tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-84045000060574879152024-03-13T07:31:30.365+08:00Sibbe The HitcherSibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.comBlogger69125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-83989833483120075382016-04-08T21:48:00.002+08:002016-04-08T21:48:59.248+08:00Hitchhiking as Therapy<div class="MsoNormal">
So… it’s
been more than 5 years since my last entry to this blog.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The main
reason spells Ofelia, I was blessed with a beautiful little daughter that
turned 5 just a few weeks ago, this changed my life drastically and also took away
all the motivation I had to write this blog.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">I still
have done some hitching of course, although not on the same scale as before.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpGnrk0vs5h6gurQAqG1W9uN7muj-ScwY9QMFBwbnU_hRu1rqHQzX1xyQTX_IYeTd5YWlx41oMZyH63W5iF4FFgGQNnNs9W-CV5mk66FK-zxZNptWlTNK5wDbuHjpWBqFuI5d7gBQsrjSO/s1600/P7126382-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="164" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpGnrk0vs5h6gurQAqG1W9uN7muj-ScwY9QMFBwbnU_hRu1rqHQzX1xyQTX_IYeTd5YWlx41oMZyH63W5iF4FFgGQNnNs9W-CV5mk66FK-zxZNptWlTNK5wDbuHjpWBqFuI5d7gBQsrjSO/s320/P7126382-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hitching Sweden</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Still, I’ve
had the chance to try my thumb in countries like Iran, Armenia, Georgia,
Ukraine, Moldova, Albania, Serbia, Bulgaria, Latvia, Lithuania, Ireland,
Norway, Denmark, Germany, Poland and the Philippines since.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">But that’s
not why I wanted to write this entry. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">I’ve
been feeling pretty down lately because of reasons I don’t want to talk about
but the other day my sister was visiting my parents and I decided to ride with
them home to Denmark just to get a change of scenery. Then instead of going
home I made a last minute decision to just get the hell out of there, I had to
be back in 8 days though because of Ofelia so I scanned for cheap flight tickets in
Europe and found tickets home from Poznan in Poland for 10€ a week later.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">So off I
went, walked out into the rain, stuck my thumb in the air and made a quick
prayer to the hitcher gods(take a <a href="https://www.dauntlessjaunter.com/2013/08/22/meet-the-deities-of-travel/" target="_blank">pick</a>)!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA36IdbwSjP3SQ8FZEfQmb5KKSsKQKMokFD5-40XfePR8SrheQDeggclTeUdlILn_wJk4o14o0qcZZlGl4Xxa8bZYbITC5c1ZBIqDrbuI-vzI8FV5Ros2p_lRHYcBjD8qPaWPnmBt8QSys/s1600/WP_20151109_14_08_03_Pro-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA36IdbwSjP3SQ8FZEfQmb5KKSsKQKMokFD5-40XfePR8SrheQDeggclTeUdlILn_wJk4o14o0qcZZlGl4Xxa8bZYbITC5c1ZBIqDrbuI-vzI8FV5Ros2p_lRHYcBjD8qPaWPnmBt8QSys/s320/WP_20151109_14_08_03_Pro-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hitching the Philippines withYuri</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
At the end
of that day I was 750 kilometers down the road in Leipzig, Germany, next day
Dresden and after that Wroclaw in Poland. Here I decided I would stay for a
couple of days to explore the city and hang out with local people and other
travelers.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Sadly, I
got quite sick in Wroclaw so in the end I had to take a bus the last 150km to
Poznan and fly home from there. I did a last hitch though from Malmö Airport to
Malmö.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">I wanted to
tell you how amazing it is meeting all these people on the road from totally
random walks of life, having deep discussions with some or just being grateful
they are helping me on my journey.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">It can be
discussions about their lives, their relationships, what happens in the world,
their families or maybe they are curious about all these things about me. You
totally get sucked into the conversation and their lives and forget about all
the worries you have back home.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvUwyQIymcntZy-Sq8kyOiVQqNIbRi6DQj8XkNk9YkheEjdYDZhjLYR0ylL5MPwdKnaYV15HfiPcs7yoNwmrxgqGwDHwhJ5NzSEc37EsfleavryNuSLTOI5yLJu1iAhFxOZnpTVGDYYfGp/s1600/WP_20140715_002-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="166" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvUwyQIymcntZy-Sq8kyOiVQqNIbRi6DQj8XkNk9YkheEjdYDZhjLYR0ylL5MPwdKnaYV15HfiPcs7yoNwmrxgqGwDHwhJ5NzSEc37EsfleavryNuSLTOI5yLJu1iAhFxOZnpTVGDYYfGp/s320/WP_20140715_002-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hitching Lofoten Islands in Norway</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">So in a
way, the hitching works as therapy for me. Hearing about other people’s issues
or their view on mine. This from a total stranger that you will never meet
again (although there are rare occasions you <a href="http://www.sibbethehitcher.com/2010/03/24th-of-march-2010.html" target="_blank">do</a>), so there are no restraints to
what they might tell you or what you can tell them. Sure they might judge you,
but they are just being honest. You get fully immersed in the hitching whether
it’s the current ride or a ride you just said goodbye to and left an impression
in both yours and their lives.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Being at
home I tend to get stuck in my worries and issues, while on the road I live in
the moment. I look forward to the next ride and the people I will meet. You
never know what to except and one thing hitching has taught me is that never
believe in first impressions or the prejudices I might be carrying.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Anyway, I
wanted to give a short summary on the rides I was given during these days, as a
tribute to these wonderful people and to show what diversity of people that
actually do pick you up.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Leaving my sister’s
house, I was first picked by a retired Danish gentleman which nowadays lives in
France helping to build houses, we discussed how life differs living in France
compared to Denmark during the short ride.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Next was a
guy my age that was an ex-soldier, we had a lengthy discussion about the
current immigration and integration situation in Denmark and Sweden.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">After this
another short ride with a guy my age that was on his way to his aunt to give
her daughter an Easter Egg because she sent him a gækkebrev (it’s a Danish
thing)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Next an
elderly fellow named Egon picked me up. He was constantly laughing, smiling and
being in a general good mood while speaking with a Southern Jutland accent, it
had to be the hardest Danish accent I’ve ever heard! This was on Good Friday
and he was driving around his tow truck working, he told me he much preferred
to be working the whole Easter weekend then celebrating Easter, he liked
working.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx3jnEOVmKhpH3jsNbndkqFODPR669_u-WeKdMwcv72M9gwkGM0xC8F68bGMgy1WgZUG0H76IwBS0L4dqwT-HKLaovhrigUGNu9y0qJ9OVwLVtbddw8W5EehEmr1pc-BgZIgzk6EMPap62/s1600/P9114255-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="196" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx3jnEOVmKhpH3jsNbndkqFODPR669_u-WeKdMwcv72M9gwkGM0xC8F68bGMgy1WgZUG0H76IwBS0L4dqwT-HKLaovhrigUGNu9y0qJ9OVwLVtbddw8W5EehEmr1pc-BgZIgzk6EMPap62/s320/P9114255-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hitching Transnistria, the sign says Chisinau</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">A German
couple my age were the next ones to pick me up, Jonathan was driving while his
girlfriend was sleeping in the backseat having a fever. I was riding with them
for about 5 hours so me and Jonathan got a lot of talking done! He was
currently studying his 3<sup>rd</sup> year to become a dentist, but he had
already finished 6 years of studies before that to become a doctor and had
another 3 years to go before he was done with the dentist part.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
We
discussed everything from the goals of our lives, the current situation in
Europe, what makes us happy and why people always seem to choose money over happiness
when given the choice?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The last
person to give me a ride that day was a well-dressed curly haired gentlemen
driving a fancy car, he spoke some English but didn’t really want to talk. Instead
he had this monitor in the car on which he was playing music videos from the
80s. Blasting it out loudly in the car while driving at 200 km/h in the rain
and dark while eating a Burger King burger with one hand! Made me a bit nervous
but I only rode with him for some 20-30 minutes before he dropped me off in the
outskirts of Leipzig!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKY2YVtksEqJwVw_Mn9GkMlFxIBZbp2MwqkXpHA_AkzxOgZGxWtokr6xh1cHK5RE57TqEramrrDUGMHkwGMH1Z0T0lQZpm89vUyLjY8nNbnrDlJrze7JBVE_IgJYhWMwYvQBfvs_QZv1TR/s1600/P7166623-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="129" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKY2YVtksEqJwVw_Mn9GkMlFxIBZbp2MwqkXpHA_AkzxOgZGxWtokr6xh1cHK5RE57TqEramrrDUGMHkwGMH1Z0T0lQZpm89vUyLjY8nNbnrDlJrze7JBVE_IgJYhWMwYvQBfvs_QZv1TR/s320/P7166623-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Midnight Hitching in the North</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The next
day I experienced the issues of hitching in a country where you don’t speak the
native tongue.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">First a
middle age lady picked me up, she did speak some English but was just way to
stressed out to do any talking. She drove me a bit at 180km/h and then dropped
me of at the ramp going back to where I was coming from! I wonder what was on
her mind that day.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Next an older gentleman picked me up, he didn’t speak any English but was still a jolly
old fellow! Where he dropped me off I ran into two other hitchhikers wearing
red hoodies. They were on their way from the UK to Slovenia as a University
Project, there were 180 of them in total and they all started at the same time.
Interesting thing to do and compare experiences with </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "wingdings"; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-font-family: Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-char-type: symbol; mso-hansi-font-family: Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-symbol-font-family: Wingdings;">J</span><span lang="EN-US"> I also happened to run into 3
others from their group at the hostel in Wroclaw.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The last
ride of the day was given by two rather young women and a small girl. The girl
tried to talk to me but sadly my German is lacking quite a lot. They eventually
dropped me of in Dresden where I found a last minute couchsurfing host, yet
another great way to meet interesting people!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8JGR950GQDwqzt51O6B55EqSE3wJHNgnDIWjmJek802TWyV9kvnVph3FjVum4XMIVUDtBOmXqaPErvsjWz-g-l9KWz0tx_yf1ll9v6w4bvBsBncDYFky_pzR2is0qZjRg8fKRK-nbh5zx/s1600/P9024155-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="168" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8JGR950GQDwqzt51O6B55EqSE3wJHNgnDIWjmJek802TWyV9kvnVph3FjVum4XMIVUDtBOmXqaPErvsjWz-g-l9KWz0tx_yf1ll9v6w4bvBsBncDYFky_pzR2is0qZjRg8fKRK-nbh5zx/s320/P9024155-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hitching Crimea in Ukraine with Margarita</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The
following day the first car to pick me up was a couple on their way to the
family Easter dinner. The guy was 35 just as me, he just left his job just as
me, he was thinking about totally changing career and starting doing some more
physical work because he wasn’t happy sitting in front of a computer all day
long, just as me! Was nice running into someone that is going through the same
journey as I’m doing, kind of. We also discussed why German people are so bad
at English!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">And voila,
next car was a middle age man that didn’t speak any English..<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">The last
ride to Wroclaw was given by a very talkative Polish guy named Tomec who had lived
the last 34 years in England, he once went there on vacation and because of
some Polish crisis at the moment he was given the choice to stay which he did.
Nowadays he was missing Poland a lot though.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">We spoke
about a lot of things. The history of that Polish region, Polish food, women,
how he had been tricked into becoming a father then how the mother had lied to
their daughter about him and not letting him see her and finally we talked
about children in general. Tomec was a very friendly fella which really cheered
up my day by talking nonstop!<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjscc0ivC4nG9rLaicviPzs360VL1QiYVCy3TT8PlqoDWoECKHEJ5Al5r40JQ_cBrKMyl0s96gHZOVo53PgrQoO87hyFN77xjVqAWIwvVaAqrS6ZbNXVkhZEXz0dnomBx5nn_FhzTVp81-E/s1600/DSCF5547-Edited.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjscc0ivC4nG9rLaicviPzs360VL1QiYVCy3TT8PlqoDWoECKHEJ5Al5r40JQ_cBrKMyl0s96gHZOVo53PgrQoO87hyFN77xjVqAWIwvVaAqrS6ZbNXVkhZEXz0dnomBx5nn_FhzTVp81-E/s320/DSCF5547-Edited.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Curious onlookers in the Philippines</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After this
I was in Wroclaw a couple of days, most of the time sick sadly which kind of
ruined the experience although I did have some great company there, mainly by
an Aussie from Perth.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">But on the
last day I did get one more ride, I was having issues talking because my lungs
were hurting but the guy that gave me a ride originally came from France but he
had met a Swedish girl once upon a time which made him come to Sweden and now
he had children and was stuck here ;)<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">We mainly
discussed the cultural differences and the mentality of the Swedish people,
agreeing on a lot of things! Sweden may be great for many thing, but the
Swedish mentality is not one of them..<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Anyway I’m
back home again, but it really got my appetite for hitching going again!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span lang="EN-US">Although if I do decide to write more here I really need to update the design and probably change the name of the blog ^^</span></div>
Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-66434193042056909642011-01-02T22:25:00.008+08:002011-01-12T12:51:13.854+08:002nd of January 2011“The Pearl of Africa”, that’s the words Winston Churchill used to describe Uganda. I have not visited any other African countries yet so I can’t say if he was right but I sure have enjoyed what I’ve seen so far. I’ve been here for a month and a half now and I stood face to face with Mountain Gorillas, tracked Chimpanzees, seen many different savannah animals and primates, climbed a volcano and stood on the border of Rwanda, Congo and Uganda and much more. And above all, I have experienced the Uganda people and culture.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4koqBJq0-8NakZ-G9yDSuX8JUJnCkq3Iuwd3nXMgJsCYtvOZSz9bn_gZGp2Aoztl2YY5A-X-kzmNfc3WuFUH_oy8WDH3jCOvvt-YG3L7PkPWGZZcd-0ue0DDapmN8PnIFMGpoUrSFEsEX/s1600/Kampala.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4koqBJq0-8NakZ-G9yDSuX8JUJnCkq3Iuwd3nXMgJsCYtvOZSz9bn_gZGp2Aoztl2YY5A-X-kzmNfc3WuFUH_oy8WDH3jCOvvt-YG3L7PkPWGZZcd-0ue0DDapmN8PnIFMGpoUrSFEsEX/s200/Kampala.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596053451735170" title="Downtown Kampala"/></a><br />Uganda lies just on the equator and almost the whole country has an altitude of over 1000 metres which makes it such and extremely fertile country, everything is green and flourishing and the sun seem to shine every day with a temperature around 25-30 degrees during the days all year around and around 15-20 during the nights in most parts of the country. So even though Uganda might be a poor country (although doing quite well in African standards) there is no shortage of food. The big problems here are instead the healthcare and education which is not very developed and not accessible to everyone. For example we came by a Boda-Boda accident where a small girl got her foot inside the wheel of the bike, so we carried her into our car and drove her to the local hospital only to find there was no doctor in at the moment, and they weren’t sure if he would show up at all during the day.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfXkbeBPecHo1Hu15Vd2ezHZICjeEaayIxbWdGrl5ApweLzFWdGuJjUMgetTyBlMXksTP-V30FziZj8bfR8T7Zyrz1fPgWfiR0IGyZ8Xmbubs3UGnFcXNBS1MJqNFxWSlM0IAhPN2Uz8zk/s1600/fisherman.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 126px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfXkbeBPecHo1Hu15Vd2ezHZICjeEaayIxbWdGrl5ApweLzFWdGuJjUMgetTyBlMXksTP-V30FziZj8bfR8T7Zyrz1fPgWfiR0IGyZ8Xmbubs3UGnFcXNBS1MJqNFxWSlM0IAhPN2Uz8zk/s200/fisherman.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596069304788738" title="Fisherman on Lake Albert" /></a> <br />Then people here also tend to have a lot of children, about 7 on average, add then that you have to pay for your children to go to school and if you are a poor farmer (90% of the working population is involved in agricultural work) you cant really afford for all your children to go which means about only 38% of the population finish primary school and less then 15% enrol to secondary school. Then add to this that only 4% of the population has access to electricity, about 45% to safe drinking water and quite a harsh historical past especially with recent leaders like Obote and the infamous Idi Amin and you can see that there is and have been some obvious problems for the people of Uganda.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmRbdPNip-pB8aJsSl9dCYs1Sf12r71GjCgqbYkwhWyMSL9izsx6Yft9eXatCwt9RQl7D5aSa_aWdwFyDpu5mI86pF_tjfgmFcwrHdOM_bASUCTYEQ6iVGlNl2fk8QzAvdFyR7z07SYkVf/s1600/kids.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmRbdPNip-pB8aJsSl9dCYs1Sf12r71GjCgqbYkwhWyMSL9izsx6Yft9eXatCwt9RQl7D5aSa_aWdwFyDpu5mI86pF_tjfgmFcwrHdOM_bASUCTYEQ6iVGlNl2fk8QzAvdFyR7z07SYkVf/s200/kids.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596077351733026" title="Ugandan kids" /></a><br />But still, I reckon a lot of people here live happier lives then a lot of people do in the western countries. You see kids playing everywhere and people laughing. In the evenings people sit outside their houses with only candles and play music, laugh, sing, drink and talk to their neighbours and friends every night. Compare this to back home where most people spend the evening in front of the TV on their own, day after day.<br />I also have felt very safe everywhere I have gone in this country so far, people are always helpful and friendly and don’t harass you like they can do in some other countries, if they want to sell you something or ask if you want a ride they ask you once, and if you say no they leave you alone. Only time I actually felt discomfort here was when I started discussing religion in a Matatu, they are mainly Christians here but also a lot of Muslims and animist beliefs and there is no problem between the groups, actually as long as you believe in some kind of god people think you are ok.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguAW7BkzOsC7l1zO_xTtKRPE21n9zGBaveXwPTHdyNDEs04ereJJdm2ps6bJMMWQc9jvG4Fn0rLpb4j7jh6fgGvdthT1yNQuN6Qo1f-4jh3_KObl4jEU0hcvuMSzRXZ2pZPTYNUyeUQat3/s1600/Savannah.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 134px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguAW7BkzOsC7l1zO_xTtKRPE21n9zGBaveXwPTHdyNDEs04ereJJdm2ps6bJMMWQc9jvG4Fn0rLpb4j7jh6fgGvdthT1yNQuN6Qo1f-4jh3_KObl4jEU0hcvuMSzRXZ2pZPTYNUyeUQat3/s200/Savannah.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596655143366178" title="Murchison Falls NP"/></a><br />Getting around the country is really easy which brings me to hitchhiking, this is a hitching blog so of course I have tried to hitch here, several times, but considering like 95% of the traffic on the roads is public transport it is easy getting a ride, but you always have to pay. Even in the instances when a truck pick you up and you stand in the back or a private car they expect you to pay for the ride, thankfully nothing is very expensive, with a Matatu you rarely pay more then 5000 shilling (about 1,5 euro) to get some 30-40 kilometres. They have Boda-Bodas in towns (motorbike taxis) and Matatus (minibuses), buses, trucks and pickups that go between towns, and you rarely have to wait more then 10-15 minutes before you are on the move going somewhere. They do tend to get a bit overcrowded though! So far I experienced 24 people in a Matatu (there are 15 seats) + luggage, chickens and children.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8GQU1D4idgy0Tm2VkKQii9CTXs1DNlB-z-6Wimdji6dSkh4oBVgSXIo7gLlD0EJxy2ZlkWLczuHJUIurvyjFITVtV2sYcoIiXFzSfaAyLD0JhssZHnsZGjNcJ0dYQAb6p7UPAIfErKqW1/s1600/Matoke.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8GQU1D4idgy0Tm2VkKQii9CTXs1DNlB-z-6Wimdji6dSkh4oBVgSXIo7gLlD0EJxy2ZlkWLczuHJUIurvyjFITVtV2sYcoIiXFzSfaAyLD0JhssZHnsZGjNcJ0dYQAb6p7UPAIfErKqW1/s200/Matoke.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596064997817394" title="Matoke bananas getting transported"/></a> In a small Toyota Sedan we fitted 9 people and I’ve seen Boda-bodas with up to 4 people.<br />So the country is green and fertile almost everywhere, they have 10 national parks here and they grow all kinds of stuff, for example I’ve seen cocoa and coffee plants for the first time along much other stuff that I never heard of before. The national parks wary between big forests filled with monkeys to savannah reserves, sadly in the bigger reserves about 9/10ths of the bigger animals like elephants and lions and buffalos got poached during the Idi Amin era, but they are recovering quite fast now when Uganda has realized how much the tourist industry can do for them, sure its not the enormous amount of animals you can see in some other countries like Kenya but then on the other hand you don’t get the crowds of people and it is a lot cheaper! Also the travelling is quite cheap, you can stay in a good enough place for about 10000 shillings a night (3 Euros) and have a local meal for less then 2000 (0,6<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQxY7inrjBd74ezW3-IzL6TJCuSI5nA37dypfKxjBGkqfsVZ31n7mc6qvX3jrzOS9PROu8BdB1kB1jrJvIhJ-ProZ-lQ5CDOebqIxSZQPEgM4vCRoT1UF4mObVxTPMW_virusIByUmlGNa/s1600/Masindi.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 130px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQxY7inrjBd74ezW3-IzL6TJCuSI5nA37dypfKxjBGkqfsVZ31n7mc6qvX3jrzOS9PROu8BdB1kB1jrJvIhJ-ProZ-lQ5CDOebqIxSZQPEgM4vCRoT1UF4mObVxTPMW_virusIByUmlGNa/s200/Masindi.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596078128901442" title="Bodas at Masindi taxi park"/></a> Euro). The meals usually consist of a very large portion of carbohydrates like rice, matoke (mashed bananas) or posho (mashed white maize) and a smaller portions of beans or meat, not the greatest of culinary experiences but very filling meals, a workers meal. The bigger costs around here usually come whenever you enter a national park.<br />As a last note my personal view on Uganda and its biggest problem is the explosion in population growth, from 1991 to 2010 Uganda has gone from 16 million to 33 million people, so they have doubled in less then 20 years! Add a life average expectancy<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1Bm203jZVaef4uLTvOdk5QFaAo5qTMUbTRDbDlwhDiafYS3LRsLsmLryXTBxJLls0v0q_0Xy7fbFXPv3bQ04eqFn0x9lxKOAfFFeis88pr4oMjSKXk-l9bH_gxL7P_fkoTvAwkoshmBTJ/s1600/gorilla.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 134px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1Bm203jZVaef4uLTvOdk5QFaAo5qTMUbTRDbDlwhDiafYS3LRsLsmLryXTBxJLls0v0q_0Xy7fbFXPv3bQ04eqFn0x9lxKOAfFFeis88pr4oMjSKXk-l9bH_gxL7P_fkoTvAwkoshmBTJ/s200/gorilla.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5561155323208794658" title="A Female Mountain Gorilla, only 700 Mountain Gorillas left in the world. Photo was taken by Simone Gribble while we were tracking the gorillas"/></a> of 45,7 years and 13,7 mortality rate for children under 5 years and about 10% HIV and you quickly realize that some 60% of the population is under 15 years old. So these 60% are dependant on grown ups to take care of them and they don’t contribute to society, imagine when these kids grow up and if the population keeps growing at the same speed. In 20 years there would be 66 million people living here, huge amounts of unemployed people and the local food will not be enough to feed everyone. Then I think western and Asian investors will come in and buy land, start growing modified crops and employ Uganda for slave salaries and then sell the crops to the locals for much higher prices then their own food. It has already started happening with the tea plantations around here.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7VfuTUJcHFnbVAsMcgqC2mI_bVNNHVR6MZ8q3H6UeyAnRN4sDAcUzq7s67P5q9b69Dpxj-8FFiuJQem3aWsvs_CPZP0C_6wZYrrXl0iJs_bHUU8vefqfUjJxOJXqGaUil4YQNECzoEuoi/s1600/truckride.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 121px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh7VfuTUJcHFnbVAsMcgqC2mI_bVNNHVR6MZ8q3H6UeyAnRN4sDAcUzq7s67P5q9b69Dpxj-8FFiuJQem3aWsvs_CPZP0C_6wZYrrXl0iJs_bHUU8vefqfUjJxOJXqGaUil4YQNECzoEuoi/s200/truckride.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5557596656093477346" title="Hitched a ride at the back of a truck"/></a><br />A sad future indeed and I hope it does not come true, but then they need to get educated, especially the women. But it seems that poor farmers value the boys more, so they send them to school instead of the girls which just leads to more children.