Day 69: Another Day To Forget

Sundetkojan to Södra Garberg 

Distance: 50km

A mediocre day from morning to evening. Really. I don't even know what to write. Early start again. It's foggy, mystical but cold until the sun starts finding its way through the pine trees.

I pass by a group of 5 or 6 south easters Asian looking men, camping out in the forest. They don't seem to do it for the fun of it. But rather because there might be no other place for them to stay.

This shows me how incredibly privileged I am. I choose to do the hiking, to live the simple lifestyle on the trail, to camp in the forest because I want to, not because I have to. Always with the reassuring feeling of knowing that my salary gets wired to my bank account every 23rd of the month. Even when I am not at work.

I keep thinking about these people for a while. There's not much else to do. The trail is a racetrack (it really is as they do bicycle races and long distance running races on this tail from Mora to Sälen). Every couple of kilometers there is a water refill station, free internet and benches. Hiking made ease.

It all changes after 30 kilometers. It's 11:00 when I leave Vasaloppsleden and make a right turn onto Siljansleden. Much rougher from the beginning. To be honest I enjoy it less and less the longer I hike it. Especially the descent from a surprisingly picturesque N Garberg on the completely overgrown trail is lowering my hiking spirit. I short cut once (on a marked snowmobile track, which turns out to be a pleasant walk and saves me 2 kilometers) and use forestry tracks wherever possible. Tomorrow's gonna be the same I assume. So I rather not aim for a too ambitious number of kilometers tomorrow. After two long days it's time to slow down a bit anyway.

On a positive note: I reached the Södra Garberg Raststuga. 

It is borderline to unacceptable though . No water close by, thousands of (winged, male?) ants are in there. Crawling around and what looks like slowly dying. They don't bite, still not something I can really use tonight. 

I will spend the night here anyway, as there's literally nowhere else to camp within miles. No river, no lake just trees. Millions of trees.

On another positive note (so today's diary is not tooooo negative): the weather has been amazing once more. And I am enjoying it as long as it is prevailing.