Possibly the last blog post...

 So, this might be the last post I'm making, but no promises. We still have a few days here in Sweden, but I might be having a hard time getting it done. As you see here, we had some fancy food. This is a Swedish specialty called spagetti och korv. It's a little complicated, but you need to start with good quality spaghetti and a tasty hot-dog. The ketchup on top is essential, do not forget it!

Kathryn made her specialty for everyone, and even though she doesn't want to be known as the enchilada-girl, it is something that she does very well. :D

 We also had some ostkaka. It literally translates to Cheesecake, but it is something different altogether. If you can tell me how it's made you'll get a full 5 points.

As I told you in the mini-post, we ended up in the boondocks. That's where Kathryn's relatives live, her uncle and 2 of his kids all have houses on the same property. We spent 2 days taking trips out on their boat. The property is right on the ocean, and there are islands all over the place. The weather was wonderful, perfect for a boat ride, so we all wanted to take advantage of it. This summer has had nothing but beautiful days while we have been here, it's going to be a rough awakening to go back to Hotlanta...

Even though the sun had been shining, the ocean water doesn't usually heat up that well. Still some of us still built up enough courage to hop in. It was pretty frigid, but as you can see, Micah and Salome both went in it to the neck, and pretended to love it.

We saw a swan family swimming around, but they kept their distance. With some zooming I was able to get a somewhat decent shot of them, but it would have been nice to get a little closer.


It took some convincing, but I was able to get this pose at the end of the day with Micah and Kathryn's cousin's daughter Angelica.
Kathryn's uncle managed to get in it as well, but no poses from him...

 Karin made some american breakfast for everyone, and it came out really good. It was interesting to see a culture difference in the meat counter. When buying the bacon for this breakfast, we had to buy 8 packages... They just don't come in the same size. On top of the packages being small, the slices were thin enough that you could see through them.

 On our second outing, we decided to meet up with Kathryn's cousin Jon. He had been out working, and was tugging back the work platform that he and his workmate built. They own a lot of excavating machinery, and this work-barge will hold a full size excavator, and the 30 foot pylons can be lowered down into the water for support if they need to dig while on the platform.

We got our boat next to theirs, tied them together and traveled back home on the tugboat.
It was quite interesting to see them maneuver that big thing around the islands and boats that were there.
At the Thursday night meeting, I had to cover the "Gems" part for Kathryn's cousin, and that's about the worst part possible to do when you hardly know anyone's name.... but I survived. My parents picked us up from the hall, and from there we went back to Härnösand.
We spent Friday with my other grandmother in Sollefteå, and then all of Saturday traveling down to my sisters place in Nora, which is where I am sitting now, happy and full after finishing a delicious Kebab.

Tom managed to get 6 points by getting the blueberries and lingonberries identified, but he totally failed with the cloudberries.... nice try though. :D

In the Internet Black Hole

So, if you've been wondering about the lack of updates, the situation is as follows; we're stuck in the Black Hole known as myrbodarna. I'm writing this update from a cell-phone connection that is already over the limit. No pictures today, but I have some nice nautical pictures coming up when I'm back on a real connection :D

She'll be coming 'round the mountain when she comes, when she comes.

So, seems like I had another lapse in my postings, but I'm back again! Brace yourselves, this one is going to be a little heavy on pictures. But maybe that means I won't be as wordy, since each of these is worth a thousand words....

We headed up to a place called Skuleberget. It's a pretty steep mountain as you can see here. One of the options was to take a guided tour with full climbing gear to get up to cool places such as this cave, but since we're cheap, we went with the free option. The one involving walking on planks. :)

You might think that was a little lazy of us, but it was no walk in the park (even though it literally was a walk in a park...)

The planks helped a lot, but unfortunately they didn't go all the way up to our destination close to the top of the mountain.

Micah was nice enough to pose for me even though I used a very unprofessional  camera. I think it came out pretty good, if I may say so myself.