<br />Oh well, I do love this country and the people here, the nature and all the new impressions I get every day of travelling, have never had so many new impressions in any other country and I still got another 1,5 month to go :D<br />Hope you all had a great Christmas and New Years!Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-3686882719872868212010-04-06T02:30:00.007+08:002010-04-06T02:49:40.456+08:001st of April 2010The beat of German trance is flowing through the speakers and we are doing 150km/h on a busy Autobahn. The sky is grey, the landscape flat and dull without a single leaf on the trees to be seen. We pass town after town and big industrial cities, the wind is cold and bitter.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ1fKPaGN653o5e8UQOzi9IcwNl6BYmSCTPUvrciQmL3WV_J75HzOxDRcXev4crml_VgGWlV3PJmfQhBgSPs7NbFZD3W92_CCAkO1p_WsI5kCct8wOD_CXQIpbZbcAAplt_sy_3UB_TKMZ/s1600/NZValley.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZ1fKPaGN653o5e8UQOzi9IcwNl6BYmSCTPUvrciQmL3WV_J75HzOxDRcXev4crml_VgGWlV3PJmfQhBgSPs7NbFZD3W92_CCAkO1p_WsI5kCct8wOD_CXQIpbZbcAAplt_sy_3UB_TKMZ/s200/NZValley.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5456723573138086882" title="The Valley where I was on a birthday party when arriving on the north island"/></a><br />It is depressing, really depressing. <br />A week ago I was in New Zealand with all its small lonely country roads, green rolling hills and forests and blue beautiful skies.<br />As you might have guessed I am home again, I flew via Singapore to Frankfurt and hitched after a bad night of sleep at the airport the 800 kilometres north to Odense in Denmark where my sister lives and my parents were visiting unaware that I would be coming.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhx7XDgmZ7luiLqnCQ_iWcZQBZnMBoIRJ_IhZuUKxtK2nP4I0iLfF6mHIUngGINUGOklevmaIUx-3CyhagJn7JDkkHvW0U6zyEwScvuaax7o-YGFs6-zS2swP9AF0GKcYH65PZnWuMX_oIJ/s1600/SingaporeFrankfurtFlight.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhx7XDgmZ7luiLqnCQ_iWcZQBZnMBoIRJ_IhZuUKxtK2nP4I0iLfF6mHIUngGINUGOklevmaIUx-3CyhagJn7JDkkHvW0U6zyEwScvuaax7o-YGFs6-zS2swP9AF0GKcYH65PZnWuMX_oIJ/s200/SingaporeFrankfurtFlight.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5456723564216608722" title="Singapore - Frankfurt flight, *sigh*"/></a><br />So my trip is finished for this time, now I will head back to Sweden and find a job and work for a while. Quite unexpected because I had plans to stay a whole year in New Zealand and work the ski-season there, but mainly because Veronica was back in Sweden I decided to fly home also.<br />The last week in NZ I stayed at the wwoofing place in Waihi and got a ride to Auckland the last day where I went for a quick trip in the city before leaving for the airport. It took me 66 hours to get from door to door (Waihi to Odense). So quite tired now!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWlFi6mC_KDDFs2gX5UNXNRIsIZcsrUz056U6x-zxRPJHq0jgfoa17kohdw9Yl686S8iyBSnR4Psi2Pms_Z-YMPDVdWXuE5SsAk8AIvhmskT2z0P9L8XlkF4JUDqj2LTcts_TRUC6zFA1y/s1600/KiwiBerries.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWlFi6mC_KDDFs2gX5UNXNRIsIZcsrUz056U6x-zxRPJHq0jgfoa17kohdw9Yl686S8iyBSnR4Psi2Pms_Z-YMPDVdWXuE5SsAk8AIvhmskT2z0P9L8XlkF4JUDqj2LTcts_TRUC6zFA1y/s200/KiwiBerries.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5456723559748971746" title="Kiwiberries! Hope these show up in the rest of the world some day"/></a><br /><br />I haven’t counted on how much I spent in NZ nor how many cars I rode with. Neither did I take photos of everyone I rode with.<br />It has been a very pleasant experience; NZ is a great country to travel in. It is very tourist friendly and probably one of the easiest countries to go backpacking in.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSY8Wn6qxLkDSe4EvAb84egilaY-p_Q9-ABZLPseV0FnieFpQLK5cOckkUYZSIYt5BmzJZdxYFK6XUtM43O7S5VDZdreyujGYpFc7ynrQhxIeA5toah3pXAUt-bpx-8HecKNltpjb0s1Z0/s1600/CathedralCove2.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 80px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhSY8Wn6qxLkDSe4EvAb84egilaY-p_Q9-ABZLPseV0FnieFpQLK5cOckkUYZSIYt5BmzJZdxYFK6XUtM43O7S5VDZdreyujGYpFc7ynrQhxIeA5toah3pXAUt-bpx-8HecKNltpjb0s1Z0/s200/CathedralCove2.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5456723550843719762" title="Cathedral Cove, one of many of NZs beautiful beaches"/></a><br />People need to be aware though that if you ever plan to go to New Zealand you don’t go there for the culture, history or fauna (unless you like birds). You go there to see the scenery and nature which is really in world class. Hiking trails, beaches, waterfalls, hot springs and much more beautiful and attractive things.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi080Sx1mG4mWiZ5lCDeCXdExgi9rSFz8myIh8df5jKeyaiwzn8IIVerY_ikCVjuJeB3m_jFj-vVSiH-7BCCJfvfpzXKoAy996s8d3k5Xk5QVmJCdhUIJ82bBfmvaxxryp7LV5nvkLkIzZ1/s1600/RiveroutletNZ.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi080Sx1mG4mWiZ5lCDeCXdExgi9rSFz8myIh8df5jKeyaiwzn8IIVerY_ikCVjuJeB3m_jFj-vVSiH-7BCCJfvfpzXKoAy996s8d3k5Xk5QVmJCdhUIJ82bBfmvaxxryp7LV5nvkLkIzZ1/s200/RiveroutletNZ.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5456724683832890018" title="Not sure where this was, but all over NZ you run into beautiful spots like rivers and valleys"/></a><br />It do sadden me to leave though, because New Zealand is so far away, literally on the other side of the world I think it will take very long before I go there again if I ever do.. There are just so many other places in the world that I want to see and that are much easier and cheaper to get to and travel in.<br />I hope you have enjoyed reading about my hitch in New Zealand and that you will come back and follow my adventures the next time I leave.<br />Last but not least, a huge thanks to everyone in New Zealand that did pick me up and showed me their country and incredible hospitality, I hope I can return the favour some day in some way.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFTe1MT5er7l-5TRRTGV8X2Zzm5rpe3__iW4l3ho-hbmWsdJhyphenhyphengMO1MFDojncUW3Q-vKjYKYvSJIH82eIeooC5flIiNB8NEku7Glvl9fGgLSsSwYMiJUNIHWfic7l5A64uTsFswqjAdci1/s1600/germanydenmarkrides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 22px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFTe1MT5er7l-5TRRTGV8X2Zzm5rpe3__iW4l3ho-hbmWsdJhyphenhyphengMO1MFDojncUW3Q-vKjYKYvSJIH82eIeooC5flIiNB8NEku7Glvl9fGgLSsSwYMiJUNIHWfic7l5A64uTsFswqjAdci1/s200/germanydenmarkrides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5456722997380354002" title="Rides between Frankfurt to Odense, 6 germans and one danish"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-81577343569372226582010-03-25T03:49:00.004+08:002010-03-25T04:00:13.138+08:0024th of March 2010The other day I arrived at what I thought would be middle of nowhere, a dead end road. But it turned out several hiking tracks was starting there leading to different huts and other tracks, I felt all warm and fuzzy inside!<br />All around New Zealand you can find this, huts and tracks everywhere. Often passing or leading to rarely visited waterfalls or hot springs, the sad thing though is that DOC isn’t getting enough money to maintain all of them and so one by one they get closed down and eventually overgrown. Most tourists only ever hear of the 9 famous great walks despite there are so many other nice ones out there.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTbT3EdDpHMF0lge95OPP3zqcNB2ruNyauL_eYtdvGiD0FuNUGgXifkjOGFhyphenhyphenG4msP20fA4tO91RzMguxwKyTV1UNAujELsBueZNRl1kQJaGqeRZ1MrrbSI0QT8WMm8uTIIxUjOtacZD9L/s1600/KarangahakeGorge.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTbT3EdDpHMF0lge95OPP3zqcNB2ruNyauL_eYtdvGiD0FuNUGgXifkjOGFhyphenhyphenG4msP20fA4tO91RzMguxwKyTV1UNAujELsBueZNRl1kQJaGqeRZ1MrrbSI0QT8WMm8uTIIxUjOtacZD9L/s200/KarangahakeGorge.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452291662633299362" title="One of the mining tunnels in Karangahake Gorge"/></a><br />From Waihi I hitched just down the road 5km until I came to Karangahake Gorge which used to be one of New Zealand biggest gold mining regions, DOC has done a beautiful job restoring most of it and you can walk through the picturesque gorge passing swing bridges, old train tracks and old mining tunnels. I hiked through to a river campsite where I stayed the night. Was planning to stay more nights but seeing 4 rats while just going for a short walk and finding them at my tent when I got back I decided to keep going the next day to Waihi beach instead. From here I walked along a hiking track north for about 2 hours until I got to Homunga bay. I was expecting a beautiful beach for myself but it turned out there was already some 10-15 surfers<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglUxLKWE0vCVQmZHibLKcEDaaPBJdkkVOurL0lZGt_ha9vvAq19vOZ6JG1aBAv77TsdRE5HKEA7Rj99IkswtnmhdI26UxdmSJleDvXD9uIcJiD_Wh27GUr3719SuKiQ_rDlVIio7wv3dPS/s1600/HomungaBay.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglUxLKWE0vCVQmZHibLKcEDaaPBJdkkVOurL0lZGt_ha9vvAq19vOZ6JG1aBAv77TsdRE5HKEA7Rj99IkswtnmhdI26UxdmSJleDvXD9uIcJiD_Wh27GUr3719SuKiQ_rDlVIio7wv3dPS/s200/HomungaBay.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452291650044967794" title="The view from a hill to Homunga Bay, can you see my yellow tent down there?"/></a> there and humongous waves! I cooked my dinner and watched the surfers before I went to bed, the next morning I found that my bread had been eaten by rats (or possums). I still stayed the whole day on the beach and this day only one couple came by during the whole day, so nice and quiet. Stuffed my food just next to me outside the mesh of the tent (tent is to small to keep things inside) and went to bed only to wake up during the middle of the night to find that a rat was munching on my oats just 20cm away from me, cheeky bastards! Haven’t had any problems with the animals before when I hitched, don’t know what’s up with this sudden wildlife assault on my grub.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_LD0FbOaKHvoayxT5ZwqbelvKO4533LzpHBsfxPNB6qDhoi_7laV1ZDXvm74mgjruBOqes4krH_rK_wihPZFEgK9CS0wPAf0KtTsJvv7mYK05Hsy4r940yjiJT13dmvgxVJz6642DZWfR/s1600/HotWaterBeach.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_LD0FbOaKHvoayxT5ZwqbelvKO4533LzpHBsfxPNB6qDhoi_7laV1ZDXvm74mgjruBOqes4krH_rK_wihPZFEgK9CS0wPAf0KtTsJvv7mYK05Hsy4r940yjiJT13dmvgxVJz6642DZWfR/s200/HotWaterBeach.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452291653862255090" title="Hot Water Beach at low tide, crooooowded!"/></a><br />Next day I hiked out to the road, hitched back to Waihi then north and had a freaky day of hitching. First I made a quick stop at the library in Waihi and there just next to me sat a guy from Hawaii that had given me some bread at Tongaporutu, some 350 kilometres to the south, just 7 days before. I hitched north and got picked up by German girl that had been riding with a kiwi guy and was the first couple to pick me up leaving Tongaporutu at the same day as I met the Hawaiian! But it did not end here, a few rides later a polish couple picked me up, and guess what. They were the couple that picked me up the same day just when the kiwi and German girl had dropped me off! Weird..<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG98FBOanNVjUL4_EdLSEGwrrumbMU6F5wpLgcfwbUY3NrUQHFq-94LjuVfP2sD2pYjhtv19Flds6KMGHpOZbuRDbusat3g8nIgzwj10TpsLqQg6V_zYMPqQltB0L-pQn5F3I2kFMdtLMa/s1600/CathedralCove.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG98FBOanNVjUL4_EdLSEGwrrumbMU6F5wpLgcfwbUY3NrUQHFq-94LjuVfP2sD2pYjhtv19Flds6KMGHpOZbuRDbusat3g8nIgzwj10TpsLqQg6V_zYMPqQltB0L-pQn5F3I2kFMdtLMa/s200/CathedralCove.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452291641747391250" title="Sunrise in Cathedral Cove"/></a><br />The destinations of the day was Hot Water Beach and Cathedral Cove, both are quite known and popular places and that it was Saturday didn’t make it better. Hot water beach is a beach where you have hot water coming up from the ground at a certain area during low tide, so people dig their own small little spas in the sand. But it was very crowded and I headed on to Cathedral Cove instead which probably is one of New Zealand most famous beaches and starred in the second Narnia movie. It has a natural tunnel and several huge pillars as well as beautiful blue water, white sand and islands in the distance. When I arrived there was hardly anyone there but soon people started pouring in, on the north side there was a big beach party with about 30 people and on the south side where I put my stuff some 20 American youngsters came to camp the night. But I stayed anyway and slept the night under the stars on the sand, was a beautiful night. But still no peace from the wildlife! During the night I woke up by a mouse running over me and the next morning when going for a swim the seagulls went for my lentils!<br />I hitched back to Waihi because I found myself a wwoofing host there and that is where I well spend some time for now. This is quite a different host, more like a community, the hosts are a young couple, Brazilian and Aussie and there is plenty of other wwoofers staying in the house, 5 French, 3 other Brazilians, one German girl and me at the moment. The work we do is selling local fruits from the side of the road in a van in the surrounding towns; actually I quite like it because it reminds me of hitchhiking! Sit on the side of the road looking happy and tidy showing what you’ve got. And as soon as someone stops try to be as social as possible to get them to buy extra stuff. Just like hitching! :D<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmAi1_Yti8dIb77Tl037tGFfls93yl38a-d_qf6DdHjGxXhuFGxX0KgALmroEAt35iU-TE5Fda4mXOHuVHoyBFmd6Z5Ef3b8Hq3iy5V05nf7PHUs9xTFJPU1cG1VIUM_vpSDfmYYWIZ0Sl/s1600/CoromandelRides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 120px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmAi1_Yti8dIb77Tl037tGFfls93yl38a-d_qf6DdHjGxXhuFGxX0KgALmroEAt35iU-TE5Fda4mXOHuVHoyBFmd6Z5Ef3b8Hq3iy5V05nf7PHUs9xTFJPU1cG1VIUM_vpSDfmYYWIZ0Sl/s200/CoromandelRides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5452290603245911074" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-15684431258945889602010-03-17T08:33:00.005+08:002010-03-18T08:43:32.677+08:0017th of March 2010I have realized something lately. People usually ask me what I think of their country and I always have positive things to say.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJjaOR-6pyUeDkZ26OnAZ38upzRRNikXhEnz2KE5hyPPfpG8Sss6sqbTbjCtG20e-WloY4LOJGzrVYD79sjvVTuyBi57fELU7nsvAcEA27QNh81uhXo5-e04WBsrd0jCfxNzBFpvxLnABk/s1600-h/GoblinForest.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJjaOR-6pyUeDkZ26OnAZ38upzRRNikXhEnz2KE5hyPPfpG8Sss6sqbTbjCtG20e-WloY4LOJGzrVYD79sjvVTuyBi57fELU7nsvAcEA27QNh81uhXo5-e04WBsrd0jCfxNzBFpvxLnABk/s200/GoblinForest.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449394794467269570" title="Goblin Forest while hiking the slopes of Taranaki" /></a> But in reality this is because it’s only nice and friendly people that pick me up, the grumpy, stressed and scared ones would never let me into the car to start with. This leads to me getting an image of a country that everyone is really helpful and great which isn’t in reality true. Good thing or bad thing? Well I can’t complain because I don’t have to deal with the sour apple, but it still gives a kind of warped image of the countries I travel through.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib8w-oaJNTrSBGoK_t4Tm23wgSgI4s119boUgWUk81XChWR0sKoMl55w-l7qwgXZP-T6fmTTVK9Xigvy-X3l4Mlt7_vM7_Rx_V4lAnoqcAPdLPA2HSfKwfOFt0l2mD57Zccw86zxjs_trF/s1600-h/TongaporutuNorth.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib8w-oaJNTrSBGoK_t4Tm23wgSgI4s119boUgWUk81XChWR0sKoMl55w-l7qwgXZP-T6fmTTVK9Xigvy-X3l4Mlt7_vM7_Rx_V4lAnoqcAPdLPA2HSfKwfOFt0l2mD57Zccw86zxjs_trF/s200/TongaporutuNorth.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449394811759494354" title="North of the river by Tongaporutu"/></a><br />From Tongariro I hitched west to Mt Taranki which is another big volcano, but this one is on its own which makes it quite impressive and I am pretty darn sure it will be used as the Lonely Mountain in the upcoming movie The Hobbit. Sadly the weather around Taranaki is extremely unreliable and I didn’t see the whole mountain once during the few days I spent in the region. I did go for a short hike in the rain halfway<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkEvkPhJLdfNtowA77F9_zgxz32AKvGgwe0sFz6bP4tJUq87W_IaJrhqUIB0fUe9TV_YwIbnOLpMXa4GRreGnxRDIjdIesT2PHfNN4ylxUVMb7U9xtqnOWvqR0dNUXUdhdZ9m5ce3qsWpn/s1600-h/TongaporutuSouth.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhkEvkPhJLdfNtowA77F9_zgxz32AKvGgwe0sFz6bP4tJUq87W_IaJrhqUIB0fUe9TV_YwIbnOLpMXa4GRreGnxRDIjdIesT2PHfNN4ylxUVMb7U9xtqnOWvqR0dNUXUdhdZ9m5ce3qsWpn/s200/TongaporutuSouth.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449394815995118098" title="South of the river by Tongaporutu with two of the sisters and whitecliffs in the background"/></a> up the mountain and slept for free in a hut before heading north. It was the WOMAD music festival starting in the north Taranaki region so tons of cars and hitchers were going through so it wasn’t to hard getting a ride. I headed north to Tongaporutu and the three sisters where I stayed two nights so I could catch the low tide and have a walk on this incredible beach, black sand with towering cliffs nearby, huge white cliffs in the distance and if I had been lucky Mt Taranki in the backdrop.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYmvIh8TVETZG0S4vICmdXarwOPI91l_PuGMinHXMjvFu1syTq2JLc8wurKSmjSJbd4adZjk1bdDIR4tNes-2BdmOCRcm0KmpsTy03exjcXy4TDf3PT-bxBdsGciYmqBKNVJIWcx7aFXyK/s1600-h/RuakuriCave.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYmvIh8TVETZG0S4vICmdXarwOPI91l_PuGMinHXMjvFu1syTq2JLc8wurKSmjSJbd4adZjk1bdDIR4tNes-2BdmOCRcm0KmpsTy03exjcXy4TDf3PT-bxBdsGciYmqBKNVJIWcx7aFXyK/s200/RuakuriCave.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449394804378623826" title="Ruakuri Cave, free cave by Waimoto caves"/></a> <br />I headed further up and inland next heading for the Coromandel region. I did a few stops on the way, among one of them the highly commercialised Waitomo Caves, didn’t pay to go into any caves though. Other then that the only thing that was quite extraordinaire on the way was seeing my first Kauri trees which are these huge native trees.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFnW8WVAB4pzNjtZepELYvbpouSgNqM8hJTTm7yoLe-_ruDgPKYYM9JVzqicR4tSTKcACRByIEJwZquBpjuS8Drvo-ogBEHdQwRvMNd6u7MT6gOm2b5tY6vCc9I-NHQez1yUtEqV-CCNHq/s1600-h/SouthernKauri.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFnW8WVAB4pzNjtZepELYvbpouSgNqM8hJTTm7yoLe-_ruDgPKYYM9JVzqicR4tSTKcACRByIEJwZquBpjuS8Drvo-ogBEHdQwRvMNd6u7MT6gOm2b5tY6vCc9I-NHQez1yUtEqV-CCNHq/s200/SouthernKauri.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449394806151205714" title="One of the big Kauri trees"/></a><br />For my birthday I stayed in Waihi, which is a gold mining town, in a shabby hotel with quite cheap rooms. Not exactly what I had in mind but the evening turned out quite fun anyway. Spent it with the 3 other hotel guests, one 70 year old aussie builder, one 60 year old kiwi with some weak version of Parkinson? And one middle age Indian guy. So I had myself a proper feed and shared a bunch of beers talking about all kind of things.<br />The last few days I have been a bit sick of being on the road so the upcoming weeks I think I will just generally drift around the Coromandel area, I don’t feel like stressing around to see different things. Maybe I will go wwoofing somewhere.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg9-b8FyDi0OpOdq39mMa7xPRtXaOYUf123b53cXZK83vSiFKzOMXITDWsgRbDmXGaV5w2yFbhs3mPLIRAdIteSNiY23EfBgmqL5d4ZhBDZoXwQIZIiWY413yVwdGTFv8eyCLHHUc_NQGk/s1600-h/TongariroToWaihiRides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 107px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg9-b8FyDi0OpOdq39mMa7xPRtXaOYUf123b53cXZK83vSiFKzOMXITDWsgRbDmXGaV5w2yFbhs3mPLIRAdIteSNiY23EfBgmqL5d4ZhBDZoXwQIZIiWY413yVwdGTFv8eyCLHHUc_NQGk/s200/TongariroToWaihiRides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5449397653111127442" title="Most of the rides between Tongariro and Waihi"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-44490730303922359852010-03-12T07:17:00.009+08:002011-06-20T18:57:52.522+08:0011th of March 2010I will try to keep this entry as short as possible and let the pictures speak for themselves instead.<br />I started the hike 10 AM on Monday morning and finished it at 4 PM yesterday, Wednesday. About 2/3rds of the walk I was accompanied by a nice French guy, Gerome, which I also met at the camp ground the night before leaving.<br />I walked about 60 kilometres and with an elevation of over 1150 metres.<br />The first day the weather was great with a clear blue sky. The second day it started out well but when we reached the top of the red crater around noon it started getting really cloudy so we decided not to try the Mt Doom summit. The next day we hiked back and it looked really well but 50m from reaching the summit (after a 600m climb up the mountainside) the clouds rolled in and ruined all our views! Still I am very happy I did go to the top and got to see the crater and do the “run” down the mountain afterwards!<br />This has definitively been the best multi day hike I have done and one of the best hikes ever.<br />Enjoy the pictures!<div><br /><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="3" width="100%" align="center"><tbody><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkYgZndw00QBgsrO5paZp7K1cHs2nr0cmnkhG_oRXR48OP93Z7mRiEF6z1JoMWz3q_0r0hr66hDrwLwUpiSGGSBGsG7ZyngbIg1I1Cgxb13hFAuP1otrjLARTeX0w8eMifFFAhq0xrpe0E/s1600-h/P3103299.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkYgZndw00QBgsrO5paZp7K1cHs2nr0cmnkhG_oRXR48OP93Z7mRiEF6z1JoMWz3q_0r0hr66hDrwLwUpiSGGSBGsG7ZyngbIg1I1Cgxb13hFAuP1otrjLARTeX0w8eMifFFAhq0xrpe0E/s200/P3103299.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522791992900546" /></a></td><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisrz-WtcMaDmMAyH6r31RYkkcym81rJ5HQ2Q1Hh1gbJoBpQQN-c3dBzUtqrx7R3eAf10BrCWHDn1odd6AfxleIAUVXJfXjNodptryHXGprfUFtO-4Ddla21lwBb6EgVxqxe69wy43gs46e/s1600-h/P3093258.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisrz-WtcMaDmMAyH6r31RYkkcym81rJ5HQ2Q1Hh1gbJoBpQQN-c3dBzUtqrx7R3eAf10BrCWHDn1odd6AfxleIAUVXJfXjNodptryHXGprfUFtO-4Ddla21lwBb6EgVxqxe69wy43gs46e/s200/P3093258.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522769880678642" /></a></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju0GeZZfBs-gmOY_uEftyCz5oZzmmKA1Wtzi5VWoTfMAVDOq7nFDw0IolCCRPGNdLuCgNKPUY73KYai9TAX375KXqGbeL4njqENTQKu2W8S6WCxh08Pjwkz0Kk_TC04QmZw-C9GBlRQYdJ/s1600-h/P3093213.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju0GeZZfBs-gmOY_uEftyCz5oZzmmKA1Wtzi5VWoTfMAVDOq7nFDw0IolCCRPGNdLuCgNKPUY73KYai9TAX375KXqGbeL4njqENTQKu2W8S6WCxh08Pjwkz0Kk_TC04QmZw-C9GBlRQYdJ/s200/P3093213.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522537044698962" /></a></td><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixTxaVJZU4Gd42YejOjHMO5ar337yX-z7bTrclxzkjD_PQ2RdPLh6WDrNAnq5_mrQnDzdb6SDFYkqpDIc33BxVVPht6NrwNdfkd5Svpii4ZxqhKBafx1SPfbYsA7XJ7t8Lszp5SiQVI-Lc/s1600-h/P3093203.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixTxaVJZU4Gd42YejOjHMO5ar337yX-z7bTrclxzkjD_PQ2RdPLh6WDrNAnq5_mrQnDzdb6SDFYkqpDIc33BxVVPht6NrwNdfkd5Svpii4ZxqhKBafx1SPfbYsA7XJ7t8Lszp5SiQVI-Lc/s200/P3093203.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522533530718018" /></a></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOOVXRTxCKZ3TIWwfarKfxoeZfJD-wBSwmLatSe5KyDVSdkBQwgAUk3WO-n-YY8eWkmijguSkmdpkleeRhXSVlci_rWregEO50a4ISdSztdlhcl1Q3aB9w0DTJ2Tox9LHXKULsTqk1YqA-/s1600-h/P3093200.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiOOVXRTxCKZ3TIWwfarKfxoeZfJD-wBSwmLatSe5KyDVSdkBQwgAUk3WO-n-YY8eWkmijguSkmdpkleeRhXSVlci_rWregEO50a4ISdSztdlhcl1Q3aB9w0DTJ2Tox9LHXKULsTqk1YqA-/s200/P3093200.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522527692770882" /></a></td><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4kPk3n4ax4shOg8aRBs2qEFmy2S6hJvpNtn-8bhfstJCafZRKu2GkWaFeh6wbIloyCmgjPcoR04lR9tQgij9nQG5AemOiK8f72qtrkiMzchEBSCev_WT4pJNHcIct2ubqQCOx2IWWho61/s1600-h/P3093195.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4kPk3n4ax4shOg8aRBs2qEFmy2S6hJvpNtn-8bhfstJCafZRKu2GkWaFeh6wbIloyCmgjPcoR04lR9tQgij9nQG5AemOiK8f72qtrkiMzchEBSCev_WT4pJNHcIct2ubqQCOx2IWWho61/s200/P3093195.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522522227022946" /></a></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVCmGUsJVTwuHNl7Cg6mQHl7AiHzV-P3yWloqrMxfrgVNGnIiWoJQyvy5e940sbOBDrFygNu66FdZ0y68phiuNijfbIX_sM-lSgBP-UPsaY2B_Hd30Jt_AZ2Inqo7CT_Jbh1Ekrx5EhUXZ/s1600-h/P3093187.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVCmGUsJVTwuHNl7Cg6mQHl7AiHzV-P3yWloqrMxfrgVNGnIiWoJQyvy5e940sbOBDrFygNu66FdZ0y68phiuNijfbIX_sM-lSgBP-UPsaY2B_Hd30Jt_AZ2Inqo7CT_Jbh1Ekrx5EhUXZ/s200/P3093187.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522521362058034" /></a></td><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNwFu8ueYtz8HYGwBp_8X75-Ic_vuncqr3N2QtocaY7qYHLvHkc6nC2mpBsMrxS8sgTIAj0teHONeag3ccVhCcGkbssjHVSy1H9gUEkMgsaWgsjRD2O1ZQIE4pINv2vwaPGDyEqGyT-mMN/s1600-h/P3083182.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNwFu8ueYtz8HYGwBp_8X75-Ic_vuncqr3N2QtocaY7qYHLvHkc6nC2mpBsMrxS8sgTIAj0teHONeag3ccVhCcGkbssjHVSy1H9gUEkMgsaWgsjRD2O1ZQIE4pINv2vwaPGDyEqGyT-mMN/s200/P3083182.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522115151606834" /></a></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhRJqjEgFFys1TVtRvRhz9Uj_88nZP1VfBoD9g7yubS_T7la5Rf89qiBhdR3GwNBdLSnEDjjNBiyBoHdQyaxSGQszgA61nG-ETovlmMCx3uhXFLSRiRc1KV_K5u2gkAFjLAu_vWP8TiaTS/s1600-h/P3083178.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhRJqjEgFFys1TVtRvRhz9Uj_88nZP1VfBoD9g7yubS_T7la5Rf89qiBhdR3GwNBdLSnEDjjNBiyBoHdQyaxSGQszgA61nG-ETovlmMCx3uhXFLSRiRc1KV_K5u2gkAFjLAu_vWP8TiaTS/s200/P3083178.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522110080404354" /></a></td><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP1ftdFmK4jOPCq3gYSUgEXOS2XDiKEuy5GDSVlzC9a3_LdnZr2vNnW5f20OXAkRXrXZHL6xpOXBLZbF6l_eKC-zijkLjYM8p5ZWKJNPV2I7e0rU_M-y6bGsv6aYiNEZ9HopcS1Lrkig0W/s1600-h/P3083136.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP1ftdFmK4jOPCq3gYSUgEXOS2XDiKEuy5GDSVlzC9a3_LdnZr2vNnW5f20OXAkRXrXZHL6xpOXBLZbF6l_eKC-zijkLjYM8p5ZWKJNPV2I7e0rU_M-y6bGsv6aYiNEZ9HopcS1Lrkig0W/s200/P3083136.