Lapplandsleden, Day 3

I had a good sleep. While preparing breakfast around 4:30 a.m., I hear rain falling on my tent. For a moment, I consider lying down again, but I continue with breakfast and packing. The rain stops, and I pack up a wet tent. Between the inner and outer tent layers, there are lots of flies that I can’t get out, so I roll them in with the tent. I'll have a lot of fly corpses when I unpack it again. Just before 6:00 a.m., I start walking. I am surrounded by dark clouds and hope I won’t get too much rain. Then, suddenly, the sun appears—the first time since I started from Hemavan. The day stays dry, and the dark clouds gradually turn to white, with the sun not completely disappearing again. I am relieved.

Today, I have to do a lot of climbing, but I am walking through a very beautiful open landscape. With the sun and clouds, the surroundings look stunning. At 9:30 a.m., I reach an emergency shelter and have my lunch break there. Breakfast was already five hours ago.

After 7.5 hours and almost 21 km, I reach a small hut where a Swedish woman with a dog is having a lunch break. It is still early, but I am tired. I dry my tent, as well as my socks and shoes, since there were two river crossings today that were a bit deep. Then I wash myself in the lake. The Swedish woman moves on.

I have just finished my dinner when a big guy shows up. He looks like a Viking to me. He only wants to eat here and then continue walking. He is hiking the Green Ribbon, has 600 km to go, and needs to finish within the next 20 days. We have an interesting talk about gear before he moves on.

I’m still hoping to be alone tonight and fall asleep around 7:00 p.m. At 8:00 p.m., I wake up. An older Swedish couple has just arrived. They say they only want to sit here for a while. They have been fishing - I had smelled that already and were traveling by boat. They mention they have a tent set up somewhere. I fall asleep again, but when I wake up the next time, I have to get my earplugs. The couple had decided to stay in the hut, and the man is snoring. I put in the earplugs and continue sleeping.