TS Day 81

Skallskog - Källbäcken

Via Ljusbodarna, Dala-Floda

Tuesday 28 September 2021

Today my plan was to get up early so I could start walking before the rain, because I knew it would start raining this morning.

As I sat in the tent, packing down my things, it suddenly started raining, and quite soon, it was raining a lot. Dang. If I had just been a little bit faster I could've packed down a dry tent, but no. So, since the tent was already went, I stopped hurrying as much, but I still wanted to get going early, because today I was going to walk far! The goal was a place called Prästbuo in Källbäcken, because I'd seen that there was some kind of place to stay there according to Naturkartan.

Anyway, I got ready and got going in the rain, but decided to just start with my rain jacket and rain pants on. And my Rocky Gore-tex. I'm glad I wore them, because from Skinnaråsen to Ljusbodarna the terrain was really bad. Basically it was just a wet bog. It wasn't such a problem that it was wet, but my feet sometimes almost got stuck, and it was very hard to walk in, which took unnecessarily long time and a lot of energy. If I had known, I would've taken the short detour on the dirt road.

At Ljusbodarna I wanted to take a break, dry up some inside and then put on my poncho. I had read both on signs and on Naturkartan that you could rest inside here. But no. Everything was locked! They even said that there was a spring here, but that was fenced in so I couldn't fill my water bottle there either. I walked around, and finally found some old building where I could get kind of sheltered from the rain while trying to get my poncho on. And the freaking deer flies didn't leave me alone at all. Frustrated, I had to just keep going as quickly as possible.

All the way to lake Sången I walked, freezing and shuddering from being wet. I found a shelter there, so I took a break, found a geocache and had some snacks and drank water. This pause was well needed because I had been quite tired before. This time I put my poncho on top of my rain gear and kept going at a high pace. I was walking along a dirt road and then a forest road so it was easier to walk fast, which kept me warm. When I had almost reached Dala-Floda, I stopped to call and ask if I could stay the night in Prästbuo, which I could. Yay! Sleeping inside when everything is wet really means a lot.

When I reached Dala-Floda I bought some snacks, Billys and fruit and got rid off recycling.

After that I continued to walk really fast and focused all the way to Prästbuo. About a km before reaching Prästbuo, I saw some deer on a field, and as I watched them, scared myself like crazy because I almost stepped on a toad! When I had just about a hundred metres left I met Birgitta on the road - Birgitta was the woman I had called earlier about Prästbuo. I then met her husband Sven-Erik. They had already put the heating on inside the building and filled a bucket of water for me when I arrived, so they spent some time showing me around the area. I had everything I could wish for! A roof over my head, water, a privy and a kitchen, and all of this I got for free! That really is trail magic.

In the kitchen there was an oven, so I could have warm Billys! I also tried to talk to Lukas, but phone coverage was quite bad, so after a little while we decided to give up and go to bed.

Today's:

Favourite: Arriving at Prästbuo

Distance: 36.6 km

Start time: 09:08

End time: 19:15

Ascent: 377 m

Descent: 505 m

Snickers eaten: 3

Totals (from Grövelsjön)

Distance: 374.9 km

Ascent: 5,620 m

Descent: 6,255 m

Tent nights: 7

Ice cream eaten: 9

Snickers eaten: 13

Totals (from Treriksröset)

Distance: 1,807.1 km

Ascent: 38,747 m

Descent: 38,829 m

Tent nights: 49/81

Snickers eaten: 56

Ice cream eaten: 32