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522088478213234" /></a></td></tr><tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFKvuREMmMgoEFDfh4OlPM12F1RWOUXFv458daJLUzs8wzuHa7edQ7XQiJmvgykR_NEApMtQs5se8uGGWuxUNJPPpNR_0YmqgNLANhUuBvgxLw806DGYUB6E1bpIaybLvbYGSxz_C6yS0Z/s1600-h/P3103276.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFKvuREMmMgoEFDfh4OlPM12F1RWOUXFv458daJLUzs8wzuHa7edQ7XQiJmvgykR_NEApMtQs5se8uGGWuxUNJPPpNR_0YmqgNLANhUuBvgxLw806DGYUB6E1bpIaybLvbYGSxz_C6yS0Z/s200/P3103276.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522776364375314" /></a></td><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDC97peLfEJxGap0Pj16-CKdNvdMebEPNCBZNC1RBERCwpZjru3hETnpt9KMzSeM3FjRPiQZKSGASFzrQ2rzAZWVl-9fTmP10KajJ4MGPcM76xaWsGAgHq4KNKlpsApmcbl4E5NuA0BDqg/s1600-h/P3083163.JPG" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDC97peLfEJxGap0Pj16-CKdNvdMebEPNCBZNC1RBERCwpZjru3hETnpt9KMzSeM3FjRPiQZKSGASFzrQ2rzAZWVl-9fTmP10KajJ4MGPcM76xaWsGAgHq4KNKlpsApmcbl4E5NuA0BDqg/s200/P3083163.JPG" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5447522108736581682" /></a></td></tr></tbody></table></div>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-77396559236096491152010-03-07T17:34:00.007+08:002010-03-08T03:11:07.150+08:008th of March 2010The area around Taupo and Rotorua has quite a lot of sights, so here is yet another entry with new pictures!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgARUHyPSY38ysV3wbpcjXcGiYeSVJIVVrhYk-qbRBijYge45idyjYUYsAUXrncC4VrIFB3Bmc9BKIqg5LrQrMnIhkgc6JATKCnUzkPSW55pgt2IbBgl89RBm4VEeE6tTPMpdQCUpg2mFZV/s1600-h/KeroseneCreek.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 133px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgARUHyPSY38ysV3wbpcjXcGiYeSVJIVVrhYk-qbRBijYge45idyjYUYsAUXrncC4VrIFB3Bmc9BKIqg5LrQrMnIhkgc6JATKCnUzkPSW55pgt2IbBgl89RBm4VEeE6tTPMpdQCUpg2mFZV/s200/KeroseneCreek.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445826014176240802" title="Awesome Kerosene Creek, upper falls and lower falls. Can you see me sitting in the upper falls? :D"/></a><br />After having a steaming bath once again in Kerosene Creek I hitched to the area just north of Taupo and first checked out the Aratiatia Rapids which is created when they open the gates of the hydro power plant letting the water flow through the canyon, they do this about 4 times a day. From there Craters of the Moon was pretty close, an area covered in collapsed steaming and hissing craters where you walk around on a planked walkway for about an hour.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9xt6Ts4OM1nvdUXUCDbJ1LR2czeZ9AEXzph84cCb_mZEjmSasIxNobC3zdpsSVevpyMAS9btfbJkCVwC_6pmybuVCgja1t9U9hETGssmZGzMVBE4Ca-mzyBLMAdmotnbycjv2Dbqfg_0D/s1600-h/CratersOfTheMoon.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9xt6Ts4OM1nvdUXUCDbJ1LR2czeZ9AEXzph84cCb_mZEjmSasIxNobC3zdpsSVevpyMAS9btfbJkCVwC_6pmybuVCgja1t9U9hETGssmZGzMVBE4Ca-mzyBLMAdmotnbycjv2Dbqfg_0D/s200/CratersOfTheMoon.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445824455915790722" title="Craters of the Moon"/></a><br />Next I camped in the nearby area at one of the most popular freedom camping areas in NZ, Reids Farm, just north of Taupo and the morning after when I woke up I hiked 30 minutes north to Huka Falls which is quite impressive, not a very big drop but it have some really strong rapids and is spewing 200 000 litres of water over the edge every second. From there I hiked south on the other side of the river (campsite was<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkI4aLU3JWsKCNLVy41lYRNnLDHF0xjFRxBMwpHxuO3KK70uWe57wZoe_4D8z6i40fTHBV7EaCQ8cu7aNcl3_coulnLgy7AtKTkv3ZVQ6hUSblCNLVzC79V7obqldbxr_P8riSG1sIprlr/s1600-h/AratiatiaRapids.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 133px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkI4aLU3JWsKCNLVy41lYRNnLDHF0xjFRxBMwpHxuO3KK70uWe57wZoe_4D8z6i40fTHBV7EaCQ8cu7aNcl3_coulnLgy7AtKTkv3ZVQ6hUSblCNLVzC79V7obqldbxr_P8riSG1sIprlr/s200/AratiatiaRapids.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445824448522090706" title="The Aratiatia Rapids before and after the gates are opened"/></a> on the west side) until I came to the Spa Park Hot Springs which joins the river just north of Taupo. Because they are mixing with the river you can select yourself just how hot you want the water to be. The rapids, waterfall and spring all are part of the Waikato river which is the longest river in NZ and just amazingly blue!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeDUEbfzNkTYS8iQ5L4I5QOi8jtxn_FvSTKUOkqgYLBKkVg-tmKcVebUF5P3oeV0Q9urDgJFwrfJtudYMRcLXMLebN66xJQ9eCMC_8xKflOnN9dkjhg5UaLH6kGfl5eJ0uGM3uDdcYlFPD/s1600-h/HukaFalls.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 50px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeDUEbfzNkTYS8iQ5L4I5QOi8jtxn_FvSTKUOkqgYLBKkVg-tmKcVebUF5P3oeV0Q9urDgJFwrfJtudYMRcLXMLebN66xJQ9eCMC_8xKflOnN9dkjhg5UaLH6kGfl5eJ0uGM3uDdcYlFPD/s200/HukaFalls.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445824464154367938" title="The Huka Falls and the rapids leading up to them (Standing on a bridge halfway through the rapids taking the photos)"/></a><br />Next I hitched south and into Tongariro National Park which is a World Heritage Area of both cultural and natural importance and the worlds 4th oldest national park (NZ oldest). Within it is 3 big volcanoes, the most famous being Mount Ngauruhoe, aka Mount Doom from the Lord of the Rings trilogy! Last eruption from one of the<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidnlc8ZjseDkFpergkTeLikKkXzNivOgFTOK4_VvUVXwnZlNuYYAul-dk946RkyaY6BqstSWd4p7k6Fo9f34kKc2RKHKjHJ77NDit2e4QEBmcF1Bs7YcdWt8-mUBza1WHxbW0o1U8kBiGN/s1600-h/SpaParkHotSprings.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidnlc8ZjseDkFpergkTeLikKkXzNivOgFTOK4_VvUVXwnZlNuYYAul-dk946RkyaY6BqstSWd4p7k6Fo9f34kKc2RKHKjHJ77NDit2e4QEBmcF1Bs7YcdWt8-mUBza1WHxbW0o1U8kBiGN/s200/SpaParkHotSprings.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445826024211476466" title="The Spa Park Hot Springs just north of Taupo, not as nice a the other places but still hot :D"/></a> volcanoes was in 2008, so they are still very active. Mt Doom hasn’t erupted since 1977 though. This is the place I looked most forward to on the whole trip on the North Island and today and the upcoming days I will be walking the Tongariro Northern Circuit which is voted to be one of the top 10 hikes in the world (either this one or the Routeburn, another NZ track, is always on those top 10 lists).<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXYWagG3elfZaYogrg3lX0vxris10Ujr8KW_BbvHDZgajOlIOTCXHfUoeSC9F3jPAufZ5QI21T1-CeVuh2yLf19P8ycEqEq8Sv8ym-avT5EuOz9rH8CMJ5oWB8NE5Y9Xxb_wkjI9X9VmcY/s1600-h/MtDoom.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXYWagG3elfZaYogrg3lX0vxris10Ujr8KW_BbvHDZgajOlIOTCXHfUoeSC9F3jPAufZ5QI21T1-CeVuh2yLf19P8ycEqEq8Sv8ym-avT5EuOz9rH8CMJ5oWB8NE5Y9Xxb_wkjI9X9VmcY/s200/MtDoom.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445826029463036514" title="Pure Beauty! Mount Ngauruhoe aka Mt Doom!"/></a><br />By the way, people who get divorced should travel to NZ and climb Mt Doom and throw that evil ring that have control over them in the crater so they get rid of it once and for all!! Mwuahaha, nerdylicious!<br />Edit: Lots of pictures in this entry, and because I have a lower resolution on my netbook compared to a normal computer it may look right for you guys reading this with all the pictures, but oh well..<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkCXdyQy4rwN848RePktWpINXY58HhFLLPIz-_pbNshyUHwpJ0D9O4Zk89Oyi5Mwg5xsA_Cim3Tfw9z7eGhkgG0u7hhWorwAvcEjxvdy5Onv5dfLpx0l7b3-AaMOX8BsGM-u67ZwOEo-JT/s1600-h/TaupoTongariroRides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 75px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkCXdyQy4rwN848RePktWpINXY58HhFLLPIz-_pbNshyUHwpJ0D9O4Zk89Oyi5Mwg5xsA_Cim3Tfw9z7eGhkgG0u7hhWorwAvcEjxvdy5Onv5dfLpx0l7b3-AaMOX8BsGM-u67ZwOEo-JT/s200/TaupoTongariroRides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445826660310676882" title="The rides between Thermal Valley and Tongariro"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-23841204414568637892010-03-06T05:47:00.005+08:002010-03-06T06:05:22.717+08:006th of March 2010From Rotorua I headed about 25km south to Rainbow Mountain where I hiked to the top for a beautiful view of the surrounding areas.<br />The area of New Zealand which I am currently travelling through is one of the most active volcanic areas in the world which is quite cool, because every here and there you can see steam rising from the forest and weird coloured lakes or just small bubbling mud pools.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6wtF9A7tQtUBq6CiTUJ1VGO8fuPhZf41Hx36P6f7KQE8Q1Q-mD2CkMd_rMNflUt0zl_pauPph9zmTHqPmeexgiBoX-N5auuBVlWylXMvuu26jlaPqaMZG96HJVp5uNeuxQOx3Tq8cRLzb/s1600-h/ChampagnePool.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6wtF9A7tQtUBq6CiTUJ1VGO8fuPhZf41Hx36P6f7KQE8Q1Q-mD2CkMd_rMNflUt0zl_pauPph9zmTHqPmeexgiBoX-N5auuBVlWylXMvuu26jlaPqaMZG96HJVp5uNeuxQOx3Tq8cRLzb/s200/ChampagnePool.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445273478227673730" title="The Champagne Pool"/></a><br />I headed down the mountain and further down the road and onto a dirt track for about 2km and arrived at Kerosene Creek which is this beautiful stream and hot springs waterfall, and oh yeah, because of the volcanic activity the area is also littered with hot springs, quite awesome. I set up my tent and started fixing dinner when this grumpy Maori guy showed up and told me I couldn’t camp there, so I had to quickly pack my stuff again. Didn’t even have time to go for a proper swim or take any photos because it was already dark. But this girl Danielle and her mom just came by for a<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQnALixFZhyVYpG40LO_omSaO8KcolXHPuarGRBshLFNzGEK3ea2nfBG55GXR1ZSEd95C0Ab1qOR-12otgmK4QpxbAt5cGW2dmvi9L7CTKQn4HmnCieC2-6OPAAQVBDayFceXLVR99oJdC/s1600-h/HotWater.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQnALixFZhyVYpG40LO_omSaO8KcolXHPuarGRBshLFNzGEK3ea2nfBG55GXR1ZSEd95C0Ab1qOR-12otgmK4QpxbAt5cGW2dmvi9L7CTKQn4HmnCieC2-6OPAAQVBDayFceXLVR99oJdC/s200/HotWater.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445273482902330850" title="Ahh, 40 degrees water shower!"/></a> swim so they gave me a ride and we went to a nice spot by a lake for the night. Next morning though we were told to leave pretty early because 200 people were coming in for some event.<br />From there I headed south a few kilometres until I got to Waiotapu Thermal Wonderland, a commercial thermal area. I usually don’t like paying for these things but I find this stuff really interesting so I went in and had a walk looking at all the craters and bubbling lakes and the amazing champagne pool which is this green coloured really deep pool with orange edges and water bubbling like<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij3zQV40P2rUA-984lP9UbKKrYR5fYeS7IYc9TuVdkAI0vkZw1fxVv7zmJtlDRKN6TJkyBIzurUtIT5-Quc9_vAQQB_YTa9Rg0jLRkkDCJX72J5ljMksUk_Pg2xHW83aUEECYULT9jAOfR/s1600-h/MudPool.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij3zQV40P2rUA-984lP9UbKKrYR5fYeS7IYc9TuVdkAI0vkZw1fxVv7zmJtlDRKN6TJkyBIzurUtIT5-Quc9_vAQQB_YTa9Rg0jLRkkDCJX72J5ljMksUk_Pg2xHW83aUEECYULT9jAOfR/s200/MudPool.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445273489009667090" title="Part of the Mud Pool"/></a> champagne and steam rising! Afterwards I looked up this well hidden hot spring waterfall in the area for a quick dip then I went over and looked at a huge mud pool spluttering and making weird sounds. From there I got a ride to Wakite Valley Thermal Pools which is a hot pools complex with 6 different hot pools between 35-42 degrees<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAHb3JJ2jKXh0ZC-8-d02Mul9aA9Cx91FWRg_1yMAPClnh1znaYyDueFMbvuuTi-8KueLAoibwDho7ki9fQwVMC34Blc5eadKl0mSFTuhjNXMIB20fl9uTS7nlrWrFpZa8V3p47UtR3KQ_/s1600-h/WaikitePools.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAHb3JJ2jKXh0ZC-8-d02Mul9aA9Cx91FWRg_1yMAPClnh1znaYyDueFMbvuuTi-8KueLAoibwDho7ki9fQwVMC34Blc5eadKl0mSFTuhjNXMIB20fl9uTS7nlrWrFpZa8V3p47UtR3KQ_/s200/WaikitePools.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445273495919696482" title="The Waikite Valley Thermal Pools complex"/></a> Celsius, they are fed directly from a huge hot spring sprouting out 50 litres of boiling water every second. You can also camp next to the complex and get unlimited use of the pools for only 16 $ which I did, chilling in the pools most of the evening. Today I will try to go back to Kerosene Creek before I continue south towards Taupo.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKSJIQxR2hAKuAPM4i2NdPkshqADvKTdyxqbc0NXRd21x-B23jH8WuzDNJgvN1XL-AlnI-HSd_ggJB1CTA08pTBB-4_nb4UFbIk0lhp11TFv0_idWXI2pu1Q0arHDkZLGZNVsDFZfaPVNS/s1600-h/rotorides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKSJIQxR2hAKuAPM4i2NdPkshqADvKTdyxqbc0NXRd21x-B23jH8WuzDNJgvN1XL-AlnI-HSd_ggJB1CTA08pTBB-4_nb4UFbIk0lhp11TFv0_idWXI2pu1Q0arHDkZLGZNVsDFZfaPVNS/s200/rotorides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5445270118537047954" title="Rides from Rotorua to Thermal Pools"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-8520081869145965102010-03-04T04:36:00.006+08:002010-03-06T06:07:30.371+08:003rd of March 2010The next morning I continued north to Waipatiki beach and from there I walked over to Aropaoanui beach, both were quite nice beaches but nothing out of the extraordinary. However I did find some nice Paua shells there to take with me. Then I backtracked a couple of kilometres and went Northwest until I arrived by the Tarawera tavern, halfway to Taupo. Close by there is an awesome hot spring. The signs says it is closed, but it really isn’t, but DOC (Department of Conversation) have stopped<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQNHMh63nVRLiiMuhQJ38LuINQPhzkdl5IXy7vQIbRCBxzlLn9uGCrKHP0DZu6jLhDgY-R1O-zfykGeCjNebkz5KD6rt55a-Piefy2jffHGLBorkNflV1R2W6UGETHYe8rsjpw7nB_B_As/s1600-h/WaipatikiAoraPauanuiBeach.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 133px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQNHMh63nVRLiiMuhQJ38LuINQPhzkdl5IXy7vQIbRCBxzlLn9uGCrKHP0DZu6jLhDgY-R1O-zfykGeCjNebkz5KD6rt55a-Piefy2jffHGLBorkNflV1R2W6UGETHYe8rsjpw7nB_B_As/s200/WaipatikiAoraPauanuiBeach.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5444509675570443554" title="Waipatiki Beach and Aropaoanui Beach" /></a> maintaining it so they had to put up the sign. This means very few actually go over to the springs so after putting up my tent and having a few beers at the tavern I headed over there while the sun was still setting and then enjoyed 4 hours of very hot relaxing, would guess the water is 45 degrees, takes quite a while to get used to! During the evening in the spring I had a Possum walk by just 1½ meters away from me! Possum is a native in Australia, but never managed to see one over there in the wild. In NZ they are considered a pest though.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBSDcJndB5oHwCA8rMpSt5R_bT9bxkSqmlCZRzelfuxqE519-_KpBAaSFqXH9wiNG19pu83U2dZY42gldlMiaQIKXXQYnRB4vn3bFdJuZYhkvNcREk2QFg4Va3MtSWVS47VRYQSUBSKyIw/s1600-h/TaraweraSprings.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 96px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBSDcJndB5oHwCA8rMpSt5R_bT9bxkSqmlCZRzelfuxqE519-_KpBAaSFqXH9wiNG19pu83U2dZY42gldlMiaQIKXXQYnRB4vn3bFdJuZYhkvNcREk2QFg4Va3MtSWVS47VRYQSUBSKyIw/s200/TaraweraSprings.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5444509667299578994" title="The Tarawera Hotsprings, both during the night and the morning after"/></a><br />New Zealand may be extremely dramatic and beautiful country littered with waterfalls, hot springs, beautiful views and beaches. But one thing is missing, and that is exciting animals! There are none, whatsoever, native mammals on NZ (ok, that’s a lie. There is actually 2 species of bats that are native). Neither is there almost nothing dangerous or poisonous out here (2 very rare spiders). So all the mammals that you can find in the country have been introduced. For example wild pigs, goats, deer as well as Possums. One thing NZ have though is several quite unique birds; personally I never found them as exciting as mammals though.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioS9M-icOI81-JT_WCR27wGBmGcNsI1cIkA_lVBYkFHvHKyILwoTQTBttEmEPBolA4e109y_FunvWaBqebSx5fpAFi5sqksgmuq-644XXmlQvNlnD5vTC5VfbuFr6c0omex2MXS0ftVyco/s1600-h/RereFalls.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 142px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioS9M-icOI81-JT_WCR27wGBmGcNsI1cIkA_lVBYkFHvHKyILwoTQTBttEmEPBolA4e109y_FunvWaBqebSx5fpAFi5sqksgmuq-644XXmlQvNlnD5vTC5VfbuFr6c0omex2MXS0ftVyco/s200/RereFalls.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5444509649405960738" title="The Rere Falls, with yet another picture with me in it!! Amazing"/></a><br />The next day the hitching slowed down, and it took the whole day to get back to Napier and then hitch 100km north to Wairoa, the last guy to pick me up though was this Chinese teacher Jian, whom told me I could stay at his house if I wanted which I did. I was rewarded with a nice Chinese dinner cooked by Jian.<br />The following day was another really slow day of hitching, but I did get picked up by a dude named Chris who bought me lunch and while he was on a meeting in Gisborne I tried to find a boogeyboard to buy, sadly I didn’t find one and after the meeting he drove and dropped me off outside town. Then it took me 6 hours to get the 40km I wanted to go next. So I arrived just before dusk at the Rere Rockslide.<br />Next morning it was raining, but it stopped around 10 so I got up and checked out the Rockslide. Rere Rockslide is this amazing 60m long natural slide, just like a giant waterslide in a theme park, just made by nature!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghqTn62HT6GFd6bxQV8jNTcb_alMigjXblJ8jjTnxWvRx2Yrh9oJz0DqUg_kdg7vLZoSAkGSZE-AsckPVomSCOaUBIymp7Ca3_sPmL-9LmWVltV4NiMiF7qzWX0DAis4IpFHo89luYtGFV/s1600-h/RereRockslide.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEghqTn62HT6GFd6bxQV8jNTcb_alMigjXblJ8jjTnxWvRx2Yrh9oJz0DqUg_kdg7vLZoSAkGSZE-AsckPVomSCOaUBIymp7Ca3_sPmL-9LmWVltV4NiMiF7qzWX0DAis4IpFHo89luYtGFV/s200/RereRockslide.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5444509659171677890" title="The Rere Rockslide, 60m long FUN ride!"/></a> <br />I found a half broken homemade boogeyboard which I used and broke even more after a couple of fun rides. From there I walked back on the road for about 2,5km to Rere Falls which is another beautiful waterfall that you actually can walk in behind, quite cool. While I was there an Irish couple came by and they gave me a ride back to Gisborne so I could get out on a road with some proper traffic again. I headed northwest for quite some time and eventually got dropped of in the small town of Te Teko. It was starting to get late and I was looking for a place to put up my tent walking through town when a police car came by and asked me what I was doing there. The officer told me this was probably one of the worst areas in NZ I could be in because of Maori Gangs so he gave me a ride further down the road to a hidden away campsite by a lake. He dropped me next to a campervan that was already there and an older fella that was in it came out and had a chat with me. His name was Jim and later on in the evening he cooked me dinner with some nice trout he had caught the same day and afterwards we shared a couple of glasses rum and coke while discussing all kinds of things, turned out Jim was quite the bushman and had lived a very eventful life.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb5LLBLvR6SF7ZE0tMP58iqMhnzp57iIgaU8iA_RsH_QKsW5McNrPG0xtLjmmxQXWRcw6a6bk6Ptv3TWKoAT9H_lhFB8Lf8RjZ1vrQJvOTKFfFqPilgKZ-cX41SRLEalIRuR-_Rh7nq2Cr/s1600-h/TutaeFalls.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 89px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb5LLBLvR6SF7ZE0tMP58iqMhnzp57iIgaU8iA_RsH_QKsW5McNrPG0xtLjmmxQXWRcw6a6bk6Ptv3TWKoAT9H_lhFB8Lf8RjZ1vrQJvOTKFfFqPilgKZ-cX41SRLEalIRuR-_Rh7nq2Cr/s200/TutaeFalls.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5444509674518052178" title="A Whitewater rafting boat going down the Tutae Falls"/></a><br />The next morning he gave me a ride to the Soda Hot Springs and gave me another piece of the trout to cook for dinner. The Soda Hot Springs which used to be a nice free spot had been commercialized just last year and I decided not to go in there if I had to pay. I hitched west to Tutea Falls and did a hike along the stream watching people white-water raft going over the world highest commercial run drop of 7 meters. I also managed to see a Tui here, which is quite a unique and native NZ bird. Next I hitched down to Rotorua and found a hostel so I could recharge my camera and more. Also cooked myself quite a feast this evening and got me some more insect repellent for those annoying sand flies, tomorrow Ill keep heading south into one of the most thermal active areas in the world.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVcWPIGzhCGHvrpr8PqnhCeOI_HV-YgUwIMc8nacMUPF208BJUJ0jA4o9GlPvUj6hL8Mj3bPZFg6QClXPTI7vGoZTpANMsdnKBxDyW9Kf9jpw_cs36IOfOizMsq9MGIKvpFYVZT2H-rbPi/s1600-h/Napier-RotoruaRides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 125px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVcWPIGzhCGHvrpr8PqnhCeOI_HV-YgUwIMc8nacMUPF208BJUJ0jA4o9GlPvUj6hL8Mj3bPZFg6QClXPTI7vGoZTpANMsdnKBxDyW9Kf9jpw_cs36IOfOizMsq9MGIKvpFYVZT2H-rbPi/s200/Napier-RotoruaRides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5444509294663239250" title="Rides from Napier to Rotorua, Jian is the guy by the beach in Jim the one in the lower left corner. Also got picked up by the tour bus with the rafter, but neve got a photo of it"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-6106826145566909892010-02-27T04:11:00.003+08:002010-02-27T04:21:13.766+08:0026th of February 2010I left Takaka around noon the next day, turned out to be quite a queue, but after 1,5 hour it was my turn. A couple of rides later I arrived in Picton just to miss the ferry by the minute. I did get on the next though and 3½ hours later I arrived on the North Island in the capital of NZ, Wellington.<br />Arriving eleven in the evening in a city is not the best of ideas if you haven’t booked a place to stay, especially if there is a big music festival coming up the next day. I had to walk through the city centre forth and back with everyone out partying. I went through every hostel in the centre of the city until in the last one the receptionist felt sorry for me and put me in a room that was already full,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguidecoRkbxDyzY4gPRoFSE1jrJg3PGp0rzdCS_uApKT7q5hnM0bDfIXW8J-2MKvyTi1lr-x22dwMpoLE-2-N7Taz4tdx9o3ieBE7FJmxlepnaOFAUPBXghLqHtyJWq1sCfDsiWVfUz36q/s1600-h/PutangiruaPinnacles.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguidecoRkbxDyzY4gPRoFSE1jrJg3PGp0rzdCS_uApKT7q5hnM0bDfIXW8J-2MKvyTi1lr-x22dwMpoLE-2-N7Taz4tdx9o3ieBE7FJmxlepnaOFAUPBXghLqHtyJWq1sCfDsiWVfUz36q/s200/PutangiruaPinnacles.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442648112704298034" title="Hiking around the Putangirua Pinnacles aka Dimholt´s Road" /></a> but had a lots of couples in it. During the night though these young kiwis that were in the city for the music festival came into the room several times turning on the lights and screaming, I probably would have slept better at a park bench!<br />The next morning I headed out of the city as fast as I could, took a train to the outskirts and started hitching again. Now my luck took a 180 degree turn!<br />The next guy was David whom was on his way to his brothers 48th birthday at his sisters place, so he invited me to come with him and I spent the evening in this<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMzs9QjZ3AUlWeisc7heHT1I3lQMaL6aw-iTppvZpubEIVTpf0c81h7TI9-Emoww0vzevKChFzrtpmOUQFNjXuZxPkZ2V1Aa-oW2Ag73EY4udvuA6Q85hPtOIy8NU8uzQpymSdlKxkr78j/s1600-h/CapePalliser.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMzs9QjZ3AUlWeisc7heHT1I3lQMaL6aw-iTppvZpubEIVTpf0c81h7TI9-Emoww0vzevKChFzrtpmOUQFNjXuZxPkZ2V1Aa-oW2Ag73EY4udvuA6Q85hPtOIy8NU8uzQpymSdlKxkr78j/s200/CapePalliser.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442648101400291714" title?"Cape Palliser lighthouse in the background and a couple of the seals"/></a> beautiful valley with Dave and his brother and son, sister and brother in law which were both professional sheep shearers, going to Norway every year to shear. We had a big barbeque and drank plenty of beer and whiskey that night. I had a great night but a little to topped up on beer I successfully ruined one of the zippers on my new tent, so now I wont be able to sell that either (really don’t like it), and I hope it doesn’t rain to much because then I will get wet!<br />The next morning Dave drove me a bit back on the way and bought me an ice-cream before dropping me off. From there I hitched south and 3 rides later Duncan and Sarah and Sarah’s mom whom was visiting from England for their wedding which they just had a few days earlier picked me up. Duncan had sworn that he would never pick up a hitcher again because of some weird previous experiences, but who can resist me standing there?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2qEr8MQ57QErv_2LDa7BnQOquh4M7-Eq6Lc5AlFKU9Q4-Vque9ZjMdXlGSdJrmnkaGPcb7ZWLZEMOSg-26wvjbFUSnka2sUb8lDfI44FZZR3uBCaIRszc7DYMRjgxOtebeJAABvl0eQy1/s1600-h/SarahMustering.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2qEr8MQ57QErv_2LDa7BnQOquh4M7-Eq6Lc5AlFKU9Q4-Vque9ZjMdXlGSdJrmnkaGPcb7ZWLZEMOSg-26wvjbFUSnka2sUb8lDfI44FZZR3uBCaIRszc7DYMRjgxOtebeJAABvl0eQy1/s200/SarahMustering.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442648119235929394" title="Mustering in Aorangi Range, Sarah and Sky in the picture. Not the easiest place to Muster in!"/></a><br />They had a Sheep station down by Cape Palliser where I was heading, 7000 acres and 3000 sheep + some 300 cows in the Aorangi Range, really hilly country! They told me I could put up my tent by their woolshed if I wanted which I did so I would have access to a toilet and a lunch room.<br />The next day I hitched to the Putangirua Pinnacles and went for a hike looking at the rock formations that was used in the Return of the King during the Dimholt´s Road scene. Then I hitched down to Cape Palliser which is the southernmost point of the North Island. A lighthouse and a big seal colony kept me busy there for quite a while before I hitched back to my tent at the woolshed where a cold beer and fresh eggs was waiting for me.