Kathryn found a comfortable spot to lay down (she might have lain down under duress, but we won't talk about that...) in a field of rocks. You will find fields like these all around the area, and some of them go on for quite a while. Supposedly they were once at the sea-floor, but now they're located way up the mountainside.
A popular opinion in our group is that it might have had something to do with the flood, but we're just speculating.

We also got to see some fancy roots. It's pretty amazing how they spread out, and I'm thinking that these trees won't go down easy. Maybe we could teach the trees in Georgia how to do this...



 Today we will do a botanical quiz. What 3 kinds of berries grow on the plants depicted here? 3 points for each identified type, and 1 point for the second correct answer. In the one picture you will have to specify which plant goes with which berry though... No easy points today! I will let you know that the one on the right is the one that has 2 in it though.

 The path went through a lot of different types of views. We walked through woods, over rocky parts, climbing up mountainsides and through swamps.
The weather was perfect for hiking, not too warm and a nice breeze.
The further up we got, the more it got rocky and steep.



 Finally we reached our destination. This crevice was 3 kilometers from where we parked, but it was definitely worth the hike. It was very awe-inspiring. after climbing around at the bottom of the ravine and taking some pictures, we headed up to the top of the mountain.
on the one side of the ravine it was very easy to get up, and we were treated to a beautiful view of the water below. Even though Micah is covering some of it, I'm sure you can appreciate the beauty.

To get up on the other side of the ravine was a little more precarious. There was only some narrow ledges to walk up, but we all made it, even my mom. :)


My sister and her husband chose this spot for a pda, and I though it was worth documenting.


The way down was a lot quicker, and we took a slightly different path that gave us some different views.
If the pictures don't look as good from this point forward, my camera had an experience bouncing off a rock into a puddle.
It looks in bad shape, but I think it still works.

After all that walking, of course we needed to eat. This here is a tiny little fish-restaurant in the middle of nowhere. The food was very good, and everyone was happy. :D

The next morning Bitja and I decided to make some segkakor, my Grandmother's signature bread.
I'll just show you the progress in these next few pictures. It wasn't terribly complicated, and it comes out delicious!

We finished the day with a bbq at the house where Kristine, Micah, Mark and Karin are staying and after that some of us got in their sauna. It was very refreshing!

I almost forgot. I've added up the scores, and it seems like everyone has been pretty good at figuring out the correct answers. Unfortunately no one was able to figure out that all three women were named Karin. It's very obvious when you look at them, I'm a little disappointed in all of you.
Also, the correct answer on the stove is Kakelugn, which Tom was the first one to get correct.
After adding all of it together, this is what i have for totals (if I did any mistakes, please let me know)
Tom in the lead with 20 points.
LaMontica second with 13 points
Bronte third with 7 points
Brit fourth with 1 point

Good work everyone!

Hey, did you happen to see.....?

 So, today we actually did some "vacationy" stuff. Some friends from back when have a summer home out in the boondocks, and we got invited to go there for some bbq. We stopped on the way there for a photo-op. In the background you see Sweden's answer to the golden gate bridge. 3 points if you can tell me the span of the bridge. 1 point for the second correct answer. By the way, I'm sorry I haven't updated the current stats for the competition, but I should have time to update it soon. :) Looks like Tom is making a killing... someone will have to have a talk with him about his sleeping habits...

As you can see, I wasn't exaggerating when I said it was in the middle of nowhere. It's not too far from Härnösand, but a lot of time was spent down bumpy dirt-roads. We got to see a couple of exhausted foals taking a nap. They didn't even stir as we passed by.

The main house is pretty old, it's been in the family for several generations. In their living room they had this beauty. 7 points for the one that can find out what it is, and how it works.
It comes in many shapes and colors, and it's a very efficient heating source.

The Johansson family also built an additional small cabin, since they have 6 kids and 12 grand-kids that take up a lot of space. :)
As you can see, they view from the porch is quite pretty.

