Cee’s Fun Foto Challenge: Looking Up at Things
They were fixing our roof…and I looked up at one of the guys – who looked down on me…
Byggnader
Thursday Thoughts – Moving a Town
Kiruna is the northernmost town in Sweden, situated in the province of Lapland in Norrbotten County. Inhabitants – about 20 000.
Esrange Space Center was established in Kiruna in the 1960s, and they also have the Institute of Space Physics.
The re-development of Kiruna is a reconstruction project, as the Kirunavaara mine, run by LKAB, undermines the current town center. Several buildings, including Sweden´s most beautiful church and the famous Town Hall, are to be moved or demolished. The whole town center is to be moved 3 kilometers to the east.
The ground deformations became apparent in 2003, and the redevelopment started in 2007. The moving of the town was started in 2014 and is expected to be finished by 2100. According to the plan, there will be a denser city centre with a greater focus on sustainability, green and blue infrastructure, pedestrians and public transport rather than automobiles.
Walking the empty streets at night, the snowy silence is almost visible, touchable, embedding you in cotton cold. I wonder how the people here really feel…knowing most of them will have to leave their homes and their familiar surroundings for something they have not chosen themselves. A great piece of history will be lost, and I guess a piece of Lapland´s soul as well.
Jukkasjärvi Icehotel
Icehotel is the world’s first hotel made of ice and snow. Founded in 1989, it is reborn in a new guise every winter, in the Swedish village of Jukkasjärvi – 200 km north of the Arctic Circle.
This winter season there is, alongside the classic Icehotel experience. ICEHOTEL 365. This hotel was built to be a permanent structure that includes luxury suites, each with private relax and bathroom, and art suites, all sculptured by selected artists. There is a large ice bar that serves champagne, and an ice gallery. This ice experience can be visited year-round and is cooled by solar panels during the summer months.
Let us first go inside the ordinary hotel and enjoy its cold beauty – 5 degrees C below zero.
As we walk down the aisle there are corridors on our left, all leading into rooms – the hotel has got 55 rooms and suites. I admire the grand chandeliers, all handmade in ice…
We approach the ice chapel, and the light is amazing. I have to walk slowly to take it all in.
The ice benches are all covered in reindeer skins, and we sit rather comfortably here. Artists made the altar and the decorations, as well as the baptismal font to the left.
The very white material making up the chapel is called snis – probably a merge of snow and ice, as that is what it really is.
The Torne river stretches 520 kilometers, and is the largest of Sweden’s four national rivers -in fact also one of the last untouched rivers in Europe.
It’s the Torne River that provides Icehotel with its ice in winter – and in the summer when the hotel melts, the water returns to its source. Natural ice requires a lot of work – before it is harvested in March, when it has grown its thickest. Months are devoted to maintaining the “ice field” and keeping it clear of snow for the ice to have the best possible conditions to grow.
Each harvested block weighs about two tons. The picture shows one of them standing.
In next post we will enter the new hotel and the cool bar…with drinks served in ice glasses. I will walk you through some of the spectacular art suites as well. I wonder if you would like to check in…? Hope to see you then!
Thursday Thoughts
This country road passes an old homestead, long since abandoned. I pass here maybe once a month, and every time I think…I really should stop and walk up that old road…
Today I drove past again…but something told me – this time I really must stop –
– so I finally did. I turned the car and parked it on the meadow nearby.
Happy to have made this decision, I slowly started walking towards the stonefences marking the road up to the house.
To the right, the fine old cellar that used to store food for the winter.
Then the house itself, on the left side of the road. I wonder who once lived here and why they left? The house lies beautifully on a hill, close to the forest and surrounding meadows.
My love for these roads with grass in the middle has a long story…all those childhood years I walked forest roads, meadow roads…and always with grass in the middle. StilI it is in me…I just have to follow them, to see where they go and what I eventually will find.
This road was very well kept, and must be used fairly often…
…at least by hunters
Another reminder of childhood days was this old telephone pole
Some finds I made, even if the walk did not last for more than 15 minutes. I was happy.
I believe we should try to do those little things…follow those whims and ideas we sometimes have. What do you think? It may take some time…but, I try to. Often with a positive outcome – for both me and people around me.
Thursday Thoughts – The Importance of Festivities
Travelling means learning new things every day. I guess that is one of the best parts of life – learning new things. In this 2 million people capital, Quito, Ecuador, I enjoyed every second. Almost 3000 metres up in the Andes – you had to take it a bit easy the first day.