<br />The next morning after having breakfast with my hosts I went with them to muster sheep in one of the “paddocks” because they were getting sheared the next week. This turned out to be harder then one would think considering the area is covered in wooded hills up to 600m high. So we drove to the top of the hills then two of us started hiking down trying to find and herd as many sheep as possible with the help of the dogs, Duncan just kept going up and down these hills, guess you would get pretty fit doing this so often. After the mustering and having lunch in the house they drove me up to the town of Masterton and bought me an ice-cream in the same place Dave had before dropping me off.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkAtB66CLGD3NOQn7-rL_o9B48eX7DHx77aj1kQ7NYUHs52FU40E37u9AzPQVy_7LczrC-sb1JUpUQx0qRfRldNTXzrFuIicTs2EWWx3CVihLQTlFn-o8StjO5L9DpPoP-JSPuB_lyhb2L/s1600-h/GeorgeMustering.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkAtB66CLGD3NOQn7-rL_o9B48eX7DHx77aj1kQ7NYUHs52FU40E37u9AzPQVy_7LczrC-sb1JUpUQx0qRfRldNTXzrFuIicTs2EWWx3CVihLQTlFn-o8StjO5L9DpPoP-JSPuB_lyhb2L/s200/GeorgeMustering.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442648103129704770" title="Mustering with George, a bit easier when you can stay on the back the whole time!"/></a><br />Yet another couple of rides and heading away from the highway to the less trafficked roads this woman Vicky dropped me off just outside their house, which was also a sheep station and told me if I didn’t get a ride within a half an hour I should come over to the house (Was around seven in the evening, so dusk was approaching). So after a while I went over to the house where she fed and let me sleep the night in the house, later on her husband George also came home. George and Vicky had 1000 acres and 2000 sheep + cows, quite different from Duncan and Sarah and in the morning after breakfast I went with George to do some mustering, moving sheep and cows between paddocks. Doing it in these lands which also were quite hilly but not covered in forests we never even had to get off the quad bike unless we were going through/opening gates. Maybe Sheep Herder is something I should become in the future? Afterwards Vicky made me some lunch to take with me and I said goodbye and kept hitching on yet smaller roads until I reached the Waihi Falls which is a very beautiful waterfall but very unknown to the public because it isn’t mentioned in any of the guidebooks. I ended up staying by the falls for 20 hours with only one couple from Auckland coming by to have a quick look. I spent the day swimming in the pool below the falls and sitting in the shade reading and listening to the noise of the falls, I did slip though walking around on the rocks by the waterfall (I never learn do I?) and hurt my left foot.<br />The next morning I left around 10 and two sheep farmers (yes, there is still a lot of sheep in NZ!) later I came to Dannyvirke from where I hitched north to Norsewood which is a town founded by Norwegians! There is also a wool fabric called Norsewear in town which makes very good and cheap wool socks so I had to make a stop and buy me some new hiking socks before continuing. A few rides later I arrived in Napier where I am now, have to run a couple of errands and wash my clothes and stuff so staying at the backpackers here two nights while my foot recover, half of it is blue now by a huge bruise.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxzP8vrcPX3o8tJ4Ou1NG2dHbpAg36QYAwBJNDwU0Ngi8ILAGIAIroPLxurPlvy5CcuTDdO89gJL6yD6n31hH38W-xkacEbLOKgEhbUI6S574V0hH_K7JKWPziQ11IdRshHekxE84wWF2K/s1600-h/WaihiFalls.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxzP8vrcPX3o8tJ4Ou1NG2dHbpAg36QYAwBJNDwU0Ngi8ILAGIAIroPLxurPlvy5CcuTDdO89gJL6yD6n31hH38W-xkacEbLOKgEhbUI6S574V0hH_K7JKWPziQ11IdRshHekxE84wWF2K/s200/WaihiFalls.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442648128567640530" title="The Waihi Falls in the afternoon"/></a><br />So far I only seen one hitcher on the North Island, way less compared to the south but they still are around.<br />Oh and by the way, I don’t know if I mentioned the animal thing about NZ yet. But one thing they have for sure and lots of it is sand flies, and god do I hate them, they keep on having a blood feast on my feet every day, not a nice sight. At least they don’t carry malaria so they wont kill me!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjSpCdbvyu6NyqYdM1ypjRr_0MCO6hNzMuFHp4Qys9Z3PUW4xnpoAYfyTIQRc-wW7oo2-zRVbD0ZRaFeoJRT_TcwhGK5MZ4B9gAPssr9senYc_trqSvoGsinH_ozgoRHfrwR5_-GjRZ9tY/s1600-h/GoldenBaytoNapier.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 174px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgjSpCdbvyu6NyqYdM1ypjRr_0MCO6hNzMuFHp4Qys9Z3PUW4xnpoAYfyTIQRc-wW7oo2-zRVbD0ZRaFeoJRT_TcwhGK5MZ4B9gAPssr9senYc_trqSvoGsinH_ozgoRHfrwR5_-GjRZ9tY/s200/GoldenBaytoNapier.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5442647657136494274" title="The rides between Takaka and Napier, Dave and Duncan and Sarah is twice in the picture, Vicky is the lady in pink" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-31532309387311170572010-02-19T06:16:00.004+08:002010-02-19T06:24:16.438+08:0018th of February 2010I ended up staying 12 days at the <a href="http://www.sanssouciinn.co.nz/">Sans Souci Inn</a>, helping mainly with the cleaning in the morning or the serving of the meals and doing dishes in the evening. The whole place is really beautiful and environmental, built with clay bricks, grass roofs and probably the cleanest compost toilets I ever seen! Working only a few hours a day gave me lots of time to explore the area, and boy is the Golden Bay area worth exploring!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRoUA8TFENnyfhtEXMWw7wnBr6sIwhhs7AEjZGpaSNk0_7Wtlzy2pMJNOzt1VB0tVQQCN63eahcBs6v8f2jwa298UvmfL6NaODGRI-z4ssPjdciI5cce4WVTWoCpMMulqCB6si1gVYRmFm/s1600-h/WainuiFalls.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRoUA8TFENnyfhtEXMWw7wnBr6sIwhhs7AEjZGpaSNk0_7Wtlzy2pMJNOzt1VB0tVQQCN63eahcBs6v8f2jwa298UvmfL6NaODGRI-z4ssPjdciI5cce4WVTWoCpMMulqCB6si1gVYRmFm/s200/WainuiFalls.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439711926443679138" title="Wainui Falls"/></a><br />I explored scenic reserves full of cycads and limestone cliffs which made you think there could jump out a velociraptor around every corner, I went and looked at a beautiful waterfall, a huge cave, the Pupu springs which has the second clearest water in the world (only Antarctica has a clearer water) and the springs just creates a river out of nowhere. Visited several great beaches and I also went up to the north passing the famous Mussel Inn trying their beer and all the way up to the top having a look at the amazing Wharariki beach and doing the Hills track which gave me great views of the Farewell Spit and the cliffs on the way.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinKZ1DXRDC_a_T8ePyZ30MbLYhuLe4kDhi89RS7o9y_v-mfQdaxBCjZtstj1EaBH_OF3xuPq0c9fyoAAD-I8tI8D9qu6GDU0n9wEJOdh1F5xt1GxoP_J7aOSkknc5ShbHVmeR2bbFM0brX/s1600-h/WhararikiBeach.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 148px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEinKZ1DXRDC_a_T8ePyZ30MbLYhuLe4kDhi89RS7o9y_v-mfQdaxBCjZtstj1EaBH_OF3xuPq0c9fyoAAD-I8tI8D9qu6GDU0n9wEJOdh1F5xt1GxoP_J7aOSkknc5ShbHVmeR2bbFM0brX/s200/WhararikiBeach.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439711945709206834" title="Me at Wharariki Beach"/></a><br />But this Monday I said farewell to Vera and Reto and headed to the Abel Tasman National Park to do one of the great walks of New Zealand. On the way there I was picked up by an American dude, Scott, whom was doing the final research for his guidebook, <a href="http://www.nzfrenzy.com/">NZ Frenzy</a>, for the south Island, he gave me his guide book for the north island and signed it. An awesome book I have to say, because its his personal view on places and it doesn’t list rubbish like accommodation and restaurants, just different waterfalls, beaches, hot springs and similar.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhviR5sGffYnJZLb_VspwzhSfot9fLmosSLJCfl6BIxPFvqACGvqmRyIeta-Mk39FyuIu_dR14YI44_LnIvd4ndPLYj2V2tCT0OKE_3exG_BiBXDHmO2vhTCfhOMmJ6IgOcBwTesgKJHmA5/s1600-h/FarewellSpit.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhviR5sGffYnJZLb_VspwzhSfot9fLmosSLJCfl6BIxPFvqACGvqmRyIeta-Mk39FyuIu_dR14YI44_LnIvd4ndPLYj2V2tCT0OKE_3exG_BiBXDHmO2vhTCfhOMmJ6IgOcBwTesgKJHmA5/s200/FarewellSpit.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439711884190510482" title="Hiking along the Hill track with Farewell Spit in the background"/></a><br />The hike was 42 km long and took me 3 days. I have to say it was a little bit of a disappointment though after being around the Golden Bay area. It was very crowded and had these houses and even a village in the middle of the park which kind of ruins the experience.<br />I did pass a couple beautiful beaches and bays though, and had a few really awesome sunrises and sunsets.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgelgvClLexWLgwJmztXM811DavUTNeCabOH3tc-jvqRVXv0xudb0YJNWX6CtAdTttw47y_Rf3tFmUqOsX2VbBKfh_rC2iaEBhVDzJYAKXq_ZDlJoSe9wKYZShBcGQ26Tc29GAe66USSNUF/s1600-h/abeltasmansunrises.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 90px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgelgvClLexWLgwJmztXM811DavUTNeCabOH3tc-jvqRVXv0xudb0YJNWX6CtAdTttw47y_Rf3tFmUqOsX2VbBKfh_rC2iaEBhVDzJYAKXq_ZDlJoSe9wKYZShBcGQ26Tc29GAe66USSNUF/s200/abeltasmansunrises.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439711880069057778" title="Sunrise, sunset and Sunrise hiking the Abel Tasman Great Walk"/></a><br />Coming out in the south end of the park yesterday I hitched back to Pohara and Sans Souci Inn again and here I ran into a problem with NZ, as I mentioned in the previous entry hitching NZ is really easy, it’s Childs Play! So there are a lot of hitchers around which causes another problem, every now and then the spot you get dropped at already has another hitcher trying to get a ride.<br />Being a polite hitcher you of course walk further up the road and get behind the hitchers already there, first come first serve. This though can delay you ride quite some because the other hitcher most of the time needs to get a ride before you have a chance of getting picked up. Then we have all these newbie hitchers which actually don’t get behind you, but is a complete ass instead and starts hitching in front of you!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb2XRVKOhOEmeLXC67Tp4hm6WgUSLwuw5ocwxNIllO2tWBHcXFlBg-2gl_uWbaQk3acLwIPNtZL7Nz6gQ5pcveNSLHwoY5Zak2xO1IAK4mv9b5izm3iUWCNb0xkfyxFQC09bJcEd_SsuTV/s1600-h/WateringCover.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgb2XRVKOhOEmeLXC67Tp4hm6WgUSLwuw5ocwxNIllO2tWBHcXFlBg-2gl_uWbaQk3acLwIPNtZL7Nz6gQ5pcveNSLHwoY5Zak2xO1IAK4mv9b5izm3iUWCNb0xkfyxFQC09bJcEd_SsuTV/s200/WateringCover.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439711934862409858" title="Beach at the Watering Cove, on of the campsites on the Abel Tasman Coastal track"/></a><br />Anyway, I did get a ride back (even before the guys in front of me!) and picked up some stuff I left at the Inn which I didn’t want to carry with me during the hike. It had started rain quite a lot now so I hitched into the nearby Takaka and found a hostel for the night, today it is still raining (supposed to be nice tomorrow) so I decided to stay yet another night.<br />I have probably been riding in around 30 different cars the last 2 weeks, but because most of them have just been shorter rides I haven’t taken any photos except off this German tourist that picked me up 3 different times the same day and the following days I kept running into him everywhere. And the other photo is of Scott, the NZ Frenzy author.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWXWcUgODWrYmwUD3IqVyXrkRYTlMoJLqx4Nesdjt-SHJT3AKOmI4ps045CCIc4N2ptRfO86dyVBv52dW9TYtOPkXNYs8NY7cF-Qo03dwq9RyVDT-lhcs46y07LMmbErk7tqUpgFoZFebR/s1600-h/goldenbayhitches.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 75px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWXWcUgODWrYmwUD3IqVyXrkRYTlMoJLqx4Nesdjt-SHJT3AKOmI4ps045CCIc4N2ptRfO86dyVBv52dW9TYtOPkXNYs8NY7cF-Qo03dwq9RyVDT-lhcs46y07LMmbErk7tqUpgFoZFebR/s200/goldenbayhitches.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5439711412627278930" title="German Tourist and Scott Cook"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-5810922550640627722010-02-08T11:05:00.005+08:002010-02-10T11:04:18.299+08:004th of February 2010Landing in Christchurch, New Zealand, I was a bit confused what I would do next because I had expected Veronica to be by my side. But as I was now here and got a one year working holiday visa I headed into town and found myself a hostel. The next couple of days while trying to come up with a plan I also got myself a bank account and tax number and I tried to have my phone unlocked, which was a lot harder then one would think.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv9zGzoGzQwtztJjJXJrcJ-q9VkHTYfsZfCIlboK5vrluAgbUc7T-_uvPuDLF1gEv8GdasfRLt2sp2HjFCmYu0nwR3L5dxdFOTNScz2datyI1QZjVWVUfUsahu_4Om_W5YAHsPUa4iUOuC/s1600-h/leavingchristchurch.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 113px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv9zGzoGzQwtztJjJXJrcJ-q9VkHTYfsZfCIlboK5vrluAgbUc7T-_uvPuDLF1gEv8GdasfRLt2sp2HjFCmYu0nwR3L5dxdFOTNScz2datyI1QZjVWVUfUsahu_4Om_W5YAHsPUa4iUOuC/s200/leavingchristchurch.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5436008666822980050" title="Didn't even get out of Christchurch before I ran into the first Hitcher" /></a><br />So after a few days messing around and actually catching up with a friend from back home which just happened to be passing through Christchurch I gave up (on the phone part) and just decided I would leave town and see where the road takes me. I took a bus to the north outskirts of town (I never been north of Christchurch before, but I was in NZ in 2007 and went around the rest of the South Island) and started hitching, as usual its hard to get out of a city but once I got a ride everything started rolling and the next few days was just great.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNNmRZD1OC1AZLvU5ZMfIhT2THyNRiG2YV-BUu2rKKntKaEEy0sZ-NvoQXmVIlSr-TLJBJEFCsow__Gcdql3PRC4OmCSPtLefDZpT3brvUYYj1mrUiCCd93hQshJ45fbb3dQmwVcY4Uaur/s1600-h/QueenCharlotteRoad.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 120px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhNNmRZD1OC1AZLvU5ZMfIhT2THyNRiG2YV-BUu2rKKntKaEEy0sZ-NvoQXmVIlSr-TLJBJEFCsow__Gcdql3PRC4OmCSPtLefDZpT3brvUYYj1mrUiCCd93hQshJ45fbb3dQmwVcY4Uaur/s200/QueenCharlotteRoad.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5436008684725432354" title="Just west of Picton along the Queen Charlotte Road, NZ is a very pittoresque country"/></a><br />The first guy to pick me up bought me an ice cream when he dropped off, the second guy adviced me about great WWOOFing places he knew about in his area and gave me a bunch of organic fruits that he had grown himself. The third guy showed me a great spot to camp for the night. Later on two American guys came and put up their tent close to me and we got talking and the day after they gave me a ride further up north to Picton. From there I went west on a scenic route with a dutch dude followed by a brittish couple on their honeymoon!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkif3U_0y5xdAKkmXymSYqy5HwOgVXYvjLVvTLofhhUaP0WTeBPZaZdLGJZtNMidY7dZrjUjZO-ihyphenhyphenT3fIAXHQVAWxsG3K8n9IAKRM1QMEkkbF6oofulDpuwlIlYoOqmTTNaz3YxbOfAXO/s1600-h/leavingRichmond.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkif3U_0y5xdAKkmXymSYqy5HwOgVXYvjLVvTLofhhUaP0WTeBPZaZdLGJZtNMidY7dZrjUjZO-ihyphenhyphenT3fIAXHQVAWxsG3K8n9IAKRM1QMEkkbF6oofulDpuwlIlYoOqmTTNaz3YxbOfAXO/s200/leavingRichmond.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5436008670099463058" title="Leaving Nelson" /></a><br />The thing about New Zealand is that hitching is still going strong here, just in 3 days I have seen 12 other hitchers out there, compare that to Australia where I hitched for 150 days and saw in total 1 hitcher on the roads! So getting a ride in New Zealand is really easy, people around here are used to the hitchers which is great. But then on the other hand it does take away the uniqueness of what I am doing and doesn’t make me that exciting to people that do pick me up.<br />Finally I got to the town of Nelson in the north and checked into another hostel so I could have a shower and go through my options of what to do next.<br />That evening and following morning I called a few different WWOOFer hosts, I have explained this on my Oz hitch, but WWOOF stands for willing workers on organic farms, in short it means you work at a place for 4-6 hours a day and they feed you and give you a place to sleep as well as teaching you about what they do and show you around the area. Finally I found someone that had room and it just so happened to be one that the guy recommended to me the other day!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIXDx22kXrtFfIzpCZ6m770WBhIcvy7PsPWD8zetPbgWO979HDg0F-XFDJOUGySc8BPQSpsutVe6tXZ0Vssw7hBNwb6eRyKSH6OfeOajK2jizt2qmr-S9U9OIJtEb0gJsliRJAGH5lT-sk/s1600-h/Pohahabeach.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIXDx22kXrtFfIzpCZ6m770WBhIcvy7PsPWD8zetPbgWO979HDg0F-XFDJOUGySc8BPQSpsutVe6tXZ0Vssw7hBNwb6eRyKSH6OfeOajK2jizt2qmr-S9U9OIJtEb0gJsliRJAGH5lT-sk/s200/Pohahabeach.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5436008677316230082" title="Pohara Beach and Pohara, where Im currently staying at. Low tide which makes the beach some 200-300 wider because of the shallow water"/></a><br />So I hit the road again and two quick rides later I arrived in the small town of Pohara in the Golden Bay region where I’m now at. <br />So the next two weeks I will be working here a few hours a day at a place called Sans Souci Inn. It’s owned by a lovely Swiss couple, Vera and Reto, and they have accommodation and a restaurant at a really beautiful spot just 50m from the beach.<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1WUM8aMjTAzz44kI4iNZ-XfP53F6huFahleAb7q-ht7hPO-E8bvnpDzJNXzvzk8cvNyTdrwwiCoQd7Krsu1ZAds5l7-vKO7a8nZ2WaJBQrRSygqdKebVRUpg-jJBTr89J4dt8GQDjv3yh/s1600-h/1-3rdFebruary2010rides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1WUM8aMjTAzz44kI4iNZ-XfP53F6huFahleAb7q-ht7hPO-E8bvnpDzJNXzvzk8cvNyTdrwwiCoQd7Krsu1ZAds5l7-vKO7a8nZ2WaJBQrRSygqdKebVRUpg-jJBTr89J4dt8GQDjv3yh/s200/1-3rdFebruary2010rides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5435704032456847410" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-80956181762774659462010-01-29T16:07:00.005+08:002010-01-29T16:37:10.150+08:0027th of January 2010, AustraliaI have been a bit lazy on the blog writing front lately but Veronica has been writing the travel diary at resedagboken atleast, in Swedish though, but as mentioned before this blog is just dedicated to my hitching.<br />But hitched I have, a few times at least and just delayed writing about it but now finally I have taken myself the time to make a short (or so I thought) summary.<br />After Malaysia we headed over to Lombok (Indonesia) for two weeks then flew down to Perth, Australia, where I have lived some 16 months before so I could visit friends and show Veronica around the place.<br /><br />We wanted to see the Margaret River region which is about 300km south of Perth but didn’t feel like spending money on a rental car so we decided to take the city trains to Mandurah in the south parts of Perth and then start hitching from there.<br />As expected, hitching with a girl by your side makes life a lot easier, sure not as many have the room to pick you up but at least people aren’t as afraid of picking you up as they usually are. We even got asked several times during this trip if we needed a ride without even trying to hitch, we were just walking past with our backpacks on our backs. Lady luck was also with us and the first day we even got offered to stay for free in a really nice rental vacation house.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS7DfjstlFR4CVZEzcOqArPORSfOZtmGsMVBwqyKk4ToXkC3Aq4rZImMP5QLK6KzNFuc4JSqKiGOyDWlRMe-eFhM-855onZONBGI7uCH79aE7zWpKs2r9uMIg7qq3MSyr9rOMVdOtc8loP/s1600-h/leeuwin-naturaliseNPhitch.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS7DfjstlFR4CVZEzcOqArPORSfOZtmGsMVBwqyKk4ToXkC3Aq4rZImMP5QLK6KzNFuc4JSqKiGOyDWlRMe-eFhM-855onZONBGI7uCH79aE7zWpKs2r9uMIg7qq3MSyr9rOMVdOtc8loP/s200/leeuwin-naturaliseNPhitch.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432072020271064946" title="Veronica hitcing in the Leeuwin-Naturaliste National Park in the Margaret River region" /></a><br />In the Margaret River Region there are over 100 wineries spread out as well as beautiful beaches and caves and much more, for example a cheese factory and chocolates factory which you can all go to and do some free tasting on. So the next 2 days we hitched between the wineries and all the other things just tasting our way around, didn’t go to well the first day because we ended up on a side road. But after a while it started going better and the next day we were on a roll even being invited to a private cellar door tasting directly from the barrels at one of the fancier wineries. I think Veronica really got new found passion for wines and wine tasting after visiting the wine region of Margaret River!<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJCJqAjjMmudseezmESUV3i5zT_Ty9KUmflf5WL6Ujin8EHVZxekKEOepHWdQI4Pvca1h2DuIThYVQAE-mmqrooei5E18ths4ywhTGqyV5RLOB_4LWVwCFPUJftnrlQgCGX3oo0oRdp3TV/s1600-h/Margaretriverides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 100px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJCJqAjjMmudseezmESUV3i5zT_Ty9KUmflf5WL6Ujin8EHVZxekKEOepHWdQI4Pvca1h2DuIThYVQAE-mmqrooei5E18ths4ywhTGqyV5RLOB_4LWVwCFPUJftnrlQgCGX3oo0oRdp3TV/s200/Margaretriverides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432070990550950834" title="Margaret River rides"/></a>The next hitching we did was the 1000 km from Adelaide to Melbourne after having crossed the Nullarbor in a relocation camper van during Christmas and then spending new years in Adelaide. Once again the hitching went with relative ease and just after 2 rides we ended up in the Grampians National Park in Victoria where we wanted to have a look before we kept going further. Driving into the Grampians I was stunned by the beauty of the place and the incredible amounts of kangaroos that came out in the dusk, literally hundreds of them grazing for the night. Sadly the whole Grampians experience was ruined for me when we arrived in the town of Halls Gap, so sadly exploited, expensive and full of tourists. They even dared to charge 30 dollars for us to put up a tent. Hiking the trails from Halls Gap the next day was steaming hot, I passed some really nice places too but sadly there were people everywhere. If we had known this beforehand we would just have found us a bush camp while driving across the park on our way to Halls Gap so we could have got away from the crowds and enjoyed the place in it's full splendour.<br />After staying in Halls Gap three nights we kept on hitching towards Melbourne.<br />It’s interesting how I start to realize how many things you actually have to think about when hitching to make it as easy as possible and the best experience for both me and the people that do pick me up. So it felt like Veronica was my young padawan, trying to teach her the skills and tricks of hitching.<br />A great thing about hitching with someone else is also that one of you can relax if you want to, so one person can sit on the side of the road chilling (just make sure the person is seen by the drivers also) while the other person hitch. Same goes for riding in the car, just make sure one of the hitchers keep the driver entertained and happy and the person in the backseat can go to sleep or just daydream. The last ride we got for the day Veronica was in the front seat and I think I forgot to point out to her to keep an eye on where the driver is actually driving. Often it happens<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1PhGcEhUMYZfT1HEGEi_DvwM_d_mUvsZveqMhMiEdHX02oVkO_iB6658spiqUpHXex9iKKxfDSn1Ws9j8VgNZPsH122zXdEUw9jWdicnD9eR7ywp7GB8j6s9ORyW31Mf-lAP9ihu25Kpf/s1600-h/TheGrampians.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg1PhGcEhUMYZfT1HEGEi_DvwM_d_mUvsZveqMhMiEdHX02oVkO_iB6658spiqUpHXex9iKKxfDSn1Ws9j8VgNZPsH122zXdEUw9jWdicnD9eR7ywp7GB8j6s9ORyW31Mf-lAP9ihu25Kpf/s200/TheGrampians.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432072022121978162" title="Northeast part of the Grampians with the small town of Halls Gap in the middle"/></a> that they think they have a great idea and end up dropping you at a hard spot or by the train/bus station because they think it will help you (of course always in the best intentions). What some people don’t seem to understand is that I/we actually have chosen to hitchhike and enjoy it and therefore have no need to spend money on public transport.<br />Anyway, we suddenly ended up in Ballarat which is the second biggest city in Victoria and quite a turnoff from the highway to get to. So instead of walking a couple of kilometres to hitch again we took a bus directly to the Melbourne airport where we caught a plane the same day to Hobart, Tasmania. To make up on the Ballarat miss we walked out of the Hobart airport and got a quick ride into Hobart and a private tour of the town while we were at it :D<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaLssjsgTXazByCS9tq7cFwRXb_QfGES4eVQJ5MMfGuxo1WuFjvjHqIVV3WcTrBUyYILWrqsHHY1m9H7Y0ymJ4_LMMsiL_5qjMBOXbbtY9GYqVV0Qd40DheKEhH6dRHloCizGtR9pm-XIh/s1600-h/adelaidemelbournerides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaLssjsgTXazByCS9tq7cFwRXb_QfGES4eVQJ5MMfGuxo1WuFjvjHqIVV3WcTrBUyYILWrqsHHY1m9H7Y0ymJ4_LMMsiL_5qjMBOXbbtY9GYqVV0Qd40DheKEhH6dRHloCizGtR9pm-XIh/s200/adelaidemelbournerides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432070981283410658" title="The rides between Adelaide and Melbourne, and the Hobart one" /></a>After going around Tasmania (I’m just totally in love with that island, so beautiful and amazing!) for about 2 weeks we flew up to Melbourne again, Veronica had decided that she had enough of the travelling and caught another flight that night and thus begun the long journey home to Sweden.