching between cold weather and warm weather and storms. Of all my days off during January, I timed it perfectly with the storms every time, except once, a weekend where I went to Kiruna with a colleague/friend here. We visited the ice hotel and went to a presentation about Tarfala research station. It was really interesting! And the light those days were just amazing. We also had some car issues, so we ended up going there by car, and going back by taxi...

On one of my few days off, I had also planned to go to the Jiepren hut with some friends, but unfortunately it was really stormy those days, so we couldn't go. I also couldn't go climbing with some other people, because the road was closed. A planned get-together with the colleagues was also cancelled due to the storm, and playing floorball was also not possible because there was some issues with the heating in that building. I also didn't get to see Lukas for the whole month, so we broke our previous record off being apart from each other. Not a record I want to break but still!

On top of that, I had issues with a doctor's appointment. I needed to get a time that would work with both my job schedule, but at the same time the trains were not running at all north of Kiruna due to a train derailment, so leaving Abisko without a car or without spending a horrendous amount of money was pretty much impossible. For the appointment I needed to go all the way to Uppsala, because it is apparently the northernmost Endometriosis Center in all of Sweden. So most of the month I was constantly worrying about that, and reaching out to the hospital was difficult. Both because it's a mess knowing who and how to contact different persons, but also because I don't have mobile coverage in the house where I'm staying. Planning phone calls with the hospital is pretty much impossible so trying to reach them on my off time, when I was also somewhere with mobile coverage was… Challenging.

I also had a problem with my ski boot breaking. Since I had rented it from a company in Västerås, I tried to get in touch with them on what to do about it. The issue was just that they would not answer my emails or answer my phone calls. So I ended up waiting for more than a week, gluing my boot so I continue to go skiing, just to have it break again, and again, and again… And I could still not get hold of the company to get some advice on what to do…

So all in all, January was a very tough month for me, and I was quite happy when it had passed by.

But down below you will find some pictures of January’s highlights!

*The month started out with really cold weather and the amazing colours of the polar night.*

Several days in a row I managed to go for short skiing sessions with some colleagues/friends here, in -30 to -35C temperatures.

Look! It was so cold I could barely blink, due to all the ice on my eyelashes.

Enjoying the polar night.

Enjoying amazing light on a shopping trip to Kiruna, and preparing for going out in stormy weather.

“Pärlemormoln” (Polar stratospheric cloud) and melting snow, and then some snow refill soon after!

My night outside, this time together with a colleague. It was between -10C and -15C that night (new record).

And after coming inside, I just went home and got my skis, and went for a short skiing session again.

I actually went to the ice hotel twice! First with a group of colleagues/friends. We took a group photo among the ice.

The day after I went to the ice hotel again with a colleague/friend. It was late afternoon/evening when we finally reached Jukkasjärvi.

*This was probably my favourite room. So many details! Really hard to capture fairly on camera. Also, there was the sound of running water inside of the room which was really calming.*

The “church” (don’t remember what they called it, it was something else) was also really pretty!

One of my dear colleagues! ❤️ The day after we spent in Kiruna. We went to Luossavaarabacken and enjoyed the sun (that had not risen above the mountains in Abisko yet, but here it had!) before going to town to listen to the presentation about Tarfala research station.