This time around, there were only 4 of the kids and 8 of the grand-kids there, so it wasn't too crazy.
 Apparently, the kids didn't quite get the hang of how to operate a row-boat yet though... they travel better in water.

 There were some attempts at pushing people into the water, I was close to ending up in the water with my camera in tow, but I managed to catch myself.
Not everyone was that fortunate though, as you can see here...

 Kathryn is really starting to enjoy the vacation now, you can see how the stress of learning Russian is finally leaving her.
The water was freezing, and at this point, I don't think I could feel my feet anymore.
Of course, where there is a lake, there will be a row-boat. This one was perfect for Kathryn and I, since it just seated 2. We didn't take turns rowing, but I let Kathryn hold the oars for a photo-op.
This was right next to a beaver-dam, but it didn't look like much, so I decided not to post those pictures.

 Here is part of the crowd that we had for the bbq, but there were more out roaming.

We left one crowd for an evening with another. This time with the Tunlinds. It's been a tradition for our visits to Sweden to stop by and eat something over there, and we had a very nice evening. Bob, the husband enjoyed getting to know the joke: "What do you call a guy with no legs and no arms in the pool?"
It took some explanation since it doesn't translate that well, but now he has something to use for breaking the ice with other English speaking guests.

I'm back!

For all those depending on my blog for their entertainment, I'm very sorry for my delinquency. My only excuse is that I've been on vacation. :D
Well, that and the fact that people keep coming here and adding to the crazy pile of people we have at my parents.

So, to summarize: Amazing last day at the convention as most people know by now.
Kathryn though that your minds would be blown by the "b.y.o.c." section that they have here. It's quite popular I hear.

 I was introduced to an Ukrainian brother, and got to try chatting a little in Russian. He seemed glad to get to "talk" with someone, since he's only been in Sweden a few months, and is taking classes to learn Swedish. Sad to say, I believe his Swedish is better than my Russian. :(



Kathryn did a tan comparison with her cousin Lasse and his wife Lisa. 3 points to the one that can correctly identify the arms, 1 point for the second correct answer.

I managed to get a picture of Kathryn's aunt together with her mom and my grandma (Kathryn's aunt is an anti-picturite). If you can tell me what these three women have in common, you'll get another 3 points (or 1 if you're second).



In the evening we took a walk with my mom to the outdoors museum where we found this fancy mansion.
Since Härnösand gets so many international visitors they have the signs available in 3 languages. One very important detail is left out in the translation though. What happened to the building in 1721? I'd like to think that the ancestors of someone in our congregation was involved... :D
Guess what you will get if you get the first correct answer? The first one to guess that will get a bonus point.

Dad stayed behind in the convention hall for cleanup, and also to pick up Kristine and Micah arriving by train to Sundsvall. They took a flight to Iceland before getting to Sweden (if you ask Micah nicely, you can get access to his photo stream to see the amazing scenery) but since they couldn't afford to eat there, they had to leave. :D

On Monday we introduced Micah and Kristine to the public transportation system. There is a free bus going through central Härnösand every 15 minutes, and since they got to borrow an apartment that was quite some distance from where my parents live, it might come in handy.
So far the weather has been quite lovely, mid 60s, a little breezy and sunny. It feels very refreshing after the muggy 90s in Atlanta.
In the evening my sister Bitja and her husband Sam arrived. They had been at the convention down in Stockholm.
Here in Sweden they had all the conventions on the same day. Up north in Sundsvall there were over 3k attending. In Stockholm they had over 8k and in the south in Malmö they had over 10k.
I'd like to see how that would work out in the US. Might get a little crowded. :)

 I spent all of Tuesday working on my upcoming public talk, it is quite the project, and I might tell you about it later... that is if I don't crash and burn on Sunday.
In the evening we walked Micah and Kristine home. It took us about 25 minutes to get there, and the picture right here is taken at 15 minutes after midnight... that's as dark as it gets this time of year. You don't get that tired when it's never dark.