<br />Myself I spent the night at the airport and the next day I took a short bus ride to get out of the city and started hitching west towards the Rainbow Serpent.<br />The Rainbow Serpent is Australia’s biggest Bush Doof, kind of like the one I went to outside Cairns when going around Australia. Tracey had told me about it before and it was something I really wanted to see and experience as well as catching up with Tracey again.<br />Located in a beautiful valley of paddocks just next to a huge forest in the middle of nowhere they had setup the area with 5 different stages and so many unique cloth and food stalls as well as workshops and other cool things. 13 000 people showed up with their tents and campervans and the doof kept on going from Friday<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhafcZf6IVGYyHuWhtAJ9cJL1ma4pG_c1IXj1Th8EyllmPDddYLFMyPsH_eXPpvYnMJkCZf90A9jKF3ZRQFVQB2-31CYGZV18Oco6PxnwRoxOZmyx8bYYR4A5SZOlev8m3KhA8Z5dbKxEyP/s1600-h/RS2010.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhafcZf6IVGYyHuWhtAJ9cJL1ma4pG_c1IXj1Th8EyllmPDddYLFMyPsH_eXPpvYnMJkCZf90A9jKF3ZRQFVQB2-31CYGZV18Oco6PxnwRoxOZmyx8bYYR4A5SZOlev8m3KhA8Z5dbKxEyP/s200/RS2010.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432072030317977874" title="Market Stage at Rainbow Serpent 2010 on the final day"/></a> afternoon until midnight Monday night. So I went there and found Tracey, who’s car I would recognize anywhere. Then I had a blast with her and her friends for the next couple of days. The music was a bit of a disappointment, very few times they found just the right beat but everything else was amazing, the people, they way they dressed up and the art and workshops around. The heat was scorching during the days and really cold during the night, but it all just added to the total experience.<br />On Tuesday Tracey gave me a ride to the airport in Melbourne only for me to miss my check in by 2 minutes because of the signage to the showers on the airport! So I had to pay another 100 dollars to get on the flight the next day and decided to save money and spend the 25 hours on the airport which gave me the time to write this entry <br />Next destination, New Zealand.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEFQZLF0LXS66LbubPGU7Sy8qDVmGdMFxmYC5Km-pExKe7-FWfwDItILP6bsaBlnZsE8fP684EA8RE5DlN-NPzi8rLIQ4lloj6nfAGnmRqeacygY0spMf1_6D_e2-3syzLEysDKJd7FpyO/s1600-h/RSrides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 133px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhEFQZLF0LXS66LbubPGU7Sy8qDVmGdMFxmYC5Km-pExKe7-FWfwDItILP6bsaBlnZsE8fP684EA8RE5DlN-NPzi8rLIQ4lloj6nfAGnmRqeacygY0spMf1_6D_e2-3syzLEysDKJd7FpyO/s200/RSrides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5432070999171324770" title="Rides to and from Rainbow Serpent, sadly I didnt get a photo of 2 of the cars going there. Tracey and Carlos on the second one :)"/></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-18843710398784210382009-10-23T20:24:00.006+08:002009-10-28T13:45:07.741+08:0023rd of October 2009, MalaysiaAs most of you probably know I and Veronica flew down to Malaysia to spend two weeks in the country before continuing to Bali and then Australia for a while and going to New Zealand to stay for a year after that.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLrVRF2Mv2Qyk21SGW_pl3WTD8daM5FLQQ4yisIxrdguHeHz9BP_am2zEJTd9K8cO56bcHirmXe0BLvtTKY2v1SZnZNC1LzL1XOqehIfmg2uZEV1Hb3SIhxZDf4xNeB-jQqgzlWJKoGyDO/s1600-h/gundumbrinchang.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLrVRF2Mv2Qyk21SGW_pl3WTD8daM5FLQQ4yisIxrdguHeHz9BP_am2zEJTd9K8cO56bcHirmXe0BLvtTKY2v1SZnZNC1LzL1XOqehIfmg2uZEV1Hb3SIhxZDf4xNeB-jQqgzlWJKoGyDO/s200/gundumbrinchang.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397518240973926002" title="Hiking up the mountain"/></a><br />It’s the first time for the both of us in South East Asia so we started out pretty cautiously being herded around like most other tourists, but it didn’t take many days before the both of us got sick of it and started catching local trains and buses instead until we ended up in the town of Gua Musang which from there were no buses going west to Cameron Highlands where we wanted to go. So we decided that we should try to hitch instead, being the first time I hitched in a country that I did not understand the local language (not counting Finland) it was an all new experience.<br />It took us some time to get the first ride, but as previous experience has shown you have to get out of the city on a road with no major intersections so people know what way you are heading, and once we walked out of town sweating like pigs in the 30+<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbf1dxjB1kcYVuaXZiPgSLzL9EXB1tibiye0agiJNQzSzcSFRkbJsZ6zv6hnCVaTTN7FZ6P_1rBgPc3dFnvt7eSngcc1prQDLHXyE7OhOHg9q_Z2lT-RE5FD0hLOq5HPkpDdw5VVZju9ON/s1600-h/teaplantation.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbf1dxjB1kcYVuaXZiPgSLzL9EXB1tibiye0agiJNQzSzcSFRkbJsZ6zv6hnCVaTTN7FZ6P_1rBgPc3dFnvt7eSngcc1prQDLHXyE7OhOHg9q_Z2lT-RE5FD0hLOq5HPkpDdw5VVZju9ON/s200/teaplantation.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397518232128258754" title="The first we saw of the tea plantations"/></a> humid heat with big backpacks we got picked up by a truck. The guy spoke very good English and dropped us of some 20 kilometres later at a turn off and it didn’t take long at all to get another ride with another truck packed to the brim with big logs. This time the driver spoke no English at all but was none the less a very happy guy playing the same cd over and over while tormently slow going up and down and round the corners into the highlands doing about 15-20 kilometres an hour, so it took us about 3 hours to get to where the plantations of the highlands were starting, and another minute later we were sitting in a new car getting a ride to the town of Brinchang where we wanted to go.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2m6n6DXTbQJn09ktUn5Tm7BSRDXi5l6mstMgSrjcMG4Qn3NSKi5riS0wP_Rintyk_Qi6X7u0NX9Cev-eS1BFYrcqBqX3BArGFTGPNhfslfbVxUpdTOpn79YMhiQ9fVtSNA_xP8bVqZ6UV/s1600-h/simontea.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2m6n6DXTbQJn09ktUn5Tm7BSRDXi5l6mstMgSrjcMG4Qn3NSKi5riS0wP_Rintyk_Qi6X7u0NX9Cev-eS1BFYrcqBqX3BArGFTGPNhfslfbVxUpdTOpn79YMhiQ9fVtSNA_xP8bVqZ6UV/s200/simontea.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397518239058970722" title="Me at the BoH Tea Plantation"/></a><br />So it seems hitching is extremely easy in this country being a backpacker (looking like a westerner and having a big backpack does the trick I guess).<br />The following day we trekked up the highest mountain in the area (Gundum Brinchang, 2063m) and then walked down a road getting fantastic views of the tea plantations and trying some excellent tea directly from the tea factory. After that we hitched back into town which proved to be really easy once again.<br />So that’s it, a new country and a new continent hitched :)<br />Keep checking here for more entries in the future (maybe at the page as a RSS feed or subscribe to it)<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLcXAL5dpmOt3TE4TJcRmOis1M9eWt83e7KcdzlcGKHEl0zfR63PgIgPEN9NtAhG6oxBB__QJkJhVIv71Kiyp7UGATT77jziwG-BnW67-L4BZwk21H2pqHNVhSdbLBVUDRqiXYLAQnGtR0/s1600-h/malaysiahitch.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 50px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLcXAL5dpmOt3TE4TJcRmOis1M9eWt83e7KcdzlcGKHEl0zfR63PgIgPEN9NtAhG6oxBB__QJkJhVIv71Kiyp7UGATT77jziwG-BnW67-L4BZwk21H2pqHNVhSdbLBVUDRqiXYLAQnGtR0/s200/malaysiahitch.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397518322827875106" title="The 3 rides of the first day" /></a><br />Edit: And oh, as I mentioned before I am really bad at giving people my number or telling them about my blog, so just before I left Sweden I had a “business” card printed, just saying “Sibbe The Hitcher”, and I tell people to just Google it. So I guess having a business card makes me a professional Hitchhiker? =P<br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHe_ru7KUBOsILwbBzUyrGBjtHXCM55PUU9EVxfz_gFJ9ojekTxrWykk1hnpNP1zoLTMfAyeksXJCAAhsNAwC0GjGYWf0_984Vwp8Q-3pMWGe28bB0uWf5m3ydr-3S3Sc4yA0vRFTnxdam/s1600-h/visitkort.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 151px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiHe_ru7KUBOsILwbBzUyrGBjtHXCM55PUU9EVxfz_gFJ9ojekTxrWykk1hnpNP1zoLTMfAyeksXJCAAhsNAwC0GjGYWf0_984Vwp8Q-3pMWGe28bB0uWf5m3ydr-3S3Sc4yA0vRFTnxdam/s200/visitkort.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5397522631282556290" title="business card" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-83025860157569843432009-09-20T03:31:00.010+08:002009-10-03T16:07:34.440+08:00Final Entry Hitch Around SwedenAnd so once again I am home, quite a relief because it has been an exhausting journey but I already do start to miss the road and meeting all the new exciting people, after being home for only 3 days.<br />Let me first show you the statistics of this trip:<br /><br />Days hitched: 50<br />Distance hitched: 7700 kilometres<br />Number of cars: 208<br />Money spent: 685,50 SEK (400,50 SEK)<br />Average spent a day: 13,17 SEK (8,01 SEK)<br />Weight lost: 8 kilograms<br /><br />50 is a great number of days to see a country the size of Sweden, sure I haven’t seen all the places I wanted, quite far from it but you can’t see everything now can you? <br />Sweden is also a quite large country in EU standards so it became quite a few kilometres to go around.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiselZwi4EznWFmbT7RkHqRXVAGQiHmto3nsEE_LkVTNDak5KoHBdPkCTG8ho-AZWz67oGhptMSjaZQaMFiYtB0GLyFlJ6aQQkhrk2cbmsCfMjhfIu7v6eA8Huktt5KdnFxeQcZa2iJZAs/s1600-h/50days.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiiselZwi4EznWFmbT7RkHqRXVAGQiHmto3nsEE_LkVTNDak5KoHBdPkCTG8ho-AZWz67oGhptMSjaZQaMFiYtB0GLyFlJ6aQQkhrk2cbmsCfMjhfIu7v6eA8Huktt5KdnFxeQcZa2iJZAs/s200/50days.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264247650020866" title="50 Days growth, pathetic" /></a><br />208 cars may seem a lot and quite hard to imagine when you know about the famous Swedish attitude. Sure I have had good days and bad days, but all the people that have picked me up have all been very friendly. People often asked me if it really is possible to hitch in Sweden because how closed in the Swedish mentality is and has become, but the people that lock themselves in and are afraid of strangers never pick me up, so I don’t get to meet these people. The people that do pick me almost always are very friendly and social and do want me in their car and like to help other people out, also very often they have stood there once themselves on the side of the road and know how frustrating it can be.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgno2yl6_XOnHSzp9kiHhqYux_qyydFgDdg50b9ckHpuZ8UwIFLY_9K6e1n0dJqGTi6DvemeS5Yw1gf5klONzE1PBjocfpwIGyDkCoDZdh2VRGb9aLd0nJnvM2BIHF2dqMD6xDW9xr1eFiU/s1600-h/odd.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgno2yl6_XOnHSzp9kiHhqYux_qyydFgDdg50b9ckHpuZ8UwIFLY_9K6e1n0dJqGTi6DvemeS5Yw1gf5klONzE1PBjocfpwIGyDkCoDZdh2VRGb9aLd0nJnvM2BIHF2dqMD6xDW9xr1eFiU/s200/odd.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264454643910818" title="The most odd ride of the trip" /></a><br /><br />Then there is the budget limit, the primary issue/challenge of this trip.<br />Before I started this trip I did a quick calculation to see how much a person could live on food wise, and came to the conclusion that 20 SEK would be enough. I added 5 SEK for unexpected expenses like toothpaste, kitchen fuel and etc. Then I set out on the road with a goal not to spend more then this amount on average a day.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMLNXb7FPBDkNZX4N3J78yZMoydwy2ULvmlJXJMGyN0EShSNibHtGAuFJdMkyrt-yo9KrgGfPZNI-OBlH40m4-XTR3xHuhWogjEX97L33KxxHwOA7JIiiqrqBkc7KOXcic-BXZuyD-jWBf/s1600-h/brekkie.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiMLNXb7FPBDkNZX4N3J78yZMoydwy2ULvmlJXJMGyN0EShSNibHtGAuFJdMkyrt-yo9KrgGfPZNI-OBlH40m4-XTR3xHuhWogjEX97L33KxxHwOA7JIiiqrqBkc7KOXcic-BXZuyD-jWBf/s200/brekkie.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264260848477106" title="Breakfast in Småland" /></a><br />How has it gone? Well as you can see it has gone very well! In total I spent 658,50 SEK which makes it an incredible 13,17 a day. But 3 people on this trip have also insisted on giving me money, 258 SEK in total. So this means that this trip in total cost me personally 400,50 SEK, 8 SEK a day!<br />None of this of course would have been possible without the great and helpful people that picked me up and helped me by giving me a ride and much more, and of course my friends that let me leech on them for a night or two.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMrNU7Jz_nYmedLZl_Zq96JIg1QvyzURKyYjY_RjW7X9acQYB6flqP-YyDBdLpGZhnPPX71sklYyeADDDl-d4ZP06ZxogQ5_7OPZjx2XVz1HmkVM_F9bc-FnAuBQb1WQlbaokXvuwnzhld/s1600-h/dinner.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMrNU7Jz_nYmedLZl_Zq96JIg1QvyzURKyYjY_RjW7X9acQYB6flqP-YyDBdLpGZhnPPX71sklYyeADDDl-d4ZP06ZxogQ5_7OPZjx2XVz1HmkVM_F9bc-FnAuBQb1WQlbaokXvuwnzhld/s200/dinner.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264267773655746" title="Dinner in Bohuslän" /></a><br />But to really live on a tight budget like this you have to have to be very disciplined, never spend money on anything else then food (of the 658,5 SEK 30 was spent on a entry in Orrefors, the rest has been on food in supermarkets) that you prepare yourself. So I have lived on mashed potatoes/rice/pasta in the evenings and mixed it with beans or tuna. And in the mornings I’ve eaten the cheapest muesli and dry milk, sure it might have been better to make some oat porridge but then I would have had to spend expensive fuel.<br />I also have picked and eaten wild cherries, blueberries, lingonberries, cloudberries, chantarelles, raspberries, apples, wild strawberries, crowberries and more so I have been getting some much needed vitamins in me.<br />But as I finally arrived back home I wouldn’t have made it another day without buying new toothpaste, fuel for my kitchen, tape for the feet and I was also completely out of all food.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWUpuwJXPy2yHezPUlWMFsx3gZYRH64o4mCMCEt6qFsR4gTBSOMLyBeRVyGWE76pgdAuYkU4StM88NIxSeAnstataYJxvrRXLmydSy9hGYC3arzQnpjFOeE0iIWtAuNaQsD18C1ooxnKjc/s1600-h/bags.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 112px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWUpuwJXPy2yHezPUlWMFsx3gZYRH64o4mCMCEt6qFsR4gTBSOMLyBeRVyGWE76pgdAuYkU4StM88NIxSeAnstataYJxvrRXLmydSy9hGYC3arzQnpjFOeE0iIWtAuNaQsD18C1ooxnKjc/s200/bags.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264255852229330" title="Its very hard to take a picture of yourself hitching, so it usually becomes just a bunch of pictures of the backpack" /></a><br />As you can understand this trip has been really exhausting both mentally and physically, standing hour after hour on the side of the road, one day it’s pissing down and the next the sun is burning your skin. You never know how far you will get that day, where you will sleep that night or in how many days you will have your next shower. Sleeping badly every night, living on the cheapest food you can find and hiking 10-20 kilometres some days. Always forced to have a positive attitude and being really friendly and social to everyone that picks you up.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDWWWj4_mDMdbwssdpUQ5Tko6oOgNfKErK2PIaizgqf1J6YkvqiWiqbEYkRgsJX6_k7c_dWUzgwcmTXrFJerAKz2O-i_ttffczkErMghU8VA3pI18Log3JH3TzHJump5Ss68Qmq1s_jdV-/s1600-h/hitching.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDWWWj4_mDMdbwssdpUQ5Tko6oOgNfKErK2PIaizgqf1J6YkvqiWiqbEYkRgsJX6_k7c_dWUzgwcmTXrFJerAKz2O-i_ttffczkErMghU8VA3pI18Log3JH3TzHJump5Ss68Qmq1s_jdV-/s200/hitching.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264271335786930" title="Only picture of myself hitching on the whole ride" /></a><br />I do love the challenge, but it is exhausting and these 50 days I have lost 8 kilograms (was down to 74 kilograms when I got home, being 193cm long that is really low especially considering I weighed 92 kilos the first time I went to Oz.)<br /><br />It is always interesting to go see your own country, and more people should do it. There is really a lot to see in Sweden, tons of old castles, churches, ancient monuments and similar, but also a lot of nature being one of the bigger but least populated places in Europe.<br />One sad thing I noticed travelling the north, and which has been talked a lot about is all the small towns. Its only elderly people living there, the schools have all shut down and so has the petrol stations, so it’s quite impossible for a young couple with children to move there which means in another 15-20<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4qC95JNwTe8g8_FoxnYSFXj3RdhGy4W7Qm6D5AdwYtZ0-Hi3Hw0xFpyy3Ec9RZ_kaIGTtHpYOllaBLLeoVSwuYjwL8wLAAMEu7AV0xuxUBekF1uM5YEuldpkZ7t5f8hGl1W4GBUhcnBAS/s1600-h/tannas.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4qC95JNwTe8g8_FoxnYSFXj3RdhGy4W7Qm6D5AdwYtZ0-Hi3Hw0xFpyy3Ec9RZ_kaIGTtHpYOllaBLLeoVSwuYjwL8wLAAMEu7AV0xuxUBekF1uM5YEuldpkZ7t5f8hGl1W4GBUhcnBAS/s200/tannas.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264456160746210" title="Sign in Tännäs in Hälsingland, selling land to build permanent houses for 1 SEK a piece" /></a> years all this small old towns will completely die out. It’s also very noticeable in the bigger populated towns that don’t have big industry like a mine to support them like Jokkmokk which have lost more then half of it’s population since the 60s.<br /><br />So now I am home again, getting back lost sleep and doing my best to regain my weight for my next trip. On the 12th of October me and Veronica are leaving for Malaysia, Bali, Australia and eventually New Zealand. Not planning to hitch in Malaysia and<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTZgA4BYT3iOco8NmlRkp7a_Jc5522mSlTS12ix_nW6nOF9YOLmzo0s7nq3MNa46OVqi2Z2nCuqJxbnYgk1O8RCaVX1WviBkg7JFHEAlTU2k2pVvry7BoT2jxNHx37q8D6md4b7rP2gntY/s1600-h/lofoten.JPG"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTZgA4BYT3iOco8NmlRkp7a_Jc5522mSlTS12ix_nW6nOF9YOLmzo0s7nq3MNa46OVqi2Z2nCuqJxbnYgk1O8RCaVX1WviBkg7JFHEAlTU2k2pVvry7BoT2jxNHx37q8D6md4b7rP2gntY/s200/lofoten.JPG" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383264443272506098" title="Me on Lofoten, thanks for reading my blog :)"/></a> Bali but might do in Oz and NZ. If I do I will let you know and write about it here.<br /><br />And last but far from least, HUGE thanks to everyone that picked me up and helped me on this trip and my girlfriend and friends Veronica, Christoffer, Nils, Isabelle and Anders. It would never been possible without you!<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWYK06aroIOzjGw-Nz2cQRbgIryOISCfCk4_nm1zRjD7zs0Pm4g4HJ_ElyW_LeUxFE07i8URBjhfIuEP3L-_1D2u263DbNZbOKNKo4Z8dkAiEEKsbrsWIBSCLiJG6dATf5_W0FxmFx1-NK/s1600-h/Rides.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 103px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWYK06aroIOzjGw-Nz2cQRbgIryOISCfCk4_nm1zRjD7zs0Pm4g4HJ_ElyW_LeUxFE07i8URBjhfIuEP3L-_1D2u263DbNZbOKNKo4Z8dkAiEEKsbrsWIBSCLiJG6dATf5_W0FxmFx1-NK/s320/Rides.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5383263689939380450" title="Thanks everyone!"/></a><br /><br />Thanks to everyone reading this, hope you have enjoyed it. Comments and critique is very welcome so I know if you like it and if there are things that can be improved :)<br /><br />edit: Also for anyone interested, I have added on the map where I hitched in Australia.Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-15181296029621835512009-09-16T01:18:00.006+08:002009-09-16T15:04:11.735+08:0015th of September 2009Leaving Vårgårda I had to backtrack some, found out that I forgot about Halleberg which I was planning to check out also. But quickly got a few rides and a lady buying me a hamburger meal because she felt sorry for me being hungry.<br />Halleberg and Hunneberg is supposed to be one of northern Europes elk richest areas, it’s also the King of Sweden’s hunting ground. Walked around there for about 3 hours but as usual I didn’t see a single animal, did get a nice view of Vänern,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgpfAPUpP-hAQ3ZVtE_ZXaJ5Neq0AGqrGoN8ke368aMI9X4DpSMA6rgZKY_rbDtpLEW4apavbr_r1QR1HgAwA2HpUKPQ_rB9ZPmyRYEuWQRpsl9sG6AEdIYgZqCnrW2G1YS1sBSj-nMGZk/s1600-h/halleberg.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhgpfAPUpP-hAQ3ZVtE_ZXaJ5Neq0AGqrGoN8ke368aMI9X4DpSMA6rgZKY_rbDtpLEW4apavbr_r1QR1HgAwA2HpUKPQ_rB9ZPmyRYEuWQRpsl9sG6AEdIYgZqCnrW2G1YS1sBSj-nMGZk/s200/halleberg.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381745393092431826" title="Vänern from Halleberg at the Predikstolen lookout" /></a> Swedens biggest lake, from the hill though. From there I hitched back some again and further east. Spent the night by a petrol station in Götene, talked to some police officers that thought I was up to no good and then went into the petrol station just before they closed and got myself two free hot dogs!<br />Next day I hitched to Kinnekulle, a hill/mountain covered in a bunch of nature reserves. Don’t know why I really wanted to go here but if one is into the Arn books (which I haven’t read myself)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP8lJdWWrcQMcub3Om6_wo0Ar2PfXsq4F5wwxWNPqFvo7DMUDb0wqWTwqis0xQjuRCBx5eaQVnOt72nCM6jA4Z0MX9zE7nc910AxG4_R1N57UhtDipxJF04vb7Z0IP_jAs4lBc4F1FcET0/s1600-h/oldchurch.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjP8lJdWWrcQMcub3Om6_wo0Ar2PfXsq4F5wwxWNPqFvo7DMUDb0wqWTwqis0xQjuRCBx5eaQVnOt72nCM6jA4Z0MX9zE7nc910AxG4_R1N57UhtDipxJF04vb7Z0IP_jAs4lBc4F1FcET0/s200/oldchurch.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381745416815800018" title="One of many old churches, this one built during the 12th century when christianity really started to take a hold in Sweden" /></a> it is probably a good area to visit. Did some hiking and checked out the lookout tower, the view was quite foggy but on a good day you are supposed to be able to see 63 different churches from up there despite almost half the view consists of Vänern.<br />I hitched down from Kinnekulle and continued further east, had a guy give me a wine bottle out the blue when getting dropped in Skövde, and got picked up by 4 Somalis after him. Sadly I didn’t get a picture of these either, seems to be hard to get photos of Somalis! Next I arrived in Karlsborg which is home of the Karlsborg fortress, one of the biggest buildings in Europe<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisSATbZaxbEXxO-5i4iaclOCG7NpzaQ8bbZeU45VpTINMR37yZhSWDHgTV2GmdbIMXPcFXORiNNPC-3B5sYzoxi1Sqrdkos9LNC5By_LjWujmyPlTNbQn6foF0P5Wqetj5CSRCju_gELxi/s1600-h/karlsborg.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisSATbZaxbEXxO-5i4iaclOCG7NpzaQ8bbZeU45VpTINMR37yZhSWDHgTV2GmdbIMXPcFXORiNNPC-3B5sYzoxi1Sqrdkos9LNC5By_LjWujmyPlTNbQn6foF0P5Wqetj5CSRCju_gELxi/s200/karlsborg.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381745403260044114" title="A small part of the Karlsborg fortress" /></a>. They started to build it in 1819 to protect against the Russians but didn’t finished it until 90 years later and by then it was obsolete and there was no longer a threat from the Russians. As with most other places the tours and museum had closed for the season, so couldn’t see much and its hard to get a picture of a building that has a circumference of about 5 kilometers.<br />After walking around some in Karlsborg I hitched to the town to Hjo and set up my tent for the night next to another petrol station and pizza place (not the smartest of ideas on a Saturday night) and once again I got hot dogs for free! I make such a great bum.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0uqDiITbtAdb4-e_BlAynQLKtupFmuO2f9K_FdWhN2pDTRVr2KPvRsMDh1ianhY9AGpeWmXKOrZhAsahjoQRKAhcJaCDq77RHr9XJQ5-0ubpqpYFo9_o37JUAPEqNIku-uJvAq4jACMk_/s1600-h/ikea.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0uqDiITbtAdb4-e_BlAynQLKtupFmuO2f9K_FdWhN2pDTRVr2KPvRsMDh1ianhY9AGpeWmXKOrZhAsahjoQRKAhcJaCDq77RHr9XJQ5-0ubpqpYFo9_o37JUAPEqNIku-uJvAq4jACMk_/s200/ikea.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381745402083791874" title="The Worlds very first IKEA, in Älmhult. The IKEA museum is around the corner to" /></a><br />After that I wasn’t really planning to see anything else, and I figured I could time it quite perfectly and get home on day 50. So I hitched south.<br />The last few days haven’t seen any to exciting things, but on the other hand I met some really great people while hitching. Sadly it would fill way too many pages to write about them all in this blog.<br />On the way south I did a quick side trip to get a picture of the greatest thing to ever come out of Sweden, the worlds first IKEA!<br />Then I kept on going south into Skåne and set up the tent for the night just north of Degeberga.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLsf2CrxyBPiN4KP9ZJ7CdzIrDcZLS2xdSw3YhY1WEDmLBm00go-eW-hO-n3dpKvdpQXrzj_pOxl9kGzUODVmAdacWHhbEOXqi2ekYk_TXThJkCEAx05uBtMzCXom8L-2BH15ifvT6V9Nx/s1600-h/abbekasskylt.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhLsf2CrxyBPiN4KP9ZJ7CdzIrDcZLS2xdSw3YhY1WEDmLBm00go-eW-hO-n3dpKvdpQXrzj_pOxl9kGzUODVmAdacWHhbEOXqi2ekYk_TXThJkCEAx05uBtMzCXom8L-2BH15ifvT6V9Nx/s200/abbekasskylt.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381745386848495778" title="So close to home, just one more ride!"/></a><br />The next morning I got up real early just to get home fast just to have to wait 4 hours before the first car picked me up! I keep on preaching to people that you can never be on a hurry when hitching or have to be somewhere by a certain time, and of course I broke my own rule on the very last day. But eventually I did get a few a more rides until I got to Skurup where I got interviewed by <a href="http://www.ystadsallehanda.se/article/20090914/SKURUP/977046071/1069/SKURUP/&/Simon-akte-landet-runt-pa-tummen">the local newspaper</a>. Then I hitched last 10 kilometers home. And the very last ride to pick me up on this trip when having about 3 km left was my own dad on his way home from work :D<br />So I came home yesterday, have been unpacking my stuff and eating a lot, but the hunger doesn’t cease and I think I will grab myself another sandwich right now.