Do you, for instance, know which mountain is the world´s highest? I learned from the Ecuadorian businessman sitting next to me in the plane between Guayaquil and Baltra, that it is…..Chimborazo, a big volcano in Ecuador. It is higher than Mount Everest – if you count from the middle of our planet Earth.
Colourful Old Town Quito, together with Krakow, Poland, 1978 became the first UNESCO World Heritage sites. And they keep it colourful, clean and tidy.
There were grand festivities this week – December 6 was celebrated everywhere. So, what did they celebrate? Their freedom? No, they celebrated the Spaniards conquering them in the 16th century…I asked them how this could be something to celebrate – and they all answered that they had put all this behind them – this day was just a good day for festivities and having fun. That sounded just great to me!
Ecuador Ama la Vida
Music and Dancing in the street
Miss Quito and Gentleman
Lovely festive ladies
These musicians were absolutely professional – we did not leave even if we had finished our meal…
Beautiful city and beautiful people – and wonderful food! We enjoyed Quito despite some rain. Old and young, everybody in a good mood.
A young man came up to me with a rose. You know, the thing they do everywhere down in Europe, expecting you to give some money…This young guy was in a group of students, and he was the only one to have a single rose in his hand. I shook my head and told him I had no money, but his eyes were shining when he smiled, saying that he did not want any money…just to give me the rose.
Cee’s B&W Photo Challenge: Construction
Moroccan construction often looks like this. Is it a start or are we waiting for a finish?
For more of construcktion – click here.
CFFC: Dark and Light
Dark and Light for Cee’s challenge – much of that in the rainforest, but also the reflections on the poles every lodge was sitting upon. Here some bats resting after their night adventures.
Thursday Thoughts – To Paradise and Back Again
So, I have been to Paradise – and back again. From Sweden to Amsterdam and then to Quito. After a couple of interesting days in beautiful world heritage, Quito Old Town, we flew down to the Amazon basin, Coca.
From Coca 1 1/2hour by motorized canoe on the Napo River …
Then 30 minutes hiking on jungle boardwalk before the last bit in a paddle canoe.
There was a slight drizzle, but we saw an abundance of flowers and birds already on this short way before reaching the lodge.
At Sacha Lodge we were welcomed by our hosts. The Lodge had rooms for 65 guests, but at the moment we were only 13-14. Lots of space and attention from our excellent guides.
Our own lodge was incredibly fresh and simple, just as in my dreams – but even better!
Spacey and open – in fact no walls on one side, so both shower and bedroom were open to the jungle. The only thing to separate us from the real world was a net, with all the sounds of the rainforest and its inhabitants just two steps away…I tell you, I have never slept better in my entire life. Birds, insects and howler monkeys feasting!
I remember staying in a clay and straw hut in the Nepalese jungle of Chitwan, in 1986, with giant spiders covering the ceiling and lizards and rats owning the mud floor. I did not sleep anything at all…even if I was young and brave.
A short canoe ride on the little lake Pilchicocha – Stinky Turkey, the most typical of the Amazon birds
Getting dark…but oh, the sounds of thousands and the beauty of the water
Back at the lodge for some food
We saw flycatchers and kingfishers among other birds, and in the waters below our breakfast house dwells….a cajman called Lucy!
Tarantula – less adorable
On the night walk we met many animals…many crawlers (millipeeds too), possums and some spiders of gigantic size. One of the The tarantulas was a pink toed giant sitting high up under the roof of the butterfly house. We also saw a wolf spider about the same size…Crickets, grasshoppers and the world’s biggest ant – a bullet ant – who has got the worst bite in the world with terrible pain for 24 hours. ”Watch out where you put your hands” was the advice. They might walk on the same rails or twigs you happen to use…
My favourite was the charming tree frog of course…!
This was our first day at Sacha Lodge – and I just Loved every minute of it. For the next day we were promised parrots, weavers, a women’s collective, curare, arrows and local cooking, canoe through narrow rainforest waterways and maybe…anaconda.
Good night to our extremely initiated and knowledgeable guides, Pablo and Luis.
Cee’e B&W Photo Challenge: Any Geometric Shape
Cee’s Black & White Photo Challenge: Any Geometric Shape
Gaudi´s Bishop’s Palace in Astorga, for Cee’s Geometric Challenge.
Wordless Wednesday
Leya 
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