<br />Give it another 2-3 days and I will make a final entry for this journey with statistics and my thoughts, future plans and etc.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyG3fxM8ohCeZMsZDwujJfLBWxPrLJaRbgJ67RfIO2wa03uWdQPm0OG6NmGUhvupV3uCjYCHBN30SfGm20szAlYf_E7HdwDx4qwAy8AOp9RzerRJIOPMAJEExKhMbIffrjlHXULmeiR4ao/s1600-h/day47-50.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 67px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyG3fxM8ohCeZMsZDwujJfLBWxPrLJaRbgJ67RfIO2wa03uWdQPm0OG6NmGUhvupV3uCjYCHBN30SfGm20szAlYf_E7HdwDx4qwAy8AOp9RzerRJIOPMAJEExKhMbIffrjlHXULmeiR4ao/s200/day47-50.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5381745035315201490" title="Day 47-50. The last one is my dad outside their house. " /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-41427799240149194512009-09-11T14:17:00.003+08:002009-09-11T14:26:36.847+08:0011th of September 2009This trip is really starting to get the best of me, yesterday I was walking around hungry and just tired in the whole body despite I had eaten properly and slept. I have run out of tape for my feet, my kitchen fuel is almost out and so is my toothpaste, but I wont be buying anything new. Same goes for the food, scrounging up all the leftovers I have in my bag and only buying the cheapest there is. Peasoup yesterday (7 SEK) and a can of beans in tomato sauce with the pasta leftovers later today (5 SEK). I know I will be home in a couple of days and I’m trying to break some kind of record in how little money I’ve spent, its really low this far.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijCf5eE8WOkWH3N1DglwgTcr1cIuJ4VziCs1kcly2h05e83axW9Vf1vY5z3sz8kdurLGAzfJ__pPCSzJl5AALPfPmWPXnak9QxYHcHTmsARV5O1ckuqfjFr2fMyJd3T5V0ifQdrLSOUvVX/s1600-h/haverud.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijCf5eE8WOkWH3N1DglwgTcr1cIuJ4VziCs1kcly2h05e83axW9Vf1vY5z3sz8kdurLGAzfJ__pPCSzJl5AALPfPmWPXnak9QxYHcHTmsARV5O1ckuqfjFr2fMyJd3T5V0ifQdrLSOUvVX/s200/haverud.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380090924589074578" title="The Håverud Aqueduct" /></a><br />Left Orsa after finishing my last entry. Had a pretty good day of hitching and good a long ride with a dude that was teaching kite surfing on both water and snow, really renewed my interest to learn to kite surf. Eventually I ended up Håverud in Dalsland, Håverud has this aqueduct for boats, that’s built because the river was too harsh there, and then on top of the aqueduct is a railroad, and then a road bridge and also a walking bridge, so its kind of layer on layer. Walked around and had a look and then set up my tent by a parking lot.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiduTMsCgLbxbfbNNER5XlENdpVEJIDNzcwZ8axFmey5wABLZVH1hH-58venjuYnpTaO6znoSlN-GVk8oAl8jmr93mMdkQeD-a5oD4PKNp0I5Jx1-Z6HGbecWyxs-hfzlIV6YTb_UWX2-Yh/s1600-h/fox.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiduTMsCgLbxbfbNNER5XlENdpVEJIDNzcwZ8axFmey5wABLZVH1hH-58venjuYnpTaO6znoSlN-GVk8oAl8jmr93mMdkQeD-a5oD4PKNp0I5Jx1-Z6HGbecWyxs-hfzlIV6YTb_UWX2-Yh/s200/fox.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380090905825906530" title="Had a curious nightly visitor while camping in Håverud" /></a><br />The following day it was raining a little in the morning and was very windy, but it soon cleared up and I had another great day of hitching with the sun shining on me, hitched west until I got to Tanumshede. On the way there a lady showed me where I could find plenty of chanterelles on her land so went in the and picked a big bag, sadly they got pretty roughly handled hanging on the back of my backpack (it fell on them twice, stupid bag!).<br />Tanum is another UNESCO World Heritage site. It is so because it has tons of rock carvings from the Bronze Age, over 500 different carved panels in a area of 45 square kilometres.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG9qxaHtc_8fOXVBHemIBvFypbzCzkxovmgaebNyIZvsTB6EoRJPETPevazFNDiTHKkFPzpIpcieHH_-RCHuPvg182OiIhA-i3c7DlBu2IZN2vSJo10Gbf_uOD26_Nb8GsXPxzAMlebNF0/s1600-h/tanum.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgG9qxaHtc_8fOXVBHemIBvFypbzCzkxovmgaebNyIZvsTB6EoRJPETPevazFNDiTHKkFPzpIpcieHH_-RCHuPvg182OiIhA-i3c7DlBu2IZN2vSJo10Gbf_uOD26_Nb8GsXPxzAMlebNF0/s200/tanum.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380090928063105042" title="One of the panels in Aspeberget which is in the Tanum rock carving area" /></a><br />I walked around the heritage area a few hours and also had my computer and phone recharged some at the free museum. After that I hitched southwest towards the coast of Bohuslän, had a look in Hamburgsund and then got a ride with a young guy that I told was looking for a place to put up my tent for the night, so he drove me to this beautiful lake close to his home. So that evening I could go for a swim and clean myself up, first time in over a week. Then I had bacon, fried chanterelles and mashed potatoes for dinner, oh what a feast!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVb8Rhe4SrqIGafaMp7DIRB6bFqiFj5DV92QDt0c4MTYZbK61AMka7Dq0cRrT2QX4ZHswFp9GzKa4Qu-sT8sGgoKFDJIXosyJekwo9n5cgjL6I6sYrKA8WSI9pTiKWDsk5NwgTlwUlApqT/s1600-h/tasterodlake.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 133px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVb8Rhe4SrqIGafaMp7DIRB6bFqiFj5DV92QDt0c4MTYZbK61AMka7Dq0cRrT2QX4ZHswFp9GzKa4Qu-sT8sGgoKFDJIXosyJekwo9n5cgjL6I6sYrKA8WSI9pTiKWDsk5NwgTlwUlApqT/s200/tasterodlake.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380090934864434514" title="Tåsteröd lake where I camped out, first picture is like 6 in the morning looking east, next is around 9 in the morning looking west" /></a><br />That night I had frost degrees, you can feel the autumn is approaching this far south to. I hitched back to the coast and by it down to Smögen which is one of the more famous places on the west coast. The Bohuslän coast is really rocky and consists of over 3000 islands; it is quite a beautiful place with a different look then the rest of Sweden. I walked around a nature reserve next to Smögen then through town and through the town of Kungshamn, seems like a really high class area to me. The west coast is also littered with these cosy little fishing villages that just get packed with tourists during the summer; luckily the summer season is over for the year. Next I hitched to Lysekil which is another town by the coast, a little bit bigger though and had a walk there. My feet are starting to hurt to so switched back to wearing flip-fops again, the weather was just awesome so was nice walking around in those and just a t-shirt.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIz3owhQXYbdF01yRMBu3G3If0rL4OuMcOHOvHkovhIXSqz2RgU0hH_PCZWhKqadJBYUnWXFVSqGz5dmwWWKEwShj-W2JLMNR7jbyrcrv8PWzd1TRD9vu-_W4YpELu2779j3RwnX-RHGh_/s1600-h/hamburgsundsmogen.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 133px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIz3owhQXYbdF01yRMBu3G3If0rL4OuMcOHOvHkovhIXSqz2RgU0hH_PCZWhKqadJBYUnWXFVSqGz5dmwWWKEwShj-W2JLMNR7jbyrcrv8PWzd1TRD9vu-_W4YpELu2779j3RwnX-RHGh_/s200/hamburgsundsmogen.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380090914746166402" title="Top picture is from Hamburgsund, lower picture is on the bridge between Kungshamn (on the left) and Smögen" /></a><br />From Lysekil I went east with a car ferry and into the countryside again, got dropped up on the middle of a freeway by a women that thought it was a good idea to hitchhike from there, it wasn’t! First of all it is against the law to stand there and then cars aren’t allowed to stop on the road and they all are driving really fast. But after about an hour the most unexpected vehicle stopped, a 19m long Norwegian truck. (Didn’t even bother try to hitchhike with trucks there because there is just no way they can stop on the side of a freeway, or that’s what I thought!).<br />Rode with him a bit southeast and then helped him some with his computer and he rewarded me with a beer and some chips, yummy! Then I set up my tent behind a bush next to McDonalds in Vårgårda. That’s where I am right now, preparing to leave for the day.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM86A9tcZc4_xnWpEU1oO4lI8YV-D_Hvk1eTdWjXWhGKSA5pPuyo4SFDybHPeJBB_bBQZFpDe1Fw9BfTNfocFUQXvb8jKQi3cANIXHcGiGXm1unXmuQDF2zLuBB5gli7zpOyFgauMGqNyp/s1600-h/Day44-46.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 56px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiM86A9tcZc4_xnWpEU1oO4lI8YV-D_Hvk1eTdWjXWhGKSA5pPuyo4SFDybHPeJBB_bBQZFpDe1Fw9BfTNfocFUQXvb8jKQi3cANIXHcGiGXm1unXmuQDF2zLuBB5gli7zpOyFgauMGqNyp/s200/Day44-46.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5380090559285360402" title="Hitch day 44-46" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-4335083017005835642009-09-08T16:03:00.008+08:002009-09-09T20:20:42.072+08:008th of September 2009The other night my computer didn’t shut down properly so the battery got drained, but now I have been able to charge it again so I can make a new entry,<br />As I mentioned in my first entry and up in the right corner I am trying to do this trip on a extreme budget, haven’t mentioned before how much I’ve spent<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia5BuXq5LwGg887IjvvzixnM-9bDEZVZR6AJV1QxoScAUvCEXZVjPu5AcMG9l59flXMLwbJpVq7LsCBs7rNJExkh_DY2D_7ANFpwIAnNbFs0MOiWOjBz2FpTRAhRwVdBfPBWtYXKJIqvJp/s1600-h/tannforsen.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia5BuXq5LwGg887IjvvzixnM-9bDEZVZR6AJV1QxoScAUvCEXZVjPu5AcMG9l59flXMLwbJpVq7LsCBs7rNJExkh_DY2D_7ANFpwIAnNbFs0MOiWOjBz2FpTRAhRwVdBfPBWtYXKJIqvJp/s200/tannforsen.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379005096243597378" title="Tännforsen, one of Swedens biggest waterfalls" /></a> yet and I still wont, I will be done with this trip in about 7-10 days so will write it all then, can just say that its going very well this far, way over even my own expectations!<br />Also want to clarify one thing here:<br />I never ask anyone for anything! I do not ask them to people to give me a ride, I just stand on the side of the road with my<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh87_2hsdHJ1XH8gc0z8q2endA5yaa5T4UU-lpygBFHjD4pZ77boWw51dCoiSnlhxGoww8pFP21Csv1lAJ0keq-HGU7S4KQ37HL0YXsB1N9TbmVTqXiHqRGqVRYzPToefVFZSceNyfQroh3/s1600-h/sanfjallet.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh87_2hsdHJ1XH8gc0z8q2endA5yaa5T4UU-lpygBFHjD4pZ77boWw51dCoiSnlhxGoww8pFP21Csv1lAJ0keq-HGU7S4KQ37HL0YXsB1N9TbmVTqXiHqRGqVRYzPToefVFZSceNyfQroh3/s200/sanfjallet.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379005081191949938" title="Sånfjället on the second day" /></a> thumb in the air, always. I also never ask anyone for food or a place to stay or anything similar, I just tell them about myself and what I am doing (usually don’t mention what other people has done for me unless they ask) and if they decide to do anything for me it is their own idea and their own free will, just got to love seeing that there is people in the world that actually want to help out other people.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoknErvU1YS4zoZfziAlY9uP1SDTgw0Lgs7BlMXvUqxuAE8x7xOg7G12-xXDZ2d7O6cqgQi9iKa1E-lishHbn4AnxOgUom67Oaq0i9jF6XSDXKMdLuPGETG5v1AaKyl0yTyx_SAVLIsWYh/s1600-h/roadreindeer.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoknErvU1YS4zoZfziAlY9uP1SDTgw0Lgs7BlMXvUqxuAE8x7xOg7G12-xXDZ2d7O6cqgQi9iKa1E-lishHbn4AnxOgUom67Oaq0i9jF6XSDXKMdLuPGETG5v1AaKyl0yTyx_SAVLIsWYh/s200/roadreindeer.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379004894091529570" title="Reindeer on the road to Rogen" /></a><br />The next day leaving Anders I decided that I would take a short trip to the west to see Tännforsen, one of Sweden’s biggest waterfalls, before I kept on going south. It was pretty easy getting there and I did my first ride with a campervan on this trip when leaving the waterfalls. The waterfalls were as always beautiful, but as with all other waterfalls the flow is almost at its lowest at this time of year. I would love to see them all during the spring flood.<br />That day the hitching went pretty well and got 8 different rides before I set up my tent just next to a golf course, a nice old lady took quite a detour to get me there.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh36vCBPuv6bl0Jw-utBgQ7_OwXvKrbVTZEucTgtLu_GnkObqDHxMEuuUHelW77lAEpdglT-ZHOztHLX2xhCPJWgtprbcCA0PMCg65by-U0LgA7CVxOOTPICU4k2dRGVfW4HzPUMZxeHMb0/s1600-h/rogen.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh36vCBPuv6bl0Jw-utBgQ7_OwXvKrbVTZEucTgtLu_GnkObqDHxMEuuUHelW77lAEpdglT-ZHOztHLX2xhCPJWgtprbcCA0PMCg65by-U0LgA7CVxOOTPICU4k2dRGVfW4HzPUMZxeHMb0/s200/rogen.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379005077109203938" title="In Rogen Nature Reserve" /></a><br />After quite a cold night the rain came, so took a while to drag myself out of the sleeping bag but I eventually did and got a ride with a lady that bought some lunch for me at Statoil, then I hitched into Sånfjället National Park with a Jaguar. Sånfjället is one of nine national parks that got founded in 1909, Europe’s oldest national parks.<br />Had a chat with a very enthusiastic ranger then started hiking with high hopes to maybe see a bear, but 5 minutes after leaving it started raining on me and was really foggy, it kept doing this for the next 2,5 hours I hiked. Set up my tent in a valley between two mountain tops inside a badly built wind shelter. It was so cold in the air, windy and raining with a sight of about 15-20 meters. Tried to dry my stuff (my feet and legs were soaking wet, so boots, socks, pants and shirt were also very wet) but nothing could dry because I was up in the low flying clouds, so the humidity was very high.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWJk2LoBwxUoTHm-tYOZ_eC3E_w7PRXUMr4v_dde-XIfjoiMutD_LI3yy3MAwPXucdTt8cnFbJCfWxCH7eevTuIxLiR9EaxXc3m9IK7ACLQZmDgk6DhnFD-J6pigeMKvRhuQccS0ibE-Bm/s1600-h/blowntire.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWJk2LoBwxUoTHm-tYOZ_eC3E_w7PRXUMr4v_dde-XIfjoiMutD_LI3yy3MAwPXucdTt8cnFbJCfWxCH7eevTuIxLiR9EaxXc3m9IK7ACLQZmDgk6DhnFD-J6pigeMKvRhuQccS0ibE-Bm/s200/blowntire.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379004870396383554" title="One of the tires exploded while riding with Carmen and Sigi, kind of shaky ride!"/></a><br />This was the first time on this trip I actually feared for my own health, had some warm soup and crawled into my sleeping back and had a very cold night.<br />The next morning the weather was the same but I stayed in my tent until lunch and it eventually cleared up, so put on my wet boots and pants and hiked out some 10km to the other side of the national park. And of course I didn’t see a single animal, but would like to go back some day when the weather is better and give it a second try.<br />I hitched until I got to the town of Tännäs which has Sweden’s highest located church<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJLeS9XlyVYlWtpf6nki_7a6dBkNxOi35v25UY3CZqQ-5JSTphAnGuofLsgpWZgnpnHZbvo1l56fTZ27oxFsOSY92W69cu_6EI20NSyLLQEheEvsdOWbSLBww-AfIKpTmOBmxVH0V-rvvP/s1600-h/Elks.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 126px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJLeS9XlyVYlWtpf6nki_7a6dBkNxOi35v25UY3CZqQ-5JSTphAnGuofLsgpWZgnpnHZbvo1l56fTZ27oxFsOSY92W69cu_6EI20NSyLLQEheEvsdOWbSLBww-AfIKpTmOBmxVH0V-rvvP/s200/Elks.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379004877935285570" title="3 Elks! Kind of hard to spot"/></a> and some other stuff, and there this German couple Sigi and Carmen picked me up. It is unusual Germans pick me up and especially when they drive campervans, but it didn’t stop this couple which was driving a really cool old campervan. They were heading into Rogens Nature Reserve which I had read about before, but was planning to skip because it’s hard to get to while hitching. But I went with them in there and set up my tent next to their car, and they fed me a nice two course meal by the open fire. It was frost degrees that night so it was a very cold night.<br />The next morning we started with a 21 km hike, not my favourite thing to do in the mornings but at least I left my backpack in their car and it felt really good once we were finished.<br />Rogen nature reserve is this huge maze of lakes and boulder ridges. We did see quite a lot of reindeer during the walk (Sigi and Carmen also had two dogs with them which often smelled the reindeer before they detected us).<br />After the hike we drove further south, it so happened to be they were heading to the same national park that I was so I kept going with them. Was a very slow car but I half slept in the back most of the time.<br />Alas I got to see more Elks! Just as we passed the border into Dalarna there were 3 of them grazing some 100 meters away from the road, sadly the zoom on my new camera is no good, so couldn’t get a good picture.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBJis4FRTsMHa3sd3BN_xL6aoxzE7GLS5a7KTYkYhydqOx2m34-Se4VEqLuU5Vdj1iqoxhYbPexINMPQ36F0OjMUhRVvBxCJNDXbd8CTf_sKeta2cmSJ0yZ0xN_Yo822EPg1QfR5rpiJeh/s1600-h/njupskar.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBJis4FRTsMHa3sd3BN_xL6aoxzE7GLS5a7KTYkYhydqOx2m34-Se4VEqLuU5Vdj1iqoxhYbPexINMPQ36F0OjMUhRVvBxCJNDXbd8CTf_sKeta2cmSJ0yZ0xN_Yo822EPg1QfR5rpiJeh/s200/njupskar.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379004887588593410" title="Sigi and Carmen and their dogs by Njupeskär, Swedens highest waterfall" /></a><br />We set up camp that night a couple of kilometres from the national park and once again I got free dinner. Had another freezing frost night and the next day we drove into Fulufjället National Park. Fulufjället is one of the newest national parks in Sweden and it Sweden’s southernmost mountain chain. It contains Swedens highest waterfall (Njupeskär, 93 metres high) and also the world oldest trees (cloned themselves) being almost 10 000 years old. It is also given the status of a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAN_Parks">PAN park</a>.<br />We did a shorter hike here to the top of the falls and around, and one thing that hit me while walking here is how other tourists are dressed,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkAgaOzOMD6z9sYX_cAdYiKtTOt2Qqnco3OftXpBpC-RuaYrXS7hq3QBRud9IOmGWhUvykcQuLgSK0iRJPCc9ZYWk7s6xRJdjJqA69iuLZk4L1anxzg28b6QCpZU3v4GTAcDTXSKspkkmS/s1600-h/fulufjallet.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgkAgaOzOMD6z9sYX_cAdYiKtTOt2Qqnco3OftXpBpC-RuaYrXS7hq3QBRud9IOmGWhUvykcQuLgSK0iRJPCc9ZYWk7s6xRJdjJqA69iuLZk4L1anxzg28b6QCpZU3v4GTAcDTXSKspkkmS/s200/fulufjallet.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379004880605982626" title="View from Fulufjället, on top on the Njupeskär waterfall" /></a> I’ve noticed the same in other places. They all carry really big expensive cameras and the most modern and expensive in hiking gear, then the majority just go back and stay in their campervans or hotels without spending a night in the parks. Obviously people do have way too much money.<br />After the hike I rode with Carmen and Sigi the rest of the day until we got to Orsa, we did see another Elk also during the ride. In Orsa they went into a caravan park and I said my goodbyes and walked some until I found a good spot to set up my tent by the Orsa Lake in town.<br />So that’s where I am sitting now, just going to finish this entry then Ill try to cover a longer distance going south today.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlITgJbwjjxamsbEVAtSu3pQHNz6Ny-xZZOl0BAX1iFBlvxt-UUW4VpA3t0_TnYaofPOcyxyLaoUSoPNEEHIicEKWC2D7Y6-KQwkUtMNnEU6rqDejO-mIDNcMfZIHwVmYYm__q5GM-LMCR/s1600-h/day39-43.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 56px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhlITgJbwjjxamsbEVAtSu3pQHNz6Ny-xZZOl0BAX1iFBlvxt-UUW4VpA3t0_TnYaofPOcyxyLaoUSoPNEEHIicEKWC2D7Y6-KQwkUtMNnEU6rqDejO-mIDNcMfZIHwVmYYm__q5GM-LMCR/s200/day39-43.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5379004418821608482" title="Day 39-43, Day 42 and 43 I rode with Carmen and Sigi only" /></a><br /><br />Edit: for anyone who hasn’t noticed it, on the Google map page down in the left corner you can switch pages. Apparently Google doesn’t allow more then 25 markers on each page. Also if it doesn’t show the numbers 1-4 down there, try pressing F5.Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-22595107670466234982009-09-03T15:23:00.011+08:002009-09-03T16:25:15.624+08:003rd of September 2009I’m starting to wonder if I’m<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMDlTQsRwzmsU6BJgqpHyVmVFbMmhIOAUl2hieMb879V1d7ZuvW4lMMBh_D7ZZcrr4y5mdv98fADHXbcTKSDcGFYCtrMCQfqmMyY3ARMHF6D_ZtWLWAbNQmrPju4Jer0wi9RsM3zwWpJB4/s1600-h/basecamp.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjMDlTQsRwzmsU6BJgqpHyVmVFbMmhIOAUl2hieMb879V1d7ZuvW4lMMBh_D7ZZcrr4y5mdv98fADHXbcTKSDcGFYCtrMCQfqmMyY3ARMHF6D_ZtWLWAbNQmrPju4Jer0wi9RsM3zwWpJB4/s200/basecamp.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377139192921705426" title="Basecamp, lunch underway" /></a> carrying some anti-animal deodorant or something, because it just seems impossible to see any of the ones I want to see! Seen one Elk for about 2 seconds this far, and I mean it’s because of them so many Germans come here. I’ve been all around Sweden and lived my whole life here and still only passed one,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU0QgKvItrbOz5L8MJnN0DGfG5gpxgxO_p97yJj4aQFsiRXZqla-tZ-WNmoBvsWVBvEdGZcgwdPGGbrNdPUaA0LRECpkNeI3iWsn19_rQKgfsF3gs6KqtmwTWzPeW1Z71nUWoV8N_oSuyZ/s1600-h/fishes.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgU0QgKvItrbOz5L8MJnN0DGfG5gpxgxO_p97yJj4aQFsiRXZqla-tZ-WNmoBvsWVBvEdGZcgwdPGGbrNdPUaA0LRECpkNeI3iWsn19_rQKgfsF3gs6KqtmwTWzPeW1Z71nUWoV8N_oSuyZ/s200/fishes.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377139199835482546" title="The catch of day 1, 4 of those are mine including the biggest trout!" /></a> oh well. It’s not over yet.<br />So the next day we got up early and drove about 130km to the north following just a dirt road, stopped by a small stream and hiked up a couple of kilometres until we got to this idyllic lake and set up base camp there.<br />It was me, Anders and five of his friends and we all slept in a big tent with an open fire, so now just about everything smells of smoke.<br />We did some fishing in the lake and went looking for more lakes to try our luck in during the days, turned out to be a really good first<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwYHEH5Xt0fOFKfJP6Hlm_LKfDyX-fs60vLvEc1tqB4OhWtG6q2HVz6hKzpU-Xze9HOZrEJmQFmPkeLbzth5ijAEY3W19U_jY6ecxqN2y03dmgTkSSEf9VDhYjWPSv5TsKrz_FEIHCMjVZ/s1600-h/lake.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwYHEH5Xt0fOFKfJP6Hlm_LKfDyX-fs60vLvEc1tqB4OhWtG6q2HVz6hKzpU-Xze9HOZrEJmQFmPkeLbzth5ijAEY3W19U_jY6ecxqN2y03dmgTkSSEf9VDhYjWPSv5TsKrz_FEIHCMjVZ/s200/lake.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377139203892300802" title="The lake where we set up camp and Gorm, who was more into cuddling then going bird hunting"/></a> day catching 9 fish (Trouts and Arctic Chars) that we cooked for lunch the next day and we threw back several fishes that was a bit too small to keep. The other 2 days wasn’t as good though with not a single fish worth keeping! <br />We also walked across and picked lots of chanterelles, some porcini and as always tons of blueberries and a few cloudberries too.<br />I had 3 very enjoyable days up there exploring and fishing,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2PQkNpfisP9z31RBwCl-fShvbgb5Yj2YFK1yfsiV7uHOcuj3Nc-lVINLv9mVui2AiHcLYBTt8xxFH336OsQCyU7QuAWZ1kv9OtTWrme_1TxInT0M27GD04kVYVFluyfYZ5yC2ax7DZHo2/s1600-h/lakehunt.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2PQkNpfisP9z31RBwCl-fShvbgb5Yj2YFK1yfsiV7uHOcuj3Nc-lVINLv9mVui2AiHcLYBTt8xxFH336OsQCyU7QuAWZ1kv9OtTWrme_1TxInT0M27GD04kVYVFluyfYZ5yC2ax7DZHo2/s200/lakehunt.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377139209823347858" title="Out lakehunting" /></a> my boots has started breaking a little bit more and smells so much of smoke now which isn’t too good. We were also very lucky with the weather, was supposed to rain most of the time but only rained during Tuesday evening and night.<br />I slept another night and Anders place<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjihZUMLomCTFKjWSpHUK4gFJTkTB3u6SP_qoWAeEXf8SvFwShjP2_9J9f8c9W9EzE0uWr-xVp6KbfoEinbZ0295_PONERhRif-u3l_aeHqXW9NkfPUJIAq-NPX5zZLcHKwp8y63I8EXiGN/s1600-h/lunch.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjihZUMLomCTFKjWSpHUK4gFJTkTB3u6SP_qoWAeEXf8SvFwShjP2_9J9f8c9W9EzE0uWr-xVp6KbfoEinbZ0295_PONERhRif-u3l_aeHqXW9NkfPUJIAq-NPX5zZLcHKwp8y63I8EXiGN/s200/lunch.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377139219254396002" title="Lunch getting ready!" /></a> so I could wash my clothes and today I’m off to Sånfjället.<br />Sånfjället is supposedly the most important bear habitat in Scandinavia, so if I’m lucky I'll see one or maybe some Elk because there is supposed to be a large population there also.<br />I am really hoping to get to see at least one of the four big predators<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDQOF341ooa18T2YRO-cwPJXasnkf_si6yBtbbX_lp1RnoMsvjTON4TGqsBsBcwlw5oYmXkpZiJUKgz3TFpHcup9Z1dAJ-glOMdDEWgdkXp1W5D1PQ7AWcpNM8yjl7fp7ILMD3XMmA3Q2_/s1600-h/streamcrossing.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDQOF341ooa18T2YRO-cwPJXasnkf_si6yBtbbX_lp1RnoMsvjTON4TGqsBsBcwlw5oYmXkpZiJUKgz3TFpHcup9Z1dAJ-glOMdDEWgdkXp1W5D1PQ7AWcpNM8yjl7fp7ILMD3XMmA3Q2_/s200/streamcrossing.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5377139288138149778" title="Anders trying to cross a stream" /></a> we have here in Sweden, Bear, Wolf, Lynx and Wolverine, although they are quite rare and very hard to spot.Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-91282733091279173262009-08-31T14:04:00.011+08:002009-09-03T15:21:32.552+08:0030th of August 2009<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="" lang="EN-GB">Getting out of Svolvaer was pretty easy and the first car to pick me up had once picked up Isabelle also. Another two rides and I got picked up by this awesome Norwegian couple Tommy and Nadine, almost immediately after I got into the car they asked me<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhc7DfZerAB4bP4I90GgIwCd_7RylQ3262dT773cb37xSSgfDXiDuSTz-rk40AaXOqk4xEhnk0mON1TbQzqhovJ-Dmv5RRHBWyZddSSrx72zTH2P9BOVTQNSBoLYqhxa5eigixyWaAFK4QB/s1600-h/narvikfjord.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhc7DfZerAB4bP4I90GgIwCd_7RylQ3262dT773cb37xSSgfDXiDuSTz-rk40AaXOqk4xEhnk0mON1TbQzqhovJ-Dmv5RRHBWyZddSSrx72zTH2P9BOVTQNSBoLYqhxa5eigixyWaAFK4QB/s200/narvikfjord.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376006194612591986" title="The Narvik Fjord with Narvik on the left, a very important habour during WW2. Lies quite a few sunken german ships here" border="0" /></a> if I could drive (doesn’t happen very often). We drove to their home and had some sandwiches and after chilling for a while they decided that they should go to Abisko where I was heading because Tommy knew the owner of one of the hostels. So once again I drove, crossing the border into Sweden and arriving at the </span><span lang="EN-GB"><a href="http://www.abisko.net">hostel</a></span><span style="" lang="EN-GB"> where a bunch of guys and one of the owners was having a few beers in one of the best Saunas I’ve been in (ok, being from Skåne that doesn’t say too much, but still) so we joined them<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQITfydjZQohDXpzA-LjSYjDArpKXKJnnVRgzvBwioVlDRZiTQdXT3GNmKHNnF8B3fyt_pLCpssqqlw02vCfwwiuAbLbf9taaTbmwQtl2HeDWc-erasQpehobqmdx8Dq1p6dSN4ymn1OY1/s1600-h/abisko.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQITfydjZQohDXpzA-LjSYjDArpKXKJnnVRgzvBwioVlDRZiTQdXT3GNmKHNnF8B3fyt_pLCpssqqlw02vCfwwiuAbLbf9taaTbmwQtl2HeDWc-erasQpehobqmdx8Dq1p6dSN4ymn1OY1/s200/abisko.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376005469062835698" title="View over Abisko NP when hiking up a mountain with the famous Lapporten in the background" border="0" /></a> there for the rest of the evening. The next day Tommy and Nadine went home again and I asked the owner Thomas if I could stay at the hostel another night which was ok (thanks Thomas, Tommy and Nadine!). I was originally planning to hike 110 kilometres down Kungsleden which is supposed to be one of the best hiking trails in the world,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy11Wtj2PKq_uJaGlt8rhc8jxS8nVqYOCiE9jzB5PIFXq-msbyYlCcpApYcvzqz958X-pYEn9fxEYt5s9tZZcjD-IgUnfpbO3k9K2lFODHlH-KRUHhwUKuVAfzLQQuqysQYuxLNunYDWB6/s1600-h/huskies.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 134px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy11Wtj2PKq_uJaGlt8rhc8jxS8nVqYOCiE9jzB5PIFXq-msbyYlCcpApYcvzqz958X-pYEn9fxEYt5s9tZZcjD-IgUnfpbO3k9K2lFODHlH-KRUHhwUKuVAfzLQQuqysQYuxLNunYDWB6/s200/huskies.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376005496909791074" title="Huskies! :D" border="0" /></a> but being a bit exhausted from being on the road for a month I decided to just hike up onto a mountain in the Abisko National Park that day to enjoy the amazing view. The abisko.net hostel also offers dog sledding tours during the winter and they have 55 Siberian huskies that I the following day got to help out feeding, would like to come back here one day during the winter to try dog sledding. I hitched a ride to Kiruna next. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="" lang="EN-GB">Kiruna once used to be the world’s largest<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-2VjKGHr4nz28rt_9fRs2YoXj8o4_90Q2bGxtD9g8Qg8RIakWrvXc-_6MsI4RQepdod-_-VMTS4CygTmRm5vyQ1np7o3tAKwmRqH1ho2cNFlruAMq0E8I6fCP_6AeWSRJPcX2b9iXQ-vg/s1600-h/kiruna.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 68px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-2VjKGHr4nz28rt_9fRs2YoXj8o4_90Q2bGxtD9g8Qg8RIakWrvXc-_6MsI4RQepdod-_-VMTS4CygTmRm5vyQ1np7o3tAKwmRqH1ho2cNFlruAMq0E8I6fCP_6AeWSRJPcX2b9iXQ-vg/s200/kiruna.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376006180718295474" title="The world largest mine in Kiruna in the evening" border="0" /></a> city by area before the definition of a city got redefined. It also has the world largest underground mine digging over 1000 meters deep and exporting tons and tons of iron pellets every day. They are even planning to move half the city of <st1:city st="on"><st1:place st="on">Kiruna</st1:place></st1:city> just because the mine is expanding. This was also the first time that I really felt that not having any money to spend hurt me, because I really wanted to go on a tour into the mine. Oh well, some other time I hope. It was starting to get dark so I got the great idea<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvXv8vhJK0oEPAw_o1P8dtOGChM4WGx1HcYWqiapUIgX4zJ8Qopb4wCZDe1YiUWiLuOZLPlXLbuGAbFr_BXYFVVk_HeDzfug0MTtm4q3ZLO0KuWUjqnAGuVsFjZS-q1rgJRE738XC_W-IG/s1600-h/hydropowerplant.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvXv8vhJK0oEPAw_o1P8dtOGChM4WGx1HcYWqiapUIgX4zJ8Qopb4wCZDe1YiUWiLuOZLPlXLbuGAbFr_BXYFVVk_HeDzfug0MTtm4q3ZLO0KuWUjqnAGuVsFjZS-q1rgJRE738XC_W-IG/s200/hydropowerplant.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376006178118843154" title="One of many Hydro Power Plant, this along the Lule Älv. Hydro Power stands for 47,5% of Swedens power production" border="0" /></a> to walk up the ski hill just outside the city so I would get a great view of the mine in the morning, only to wake up with a view range of about 10 meters because of the fog. I gave up after waiting a couple of hours and started hitching south. <o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="" lang="EN-GB">In Kiruna all the mountain birches and trees had already turned orange but as I was heading southwards the trees started getting more yellow and eventually turning almost fully green. If you look at a map you notice being this far north is about the same level as Greenland, northern Siberia and the most northern <st1:country-region st="on"><st1:place st="on">Canada</st1:place></st1:country-region>. But because of the <st1:place st="on">Gulf Stream</st1:place> we do have a much milder climate here. I hitched through Gällivare which is another city that exists just because of the huge mines and further south to the <st1:place st="on"><st1:placetype st="on">National Park</st1:placetype> of <st1:placename st="on">Muddus</st1:placename></st1:place> which is within the UNESCO world herigate<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_lihV6n5rXv4Atv8c5eKXZhkvTYKO9BjMUg14My3zYBjHglsK6_SpVA_QjdHrpq-Wamqlo7OL-UVKv7438iBiHsaKL4a_bZWAQ2hI192U200i0koB5TNiSI6-G0XuqvySZAcD6r5Td9SN/s1600-h/muddusfalls.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 134px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_lihV6n5rXv4Atv8c5eKXZhkvTYKO9BjMUg14My3zYBjHglsK6_SpVA_QjdHrpq-Wamqlo7OL-UVKv7438iBiHsaKL4a_bZWAQ2hI192U200i0koB5TNiSI6-G0XuqvySZAcD6r5Td9SN/s200/muddusfalls.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376006188530987234" title="The Aska Falls and Muddus Falls in Muddus NP" border="0" /></a> area of Laponia, the last European wilderness. Muddus also lies within the Jokkmokk municipality which is about half the size of the Netherlands and has a population of about 5000 people, the Netherlands has about 16 500 000.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><st1:place st="on"><st1:placename st="on"><span style="" lang="EN-GB">Muddus</span></st1:placename><span style="" lang="EN-GB"> <st1:placetype st="on">National Park</st1:placetype></span></st1:place><span style="" lang="EN-GB"> is a pretty large area covered in primeval forests, large bogs and plenty of ravines.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSEfinGefhyphenhyphenhn2NssjRdSsCsRzh0IEd-kCNwSAqWejvopvEb84URv4WajcIabGVAvewSwDdfzG7lXAq6G8v7qJ-xUbsV0zh1AZemwpFmad0g_YA_e32iLvLuxs2KqOivpnZUmPZ2jj0zZR/s1600-h/hjortron.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSEfinGefhyphenhyphenhn2NssjRdSsCsRzh0IEd-kCNwSAqWejvopvEb84URv4WajcIabGVAvewSwDdfzG7lXAq6G8v7qJ-xUbsV0zh1AZemwpFmad0g_YA_e32iLvLuxs2KqOivpnZUmPZ2jj0zZR/s200/hjortron.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376005491827060578" title="Cloudberries in Muddus NP" border="0" /></a> It’s supposed to have a large population of animals but of course I didn’t see a single one first hiking in 7 kilometres to a cabin and another 20 km the next day. But at least I found me some cloudberries which I never seen in the wild before, and also saw two big waterfalls. From the parking lot I got picked up by the same guy that drove me in there the day before (10km of the main road on a small dirt road leading nowhere else but the National Park).<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgibPTMG4XVR73Kk_ig94TiqPd-xEQoGuhPy9fAdZeTS9d-mTnbRahyphenhyphenF1ALMIDdk6QNx_qPnAnsPvi9NE5btEMXpSGW0cSP1YkJGPOHOyJVqzcd3FjDGTY_qiijVAsDeYdh45qKttZR4csp/s1600-h/arvidsjaur.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgibPTMG4XVR73Kk_ig94TiqPd-xEQoGuhPy9fAdZeTS9d-mTnbRahyphenhyphenF1ALMIDdk6QNx_qPnAnsPvi9NE5btEMXpSGW0cSP1YkJGPOHOyJVqzcd3FjDGTY_qiijVAsDeYdh45qKttZR4csp/s200/arvidsjaur.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376005478884187106" title="The Saami church village in Arvidsjaur" border="0" /></a><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="" lang="EN-GB">I hitched south through Arvidsjaur where I had a look at the Saami church village. Then another 30km and the rain started pissing down on me while standing by the side of the road, but I saw a sign about a bird watching tower which turned out to be quite big so it saved me from the rain that night. The next day it<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixmGpS46M3a45A7tYbQLjcFtT-UUSOI8wMPCd6b08dJyTqoG6CnU0-GYD5V6UiH0sdl_hkYIJ-ue91YmS5m9tyqeUgWUmgcGy6KAyAMiHVr7yviBWwpt2hBknllwlPB-otfV2_YYMBKYP-/s1600-h/birdtower.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEixmGpS46M3a45A7tYbQLjcFtT-UUSOI8wMPCd6b08dJyTqoG6CnU0-GYD5V6UiH0sdl_hkYIJ-ue91YmS5m9tyqeUgWUmgcGy6KAyAMiHVr7yviBWwpt2hBknllwlPB-otfV2_YYMBKYP-/s200/birdtower.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376005484395361922" title="Spent on night in this tower away from the rain, was moving quite alot in the strong winds" border="0" /></a> still rained but I pretty fast got picked up and got my longest ride this far, all the way to Östersund and there the driver bought me a McDonalds meal for lunch :D After that I hitched west to the ski resort of Åre where my childhood friend Anders lives. Today we have just been chilling and tomorrow I will head out into the mountains with Anders and a few friends of his and stay there until Wednesday, sadly the weather forecast isn’t very promising.<o:p></o:p></span></p><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKZb0wIT3ZJ3gX9jux17vKvB6BpKcmPjZGaBBjss2ftUnZFXr2UK6HerD_y8hPlo-CPGWlI5hznVqChY6YiE_fxR3l0m6gNFKqDPNiyHWha2mCi-yWjsidgkmfL3FHKh5ysoGZTiJTWGGN/s1600-h/day29,30-33.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 188px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKZb0wIT3ZJ3gX9jux17vKvB6BpKcmPjZGaBBjss2ftUnZFXr2UK6HerD_y8hPlo-CPGWlI5hznVqChY6YiE_fxR3l0m6gNFKqDPNiyHWha2mCi-yWjsidgkmfL3FHKh5ysoGZTiJTWGGN/s200/day29,30-33.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5376005124215693218" title="Day 29, 30-33." border="0" /></a><br />Edit: *sigh* another stressed out entry, always wait until the last second to write them (just finished it and we are leaving in 10 minutes) so I don't have the time to edit and re-read it properly before posting it.Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-1851988824099209232009-08-27T01:23:00.007+08:002009-08-27T01:48:23.720+08:0024th of August 2009The further away from the cities and the more desolate it gets, the more I like it the general rule seems to be. Was the same thing while hitching in Australia, loved it the most when I was alone in the middle of the outback.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho5acCB_5aJNoE3DWuOaFUJviFrKBgYLqjJkHRSqsXY2x1mKeYYi-o8S_WTsM8XvqUvQCdot2w00APM1uDE9T27CnfJY0X9MCBbV5f0Q-u2FmmrtoE56r0K_ExX8OL2jtQ6qlzUHfZDmV0/s1600-h/kukkolaforsen.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho5acCB_5aJNoE3DWuOaFUJviFrKBgYLqjJkHRSqsXY2x1mKeYYi-o8S_WTsM8XvqUvQCdot2w00APM1uDE9T27CnfJY0X9MCBbV5f0Q-u2FmmrtoE56r0K_ExX8OL2jtQ6qlzUHfZDmV0/s200/kukkolaforsen.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325069857171890" title="Kukkolaforsen, Sweden on the side I am standing and Finland on the other" /></a><br />I left Nils the next morning and had a real good day of hitching, came to Haparanda which is on the border to Finland and went north from there following the Torneå river which seperates Sweden from Finland. Did a shorter stop by Kukkolaforsen and watched the fishermen catch whitefish (Sik) using just rakes! Now that’s an unusual way of fishing and apparently they have been doing it here for a very long time.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjVRlhAbYZuop346ReQR9j6gAXe9KPUcN5SYiyJ79leSzg_JGEgHj57nQ2g4FyFajODSdq-PUDM50IUT5D1giSuLUTARqg_cxVMNJwsK_Jj4prxqf6dD5kvwGEA1d4JgvIVhZsJgYkRv69/s1600-h/stuga.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjjVRlhAbYZuop346ReQR9j6gAXe9KPUcN5SYiyJ79leSzg_JGEgHj57nQ2g4FyFajODSdq-PUDM50IUT5D1giSuLUTARqg_cxVMNJwsK_Jj4prxqf6dD5kvwGEA1d4JgvIVhZsJgYkRv69/s200/stuga.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325611952427570" title="The cabin I slept in the middle of nowhere (8km from the town, or rather houses I walked from)"/></a> I continued further north and started noticing how far away I actually am now, people are getting a lot harder to understand and I had to speak real slowly and listen closely to have a conversation. An older fella gave me a piece of dried reindeer meat after telling him I never tasted it. I would be buying some myself it wasn’t so darn expensive because it’s full of proteins and weighs very little. That night I had my first frost night, it was cold. The next day the hitching was the complete opposite and in 12 hours hitching<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7XDkLtkPurvKknR1oxhwhYd6y_29HRUfiYGLzjJlBcFe75ErKVOA2h_SmkD5JV6ZwRinK3hUNBVfffCX-jV0KGr9i3_79L-eagI2ATf8ncZJ-qbaB2Bleums-ITCznBKcD0QCLMfQK61m/s1600-h/saana.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7XDkLtkPurvKknR1oxhwhYd6y_29HRUfiYGLzjJlBcFe75ErKVOA2h_SmkD5JV6ZwRinK3hUNBVfffCX-jV0KGr9i3_79L-eagI2ATf8ncZJ-qbaB2Bleums-ITCznBKcD0QCLMfQK61m/s200/saana.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325603213318594" title="Saana, the holy mountain of the Sami"/></a> I got about 50km, of which I walked about ten. The last couple that dropped me off invited me in for tea and told me about a small free unmarked cabin some 8 km up the road. I walked up to the cabin with a total of 4 cars passing me in 90 minutes without anyone picking me up. So I decided to spend the night there having the best sleep yet on this trip, just a little too smoky after my not too good fire starting skills.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXQd53I60jyS9d6IoZuva9zdeThU7uyeI2_ICUHWxESgFly5rsLx6fPz8eYVXJpLOG5UAzklF2EHWWEtMnzoeo8bwjRyxUka1CdGi3aJmwDizFfYLNRmqz6UygTIko1uJPS1Zkvrq7IPwy/s1600-h/treriksroset.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjXQd53I60jyS9d6IoZuva9zdeThU7uyeI2_ICUHWxESgFly5rsLx6fPz8eYVXJpLOG5UAzklF2EHWWEtMnzoeo8bwjRyxUka1CdGi3aJmwDizFfYLNRmqz6UygTIko1uJPS1Zkvrq7IPwy/s200/treriksroset.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325728914125106" title="Skål from Treriksröset! Standing in Finland, Sweden on the left and Norway on the right"/></a> <br />I should have stayed on the Finnish side instead because the road is much better and has a lot more traffic on it compared to the one car every 20-30 minutes on the Swedish side, but eventually I did get a ride next to to Karesuando, Sweden’s most northern town.<br />I have started to see a<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUfsoxQ4xd7eSHuv65afDLpvtJ_IA3cThFHtoD3QQsQFD6lX2umCLdIZQGD2eznAMUEPi0evlYU7JoRuLFLd4XODSbpdheY55sK198jNf6oqV9F3GkgYqvgLV_SFR55n_DTGD7JuPAYvAO/s1600-h/reindeer.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhUfsoxQ4xd7eSHuv65afDLpvtJ_IA3cThFHtoD3QQsQFD6lX2umCLdIZQGD2eznAMUEPi0evlYU7JoRuLFLd4XODSbpdheY55sK198jNf6oqV9F3GkgYqvgLV_SFR55n_DTGD7JuPAYvAO/s200/reindeer.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325597246798962" title="Reindeer, while walking in Malla nature park"/></a> lot of reindeer now also, it's still late summer so they should be up in the mountains but there are always a few stray reindeers down in the forests and those are the ones I’ve been seeing by the side and on the road while hitching.<br />From Karesuando I walked over to Finland and hitched further north until I got to the town of Kilpisjärvi. Coming into the town you get an awesome view of Saana, the holy mountain of the Samis (the native people in northern Scandinavia).<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4BvHVi-i3fs55N-hRvuaAatP8X1c0Iw4nO-29WzuhTw70VbAISJv7JJHSbDQWT1cuaYD6fWF8zLvlURt_5WweUWjShteS3-6Yu9C7Q06yOewy95o7hhhnDKH9WsnMRnAzhRwPqocj_z51/s1600-h/norway.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4BvHVi-i3fs55N-hRvuaAatP8X1c0Iw4nO-29WzuhTw70VbAISJv7JJHSbDQWT1cuaYD6fWF8zLvlURt_5WweUWjShteS3-6Yu9C7Q06yOewy95o7hhhnDKH9WsnMRnAzhRwPqocj_z51/s200/norway.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325590073964018" title="Hitching through norway"/></a> Sadly I was in the back of a car so didn’t get any pictures until I was in town. From the town I hiked west 11km through Finland’s oldest nature park Malla, over some mountains with real beautiful nature and lots of reindeers walking around until I came to Treriksröset. Treriksröset is the spot where Sweden, Finland and Norway meet so you can stand in all three countries at the same time.<br />Once getting there, which was the main goal of this whole trip I celebrated with a beer that the last guy, a Norwegian on his way to a Sami festival,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg-RuEzpqoHODf9TeV1432mr2s7TQe4cg8dPyUTUF9y_OAlxnSWEYy4xTMuw2d0SvZwZQ-dBOZ-dmxOG19_4bGk6P8jE0P2GeGq1hNB0mMA-vmw1f_-JdOxPceqRDd8JnwGN8ZIdZ-BxUr/s1600-h/svolvaer.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg-RuEzpqoHODf9TeV1432mr2s7TQe4cg8dPyUTUF9y_OAlxnSWEYy4xTMuw2d0SvZwZQ-dBOZ-dmxOG19_4bGk6P8jE0P2GeGq1hNB0mMA-vmw1f_-JdOxPceqRDd8JnwGN8ZIdZ-BxUr/s200/svolvaer.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325620487103922" title="The town of Svolvaer" /></a> had given me.<br />I slept in a free cabin that night sharing it with 3 Finnish guys. The next day I hiked back the 11km and decided not to hike up on Saana because the weather was quite bad and walked into Norway instead and hitched further north then west.<br />This is my first time ever in Norway and I start to understand why some people I met claims it’s the most beautiful country in the world.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUbV8XtfDml8rGBtJFnL-SQiokxysRxh7zWiN1ipWUWigby8FC6BosOqGsMrS0Mr6tRsUtG2jLQTzkuufs_1Hqb0yckzLZZ6He13qQugbYTD9jqmcOY0gVmpGxc24qoCkR0VsxSHFWU2qm/s1600-h/nikki.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiUbV8XtfDml8rGBtJFnL-SQiokxysRxh7zWiN1ipWUWigby8FC6BosOqGsMrS0Mr6tRsUtG2jLQTzkuufs_1Hqb0yckzLZZ6He13qQugbYTD9jqmcOY0gVmpGxc24qoCkR0VsxSHFWU2qm/s200/nikki.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325085030906370" title="Part of lofoten and Isabelles dog"/></a> The fjords are just amazing and while I was heading west and finally got to Lofoten it just got better, slept on a hill by a bridge in my tent that night and continued out on Lofoten the next day to the town of Svolvaer.<br />I also noticed that hitching in Norway is a lot easier then hitching in Sweden, but I guess it's partly because the E6 road is basically the only road going through the country so everyone has to be on it.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpOvu7RNy8UdJmkYDjSTrkBtq_Z6GVTJLYfBzJrwdXeFWDqVjZd7qKt4Ijpx8mD-IhXSDsh4lCEL4qhWQsfs1f28SAgEiEkEXvRSIh4t5oxtNzK5uArFBVVXMPatAAh_qd2u4HacM50oDg/s1600-h/lofoten.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpOvu7RNy8UdJmkYDjSTrkBtq_Z6GVTJLYfBzJrwdXeFWDqVjZd7qKt4Ijpx8mD-IhXSDsh4lCEL4qhWQsfs1f28SAgEiEkEXvRSIh4t5oxtNzK5uArFBVVXMPatAAh_qd2u4HacM50oDg/s200/lofoten.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325074567294354" title="Part of Lofoten" /></a><br />In Svolvaer my friend Isabelle lives and works, she is a Swedish girl but I can understand why she has moved to Svolvaer, the beautiful nature and of the way better salaries then Sweden makes it worth it. I know Isabelle because she is also a hitcher, one of the very few, so it was real fun getting to chat to someone that knows what it’s all about :)<br />Isabelle works at a hotel so I got me some real breakfasts twice and could wash and have a shower. The first day I came to Svolvaer there was also a food festival so I got to try me some whale meat, both raw and cooked. I also tried dried fish and goat cheese and some other food.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5G2xOK4v0kF-h_Jr6Gxbl2LVTrAX8ZytDV4k3B2i1Z0_eiAzVI90ba4OTdITYumwbZ9_cTIHpJS5FwPgp1p7-mQPyThFEkWt98zq0roRwvNIEUXPmumECumzFB7Q9NPLIDjMpVz1qgK2o/s1600-h/isabelle.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5G2xOK4v0kF-h_Jr6Gxbl2LVTrAX8ZytDV4k3B2i1Z0_eiAzVI90ba4OTdITYumwbZ9_cTIHpJS5FwPgp1p7-mQPyThFEkWt98zq0roRwvNIEUXPmumECumzFB7Q9NPLIDjMpVz1qgK2o/s200/isabelle.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325065750266338" title="Isabelle and part of Lofoten" /></a><br />The next day we went with a friend of Isabelle further west on Lofoten and did some hiking to a really beautiful beach, and while hiking back across the mountain we could see whales breaching the water out in the ocean so the visit in Lofoten has been an awesome experience, I am thinking about coming back here next year to do some season work.<br />And oh, Isabelle says she will challenge<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6CLJywCNVDbLN9bjkLPud2sVoQQC1MW4OM3qAWpK1PvtI8syGBArBcmIIupDKcz1uDX_MgFl08n4RhE0S3FWL7lh2u0844ahlX62vAdBxj199lwyRvIH2f-pUsJ4SlKy5AE0UJ6cW_4WH/s1600-h/hitchlofoten.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6CLJywCNVDbLN9bjkLPud2sVoQQC1MW4OM3qAWpK1PvtI8syGBArBcmIIupDKcz1uDX_MgFl08n4RhE0S3FWL7lh2u0844ahlX62vAdBxj199lwyRvIH2f-pUsJ4SlKy5AE0UJ6cW_4WH/s200/hitchlofoten.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374325059398463426" title="Hitching on Lofoten"/></a> me next year and do a hitching trip for even less money a day then I do on this trip. I don’t think will be too hard for her because she got two very important things that I’m missing, boobs! Being a small blue-eyed cute girl is a lot easier getting things from people then being a 193cm long unshaved guy. I just wonder if she has the discipline to never spend any money on like an ice cream or a souvenirs or something =P<br />Today I am heading east, back into Sweden!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNYsVoiO2Qqmo0JhepxV-1fMuyb2GLRRqKUcNratZGJOA2mP2BoJrl6u-l4GeHBSRvKMnqd2tI6Zp5GkpWgWtMIEJ8WVyITwGRbsuP5xMUU_B12qUUfdrfh05zbpWFPTpaCpxIfkGr-61D/s1600-h/day23-27.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 94px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjNYsVoiO2Qqmo0JhepxV-1fMuyb2GLRRqKUcNratZGJOA2mP2BoJrl6u-l4GeHBSRvKMnqd2tI6Zp5GkpWgWtMIEJ8WVyITwGRbsuP5xMUU_B12qUUfdrfh05zbpWFPTpaCpxIfkGr-61D/s200/day23-27.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5374324511012768658" title="Day 23-27" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-56882146112271582442009-08-17T17:14:00.007+08:002009-08-18T13:51:31.824+08:0017th of August 2009The view from Skuleberget was pretty awesome, I was also lucky because they have one guided tour up there each week and I just happened to time it perfectly.<br />As I mentioned in my previous entry The High Coast is another UNESCO World Heritage Area, it is so because it has the highest “rebound” in the world.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheeIgBY6W1hIiz-nOd_fUYcRR2DP97vRWVgimksipgbAKdip53MGxYmsVMZKIW1KwpVZmrKZtpbmWMsMRKpXnZZhlMhDEsy0jiIBmLSlKcpW35I2MPsNagVPY7aMi4O4_KSmpsRQmynnQf/s1600-h/slattdalsberget.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheeIgBY6W1hIiz-nOd_fUYcRR2DP97vRWVgimksipgbAKdip53MGxYmsVMZKIW1KwpVZmrKZtpbmWMsMRKpXnZZhlMhDEsy0jiIBmLSlKcpW35I2MPsNagVPY7aMi4O4_KSmpsRQmynnQf/s200/slattdalsberget.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370859769882638082" title="Great views from within the National Park, sadly the picture doesnt do the view justice" /></a> After the ice age 9600 years ago the land has risen 285 metres and keeps on rising almost a centimetre each year. So it has the world highest coastline. Walking on the top of Skuleberget which is 296 metres high they have marked where the coastline used to be and you can actually see on the surrounding mountains and area where the coastline once was because how the trees are growing and shingle fields being so high up.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD2g1bySXGFPhNxsECUypF6zO4nmjdJVRbLJegh1I7fz0__YVGPF0Za_rPATuLLaZB4L6hebAVnfDluiRKaDPuGqhHylwiaDHzsz9joukbbFN7tFTxDMt_CfLUmEq7uyz7-p-jvBHoCEMc/s1600-h/slattdalsskrevan.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjD2g1bySXGFPhNxsECUypF6zO4nmjdJVRbLJegh1I7fz0__YVGPF0Za_rPATuLLaZB4L6hebAVnfDluiRKaDPuGqhHylwiaDHzsz9joukbbFN7tFTxDMt_CfLUmEq7uyz7-p-jvBHoCEMc/s200/slattdalsskrevan.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370859776217428418" title="SlåttdalsSkrevan, 40m high, 7m wide and 200m long" /></a><br />After hiking down the mountain and packing my tent I hitched to Skuleskogen National Park which is also in the High Coast area and hiked in some 5 kilometres. Walking up on a mountain I had the most beautiful views I have seen in Sweden so far, after that I hiked through a huge gorge (Slåttdalsskrevan) and then continued to this really idyllic place. It was a small cottage (free for everyone to use) next to a really quiet lake. The lake was 180 metres over the sea level despite the sea just being some 500 metres to the west.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBB_azvdEW6buAfdWbyNLTvVhvTz4H5uwreuUiCefI3OKU4dvCR836V-GIIqNuV5l3eESUr6VzdPYxvriEdooUhU3khncIMesG9UCjK3vtXo6TPznDev1W0d9rtLljDncJmy1p29dv5UTI/s1600-h/highcoast.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjBB_azvdEW6buAfdWbyNLTvVhvTz4H5uwreuUiCefI3OKU4dvCR836V-GIIqNuV5l3eESUr6VzdPYxvriEdooUhU3khncIMesG9UCjK3vtXo6TPznDev1W0d9rtLljDncJmy1p29dv5UTI/s200/highcoast.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370859764550745858" title="The High Coast, with the lake I slept by in the front. And the sea in the background" /></a> Made a fire here and talked to a couple that also camped out here that night. Drinking water I could take directly from the lake. There were also black-throated divers on the lake having this real eerie wail which just added to the whole experience. Have to say Skuleskogen is by far my favourite place in Sweden so far, the views and tranquillity of the place just made it all so magical.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjepp5hE5AGBL9MW7t4jAEgUiOv1Zne4qfqHkjvY0Wx41V9DnYfc9pgn_9Jn4mLtpELsid1DURLcs5ZR6mYVBTdzlJbtSb9QzG2A1m4rsuphyphenhyphenkzrBvCASc8XhJD9KrOAN3pUTVK9Hsdjc6G/s1600-h/tarnattvattnet.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjepp5hE5AGBL9MW7t4jAEgUiOv1Zne4qfqHkjvY0Wx41V9DnYfc9pgn_9Jn4mLtpELsid1DURLcs5ZR6mYVBTdzlJbtSb9QzG2A1m4rsuphyphenhyphenkzrBvCASc8XhJD9KrOAN3pUTVK9Hsdjc6G/s200/tarnattvattnet.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370859785310560594" title="Tärnättvattnet, slept in the lovely little cottage and drank water directly from the lake" /></a><br />Next morning I hiked out of the national park on the north side (started on the south side) and then started hitching north towards Luleå, it’s some 400km but I was starting to get in a hurry to get north. So 8 rides later I showed up at my friend Nils place in Luleå.<br />I slept the night there and the next day suddenly my girlfriend showed up surprising me! (She lives down in Skåne).<br />This all put me in a difficult situation, first I couldn’t keep on going because she was there and second it wouldn’t be very fair to leech on Nils and Veronica for 3 days.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKMbTxhCXLJbB4zq8yW9zNdVhwLZEXGfCQwTrD73stbz2-EFlQNx4piwDslx8a8Y06BvegRGPCpIem_WXp7fWU0KnZB2pjzMV2dHufvp9llA3Pi_ppPhg25udiJXb-ELvtK4Jay5nbxLzp/s1600-h/gammelstaden.jpg"><img style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKMbTxhCXLJbB4zq8yW9zNdVhwLZEXGfCQwTrD73stbz2-EFlQNx4piwDslx8a8Y06BvegRGPCpIem_WXp7fWU0KnZB2pjzMV2dHufvp9llA3Pi_ppPhg25udiJXb-ELvtK4Jay5nbxLzp/s200/gammelstaden.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370859758531487378" title="Gammelstaden with the houses and the church and Veronica" /></a><br />So after much thinking I’ve come up with the only way it can be done is pretending as these 3 days haven’t existed on this trip, so I won’t include them in the budget (and of course I haven’t bought any food to bring with me during these days). It almost feels like cheating but not much I can do about it.<br />This morning Veronica caught a flight home again and I am preparing to leave myself, can already feel its starting to get colder out though and the upcoming nights it’s supposed to be about 1-2 degrees Celsius where I am going, but my next goal is the very top of Sweden!<br />I do have to mention that I and Veronica went to the Church Village of Gammelstad which is another World Heritage site in the city of Luleå. It’s the largest and best preserved church village in the world. A Church Village is a place in northern Scandinavia that were used by people living on the countryside on Sundays and big holidays, they went to the village and stayed the night there in their own little house because it was to far to travel in one day. In total there is 424 wooden houses surrounding the 15th century stone church.<br />So big thanks to Nils for letting me stay here and Veronica for surprising me, now I’m just going to have some breakfast and shower and I’m off. <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJn6cq8DTG62I2LXWtrAu9VxzWUjiZeZaMT6gTjif3x44ceX0KphKw6RXdMS7ufbJS3ihXde49UfBpT7lictLgAVyZQGG3N5e6Knz21Z4f6-V2BvTZb8kI2ZfTl5NT5ol3SMDtUQznoG2Q/s1600-h/day21-22.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 200px; height: 38px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJn6cq8DTG62I2LXWtrAu9VxzWUjiZeZaMT6gTjif3x44ceX0KphKw6RXdMS7ufbJS3ihXde49UfBpT7lictLgAVyZQGG3N5e6Knz21Z4f6-V2BvTZb8kI2ZfTl5NT5ol3SMDtUQznoG2Q/s200/day21-22.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5370858824122992066" title="Day 21-22, first couple of the second day was spanish" /></a><br />Edit: It took me a bit longer then expected to do the laundry and get ready yesterday so decided to stay another night, which also gave me time to visit Marie, a friend from Australia that lives in Luleå and gossip about old memories which was fun.<br />But today im off!Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-53371318398513235732009-08-12T16:26:00.006+08:002009-08-13T08:06:22.892+08:0012th of August 2009Standing on the side of the road hour after hour really does give you time to think about things, the past, the present and the future. You plan future trips, think about what you will do when you get home, remember good old days and come up with all kind of ideas; it’s just too bad I almost never write anything down.<br />The next morning the sun was shining again so I packed my tent when it was dry and got going. Had 3 days of rather bad hitching, especially around the Sollefteå region, first I stood 2 hours just outside the town then 3 hours trying to get out of it, sure I stood 4,5 hours in a place some 30 minutes outside Sveg but that was a really lousy place to stand while the Sollefteå spots were as good as it possible can get when hitching, and still so many cars just drove by without stopping. Really makes you wonder what goes through people’s heads when they see me on the side.<br />Had one of the oddest rides ever on the first day (3rd car in the picture) and also got a ride with a bus which is really unusual. On the second and third day I got my first two rides with trucks.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhANRrwCsd6l6wfUnsnechLxsUAFagLeosuffsLbaKa9jYk0dKeNJC8iPsdqCCNZY4SieiXTIIVfy3fIVCJ7NZUddlpOpHLi65Sl4r6zl74baV3yF_yC8b0QksE-BtyQHsXvosUyW49GA0w/s1600-h/indalsalven.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhANRrwCsd6l6wfUnsnechLxsUAFagLeosuffsLbaKa9jYk0dKeNJC8iPsdqCCNZY4SieiXTIIVfy3fIVCJ7NZUddlpOpHLi65Sl4r6zl74baV3yF_yC8b0QksE-BtyQHsXvosUyW49GA0w/s200/indalsalven.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5368992037657853250" title="Indalsälven, one of the huge rivers in the northern parts of Sweden" border="0" /></a><br />So I didn’t get as far as I expected the first day but on the following day I got to my next goal, the Dead Falls. The Dead Falls was known as the Great Falls before 1796, it was this huge waterfall along the river Indalsälven. They wanted to do logging on the river so they could get the timber to the coast but it was just impossible with the falls because is smashed the wood to pieces. So they came up with the great idea to re-route a small stream via the lake west of the falls around the falls into the river again, the work started out pretty well but on the 6th of June 1796 the spring flood came and broke through the locks of the stream which ended in disaster. The 25 kilometres long lake was emptied in the less then 4 hours, 1 000 000 000 cubic metres of water washed down the river taking houses and sawmills and farms with it and the Great Falls went silent forever and became known as the Dead Falls after that. And now you can walk around in the area where the falls once were.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwCSLYn_U6cGsYozJmHOrF15hFIYDSCzMFysotxgS1oyLhF-pO7RtAEQ2E4J4otiTVwlza-fLSvxuMAt14VcencKWPdsT6FezpXwqW4UA2vBuavdU3uX85DUgxoQU6RqzK_KuXRvBWpfBo/s1600-h/deadfalls.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwCSLYn_U6cGsYozJmHOrF15hFIYDSCzMFysotxgS1oyLhF-pO7RtAEQ2E4J4otiTVwlza-fLSvxuMAt14VcencKWPdsT6FezpXwqW4UA2vBuavdU3uX85DUgxoQU6RqzK_KuXRvBWpfBo/s200/deadfalls.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5368992025703313394" title="The Dead Falls" border="0" /></a><br />The weather was pretty bad with lots of rain that day and also yesterday, but luckily I succeeded to get under a roof every time it started pissing down.<br />My next goal was this Thai Pavilion in the middle of nowhere. The last ride there a guy named Reine picked me up. I told my usual story about what I was doing and he invited me to his place, he had some houses just next to the Pavilion. So I did get a private guiding of the place, the Pavilion is the only one of its kind outside Thailand. It was built in 1997 to commemorate the 1897 visit of King Chulalongkorn of Thailand to the town. It’s pretty bizarre seeing a place like this in the middle of the Swedish forest, kind of the last thing you would expect.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb9U5YDwK59o4SqXNqEirokhreTbbzmqjTM-AgbTBrr32WPVnmdt0nH2U_VcKA_AO7QpVe-RDt9kuc_2sDxTeo55xfOZKzaHy_FXVv3tzJFkC8QM6Ln4SvPfW4-CFZQ5LRJOM8D6Is-Ure/s1600-h/thaipavilion.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb9U5YDwK59o4SqXNqEirokhreTbbzmqjTM-AgbTBrr32WPVnmdt0nH2U_VcKA_AO7QpVe-RDt9kuc_2sDxTeo55xfOZKzaHy_FXVv3tzJFkC8QM6Ln4SvPfW4-CFZQ5LRJOM8D6Is-Ure/s200/thaipavilion.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5368992039668940626" title="The Thai Pavilion with my private guide Reine" border="0" /></a><br />Next I had a shower and washed my clothes and had a proper dinner with Reine and his daughter and then I had a proper sleep in the sofa. After not being able to have a shower in over a week and not having any clean clothes to wear this was like a blessing from above, made me feel like a completely new man. Also as I mentioned in an earlier post I just love to see that we do have these kind of people also in Sweden.<br />Reine is by the way also a musician in the band Allgott & Villgott, haven’t heard of them myself before but think they are well known at least on the west coast.<br />So after another day of dodging the rain I put up my tent just next to Skuluberget by the High Coast, another UNESCO World Heritage area (Sweden has 14 in total, a few too many if you ask me). So once I had my breakfast (grows raspberries and blueberries where my tent is setup) I’ll walk up the mountain and have a look.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCh4mZ3aaInSd3dc7KLMagwHl19MU7LZoG96gj9avteKW-Jj782ZUZfElZXL_6hGVKy0P0f5j-gAAWqPy_pyI6eZQsZncH8pa4scpgHrBNM2Uu0x4kuaKFx_yHmwETdVzLlvgXl4KUvJjb/s1600-h/18-20.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 90px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCh4mZ3aaInSd3dc7KLMagwHl19MU7LZoG96gj9avteKW-Jj782ZUZfElZXL_6hGVKy0P0f5j-gAAWqPy_pyI6eZQsZncH8pa4scpgHrBNM2Uu0x4kuaKFx_yHmwETdVzLlvgXl4KUvJjb/s200/18-20.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5368991458744994226" title="Day 18-20. Ride 3 was just um, odd. 4rd ride of day 19 was a lost norweigan ;)" border="0" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-38873804996997617162009-08-09T14:26:00.008+08:002009-08-13T08:09:34.871+08:008th of August 2009Forests, forests and forests (and mosquitoes!), Sweden is just covered with pine forests except in the far south where I’m from. It isn’t too exciting to drive through all these because you don’t see too much. But once you get a bit further north in the country (I’m not even halfway through yet) the forests starts mixing with lakes, rivers, mountains and fens which almost make the landscape magical riding through. It also makes you daydreaming about having your own little cottage by a lake here somewhere.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijOcs8xDcUSaB8XwqFq2B3ki-JempKFtry-kVh9GBk0ujAwbVlDgwmqhyurN6a7wXJPZ5IenxgmxaKV_CsLo032Ia_7zxZditP1qklBwKpR3MmWzyNxOGGFjqrEYtOzKk0Aw4DGIsAgJ1F/s1600-h/lakesiljan.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEijOcs8xDcUSaB8XwqFq2B3ki-JempKFtry-kVh9GBk0ujAwbVlDgwmqhyurN6a7wXJPZ5IenxgmxaKV_CsLo032Ia_7zxZditP1qklBwKpR3MmWzyNxOGGFjqrEYtOzKk0Aw4DGIsAgJ1F/s200/lakesiljan.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367847702504034690" title="View over the south part of Lake Siljan in the evening" border="0" /></a><br />The next two days I started hitching pretty late but still covered the distances I wanted to. First I went to Falun which has the Falun copper mine, another UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is one because they have mined for copper here for over 1000 years, they have found that they were getting copper from here already in the 8th century and its been a major copper mine all until 1992 when it closed. During the 17th century it was the biggest workplace in Europe and supplied the western world with two thirds of all it copper needs exporting to countries all over Europe. It was this mine that supported the Swedish war effort and made Sweden a major player during that age. Back then it didn’t grow any trees for 5 kilometres around the mine and no plants at all for 2,5 km because of all the toxic smoke and Carl von Linné called it hell on earth when he once visited it.<br />Also both <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falu_red">Falu Red</a> which just about all wooden houses on the countryside in Sweden are painted with and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falukorv">Falukorv</a> has come to be just because of this mine.<br />After Falun I hitched to Leksand and set up my tent there just by the southeast part of lake Siljan, today I went to a lookout tower of the lake which is quite impressive, this lake and couple of lakes around it is actually a huge meteor crater, the biggest one in Europe.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQ2TGPj-ymwhoKqmkKOkPgnyxbD-kzeV6Njo-bkhKb2wBDzzARU2eyxz6lgZWT13zzgp8Tr3PTAQCSPqei6eYQXBbSYZu15C3ORI1HE3CPl-ScGoYHSH0YrAq6M_RgmIVAeQHAqiCkTib0/s1600-h/Storastoten.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQ2TGPj-ymwhoKqmkKOkPgnyxbD-kzeV6Njo-bkhKb2wBDzzARU2eyxz6lgZWT13zzgp8Tr3PTAQCSPqei6eYQXBbSYZu15C3ORI1HE3CPl-ScGoYHSH0YrAq6M_RgmIVAeQHAqiCkTib0/s200/Storastoten.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367847703298270386" title="Stora Stöten this pit is called, the mine wasnt a open cut mine to start with but after a huge collapse in 1687 (luckily no one was working at the time) this 100 metre deep pit came to be and was mined as open cut afterwards" border="0" /></a><br />After that I started hitching north to cover a greater distance and I am now in Sveg in my tent, it’s raining currently which I really don’t like.<br />Rode with an old wise man today that walked several thousand kilometres through Sweden, and actually slept in Abbekås, the town where I’m from. We discussed why people don’t pick up hitchhikers. I usually tell people that it’s because in today’s society people are either too busy or too afraid to let a stranger into their car. His theory was that people see no gain, just risk in picking up a hitcher. Which I think there is some truth behind and the sad reality of today. If people can’t gain something from doing something, they don’t do it, not even helping a fellow human being out. So most people that do pick you up are the people that once themselves stood there on the side of the road trying to get a ride because they know what you are going through.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4T850bklJ2SVZQqYS95SAw2VTsInhrEZ48V7mDB9SCPTs6Kovty7OcZPyycKHLAOZjRAv7N8r1FaCiUz3xPIrYnKQO3x_t7Ox6CU_03tqB3dxJTFlGMLhz5yMF8Ynypc8TxfqL014PvAl/s1600-h/day17-18.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 30px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4T850bklJ2SVZQqYS95SAw2VTsInhrEZ48V7mDB9SCPTs6Kovty7OcZPyycKHLAOZjRAv7N8r1FaCiUz3xPIrYnKQO3x_t7Ox6CU_03tqB3dxJTFlGMLhz5yMF8Ynypc8TxfqL014PvAl/s200/day17-18.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367847077679907490" title="Day 16-17. 4th girl was real fun and had parents living really close to Abbekås. 6th guy of second day was the wise man and last guy was a swiss ambulance driver" border="0" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8404500006057487915.post-21491804229819662562009-08-07T15:19:00.009+08:002010-03-17T08:47:48.659+08:007th of August 2009Sweden is just packed with ancient monuments and grave mounds, medieval churches and castles and old mine shafts and industrial equipment. There seems to be something worth looking at just around every corner. Think it’s like this with most countries though and you just have to make a selection to see a few things if you are ever going to make it home again.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGs2QfOZU7VdSJhXT09H_bfKQSW2_qWw6DR9h3ACAkXvhQAPxIzfBDqHygq4TCSyoL1lkaRQdLaz9_9aCSip9p7WwrNUNkR2-xNEpwXmP3mD_qobDniAJ5xlzIlsc3uxFqB9ibGD8VnEbs/s1600-h/bergsslussar.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjGs2QfOZU7VdSJhXT09H_bfKQSW2_qWw6DR9h3ACAkXvhQAPxIzfBDqHygq4TCSyoL1lkaRQdLaz9_9aCSip9p7WwrNUNkR2-xNEpwXmP3mD_qobDniAJ5xlzIlsc3uxFqB9ibGD8VnEbs/s200/bergsslussar.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121295210119010" title="Bergs Slussar" border="0" /></a><br />The next morning I got a quick ride to Berg´s Slussar which is a part of Göta Canal, a canal constructed in the 19th century which made it possible to cross Sweden by boat. There are 7 locks at Berg where I went and they lift the boats a total of 18.8 meters. Really interesting to see how the locks work.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAp0-w786V6i3rO6WM1zFhlWMxb_YBrI0ld4naxKQ5LlLRmtNO4Iemeufi8pB7YSTlZB5ZTny4jXpbAktiShdBof5tp_nzdFY3xcRkgQijB0Hc6yiH0wvG-A-hNvrJGdlH2_CF4rcF05Nh/s1600-h/sigurdsristningen.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjAp0-w786V6i3rO6WM1zFhlWMxb_YBrI0ld4naxKQ5LlLRmtNO4Iemeufi8pB7YSTlZB5ZTny4jXpbAktiShdBof5tp_nzdFY3xcRkgQijB0Hc6yiH0wvG-A-hNvrJGdlH2_CF4rcF05Nh/s200/sigurdsristningen.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121434992834290" title="The Sigurd Carving" border="0" /></a><br />After that I tried to hitch north via a not very active road so it took me quite some time to get anywhere and when the sun started to set and I was walking down the road to find a place to put up my tent the last car passing by picked me up and drove me at least some distance.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9q_WwwYsiBK8ccZnNQhqZX_iUwWvC8MEUHusWTP6jC3fqFQdL6OQieXu0kOaR2NZChk3rG78fHkPnimIka_-9UfDVIkUg_PrPJvWUHYqyRXncVwjtuY-5FA6vSwn24U4-b0Yqu7Cn0AIM/s1600-h/anundshogen.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9q_WwwYsiBK8ccZnNQhqZX_iUwWvC8MEUHusWTP6jC3fqFQdL6OQieXu0kOaR2NZChk3rG78fHkPnimIka_-9UfDVIkUg_PrPJvWUHYqyRXncVwjtuY-5FA6vSwn24U4-b0Yqu7Cn0AIM/s200/anundshogen.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121285237963570" title="View from the top of the Anundshög" border="0" /></a> Camped out just outside Statoil (a petrol station) and they were closing for the day just when I was setting up my tent so I walked over and asked if they had any food they were throwing away for the day, I ended up with 4 donuts and 3 danishes! I’m such a bum :D<br />The following day I hitched to the Sigurdristning northeast of Eskiltuna,<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpRAueTYvwhWQLjL8xMyeKa21IsFSjeK_egJEWdbbnoFZsisxMWGRA46O4JXvBKL95Qe7qcEDxS1chsML7dWGRQdEbWYiNEGxnIXpYCXRQsruj82ygzusUVSf-cJeGc21xgsRsf8UQUPmG/s1600-h/domkyrkan.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 133px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpRAueTYvwhWQLjL8xMyeKa21IsFSjeK_egJEWdbbnoFZsisxMWGRA46O4JXvBKL95Qe7qcEDxS1chsML7dWGRQdEbWYiNEGxnIXpYCXRQsruj82ygzusUVSf-cJeGc21xgsRsf8UQUPmG/s200/domkyrkan.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121295414532530" title="The Cathedral" border="0" /></a> it’s a famous stone carving made during the Viking age and ordered by a woman reciting the legend of Sigurd, which is quite alike the Nibelungen story actually. After that I hitched around the lake Mälaren (with some awesome view of Strängnäs from a bridge) to Anundshögen just east of Västerås. I was quite lucky because this guy Tobias drove me there even though it was 10km of his way home and despite he was in a hurry; actually the same thing happened when going to the Sigurdristning with another guy.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN_9a_Sb6QafK7kPARKme1YB-Q8VtmhPj_eT3-uEKGStPP1fT3hZ3AV6HWXjjfE5P77kxx1s0nUmZRuOs4FdLGENUmm_kOPIWBXNFB2wxfiDMN7BYJPbwDtZwNU-iQ9ZjAiaiATTp5UdU4/s1600-h/insidedomkyrka.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgN_9a_Sb6QafK7kPARKme1YB-Q8VtmhPj_eT3-uEKGStPP1fT3hZ3AV6HWXjjfE5P77kxx1s0nUmZRuOs4FdLGENUmm_kOPIWBXNFB2wxfiDMN7BYJPbwDtZwNU-iQ9ZjAiaiATTp5UdU4/s200/insidedomkyrka.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121303027608882" title="Inside the Cathedral" border="0" /></a><br />Anungshögen is Sweden’s largest grave mound and they think it was created sometime between the 3rd to the 6th century. They usually burned the person (most likely a king when it’s this big) with all the belongings the person (both women and men) was supposed to bring into the afterlife, and then they covered the remains with these huge piles of dirt.<br />In the Anundshög area there is several other grave mounds, 5 ship settings that were used during the Viking age for unknown reasons and a big cryptic rune stone, so it has been quite an important meeting place in the past.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjugj0Xeiim6df2draq_VzmZtyeUl4uK3mBo91j-k9Sx2ndfCefPT-6ZufsRIclxpaTIjjyCGHYgFMLsUP9wzUhZxFvZFFe9IN6q62gjXn7crlhsGqSrxBQdacoS-nUwLTnY5j8_NsnMUww/s1600-h/kinggraves.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjugj0Xeiim6df2draq_VzmZtyeUl4uK3mBo91j-k9Sx2ndfCefPT-6ZufsRIclxpaTIjjyCGHYgFMLsUP9wzUhZxFvZFFe9IN6q62gjXn7crlhsGqSrxBQdacoS-nUwLTnY5j8_NsnMUww/s200/kinggraves.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121431145495010" title="The King Graves in Old Uppsala" border="0" /></a><br />After walking around the area for a few hours I got a call from Tobias which had been away at a birthday party and he asked if I wanted to come and have a shower and sleep at their place, so I started walking there until he picked me up. So that night I had a few beers and a shower and slept in a blue bus, it just makes me so happy to see we have all these kind people I have met the last couple of days also in Sweden! (wish I could mention everyone by name here but the entries would just be way to long then , but at least all of you are in the picture of people that pick me up and I’m very grateful)<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg-ABJxYcwgnVNWDr1JWbhRsIBPZNY-8tvqAkwdGm5AIaZyWEuPu-Tc6K1IQ9hxeLedaxSGPQ1RfxUwlDQUnlAkcJADKN9AM55zU1b6WBltoLNZJk1ngSALOokGLq3nxhUFKkpRo51CLAP/s1600-h/huggorm.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgg-ABJxYcwgnVNWDr1JWbhRsIBPZNY-8tvqAkwdGm5AIaZyWEuPu-Tc6K1IQ9hxeLedaxSGPQ1RfxUwlDQUnlAkcJADKN9AM55zU1b6WBltoLNZJk1ngSALOokGLq3nxhUFKkpRo51CLAP/s200/huggorm.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367121297727863426" title="An European Adder out on the fen" border="0" /></a><br />In the morning Tobias partner Anki (whom he is getting married to on Saturday) drove me into town and we went to have her car checked. Then I hitched northeast to Uppsala which is the fourth largest city of Sweden (130 000 people living here, Sweden isn’t a very populated place!).<br />Uppsala has Scandinavia’s oldest university founded in 1477; it also has the Uppsala Cathedral which is the biggest church in Scandinavia. Went for a guided tour in the Cathedral and I was majorly impressed by the whole building, it's just so beautiful and big and has got so many old things in there, it's 118,7 meters long and 118,7 meters<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizQ3hQCKIF9dMAOH4oKesWVcOeJC_KOu8_uiuCtEdqnefsLm17gB0807AtrotQKmskAkQ7a3g1crueG5aq-MS_mbBiDhVHHpqROusTWuTRgZ22S_E8o1GhMwpAU1_YqzzwqORkHrUqPQ8l/s1600-h/nasbysjon.JPG"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 150px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEizQ3hQCKIF9dMAOH4oKesWVcOeJC_KOu8_uiuCtEdqnefsLm17gB0807AtrotQKmskAkQ7a3g1crueG5aq-MS_mbBiDhVHHpqROusTWuTRgZ22S_E8o1GhMwpAU1_YqzzwqORkHrUqPQ8l/s200/nasbysjon.JPG" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367124577028959314" title="Last nights camp by Näsbysjön" border="0" /></a> high. Construction began already 1287 but it took about 160 years to finish. From there I walked some 6km northeast of town to Old Uppsala which shows that the area has been a very important place for a very long time, Old Uppsala has the 3 king graves (3 huge grave mounds) and several other old monuments including the old Uppsala Cathedral. The mounds were made about 1500 years ago and they think they contain the bodies of 3 kings (hard to find out exactly because the corpses and their remains were burnt.)<br />Then I hitched north to this nature reserve Florarna, it’s a pretty unknown area of 50 square kilometres covered in forests and fens. Got a ride 10km into the nature reserve by this nice family which also gave me some food, then I started hiking some 5km through the reserve. Hiking through the forest was just horrible, felt like I was getting eaten alive by the mosquitoes! But on the Fens at least I got away from them and also saw my first European Adder, the only poisonous snake in Sweden. I was lucky and by the end of the hike I found some cottages that you can rent and one of them was unlocked, so I spent the night there away from all the horrible flying things outside!<br />Next day I had to hike about 9km out to get onto a road with some traffic and then I hitched west. Went pretty well until I got to Gävle where I was stuck for 4,5 hours, but on the plus side the guy that dropped me off there, Alex, gave me bread and cheese so I had some free lunch. But I finally got out of there too and got a ride to where I’m now, a rest stop just next to a beautiful lake, so yesterday I did some washing in the toilet and I just went for a morning swim a couple of minutes ago, so nice to get rid of all that sweat I have been accumulating the last 2 days from hiking.<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-GqYqEsvPdwj0hTcEdSlGf98wqj3spg5v-DlaD7ldvomHVPubgBZksmXaSdeLwGfDPjZHrmEMCUEfmwFIG7k-n327a4joqHScW-VupBhMj3VO6ROXSSCPEOle_ZbInLLjf_G9sj9UjKlF/s1600-h/day13-16.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 86px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-GqYqEsvPdwj0hTcEdSlGf98wqj3spg5v-DlaD7ldvomHVPubgBZksmXaSdeLwGfDPjZHrmEMCUEfmwFIG7k-n327a4joqHScW-VupBhMj3VO6ROXSSCPEOle_ZbInLLjf_G9sj9UjKlF/s200/day13-16.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5367122412283358786" title="Day 12-15. 2 Cars didnt want to be in a photo. 3 somali guys and a older lady. Last ride of day 14 is Tobias and first of day 15 is Anki :)" border="0" /></a>Sibbe The Hitcherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11192653744297333092noreply@blogger.com0