Snowy wonderland in Idre.

It started snowing just before lunch, and as the afternoon went on, there was more and more snow, as well as more and more wind. It didn’t get quite as windy as in Hemavan last year (when the winds forced lifts to be closed) but with the icy grains of snow it was pretty unpleasant. Especially on the lifts, where we were exposed to the full force of the snow and wind and had neither trees nor even the mountain itself to protect us, since we were above everything. We huddled, and made sure to cover every bare patch of skin with scarfs and mittens.

And I definitely did not stop at the top for photography. Not that there was anything to see there either, because the clouds were low and the air was full of snow. It was all a very white whiteness. “The nothingness,” Ingrid called it.

When we got down among the trees and stopped to look, what looked like snow on the trees turned out to be ice crystals.

Ingrid and I are in Idre for this year’s skiing holiday. This time we have my mum with us as well. During the days we will each be going our separate ways as we ski downhill while she does Nordic skiing. But we had company for the six-hour drive, and for breakfast and evenings.

The lifts close at 16:30 already so today we didn’t have time for much more than picking up our skis and just enough skiing to make our bodies remember what it feels like.

Adrian and I went geocaching in Lövsta. It was a new area for us so we had lot of easy caches to find close to where we parked. We bagged a record six caches in under three hours.

The sun was warm but in shade the ice was still all properly icy. Adrian liked the icy spots best. Wherever there was an icy patch on the path, he chose that side of the path. This place will be very swampy in spring, but now it was a nice large expanse of firm ice.

My mum and brother are here to celebrate New Year’s Eve. After a day with six people cooped up indoors, we’re going crazy. I’m not sure who’s more easily bored and in need of entertainment: the kids or my mum. (My brother is more reclusive and has no trouble entertaining himself.)

In any case, we bundled into our warm clothes and took all of the bored people out walking in Ursvik, and introduced my mum to geocaching. We found two lovely, fun caches – and also two huts like the one in the photo. Built by some scout group perhaps?

We went for a short forest walk with grilled sausages. It’s been sub-zero for a few days so the ground was all covered by amazing spiky ice formations.

Adrian and I went for a forest walk and some geocaching, him in his brand new snowsuit. He got bored a long while before I wanted to go home. Unsatisfying for both of us.

A late night swim in a small, quiet lake. Just us two at the entire lake.

Ingrid left early this morning for scout camp and Eric and Adrian are away visiting friends in Hälsingland. I’m on my own for two entire days, for the first time in forever.

Today I went biking in the Järva nature reserve and met very hairy cows.

I had my GPS with me – primarily for plain navigation rather than for geocaching. But I had downloaded some caches in that area earlier and one of them sounded intriguing. Called Fire and ants, the description said it was next to the site of a forest fire – and supposedly had a lot of ants. The part about a fire site sounded interesting, and I pretty much dismissed the part about ants. I mean, I’ve been close to ant hills before. How many ants could there possibly be?

It turns out that “a lot of ants” really meant “a hell of a lot of ants”. I could not believe my eyes. Within a sizable area (we’re talking tens of metres at least) the ground was covered with them. There was nowhere I could put my feet without stepping on dozens of ants. I could not stop walking even for a second because immediately I had ants all over my feet. I thought perhaps I could stand on something to get away from them but every log, rock, and tree stump was also covered in ants. I was walking in small circles all the time while opening the cache box and logging my visit, to avoid being totally overrun. As soon as I was done, I made my escape – running.

This is what the ground looked like, all over:

Still in Rõuge, we went on a little excursion to Luhasoo bog.

Estonia has a lot of bogs – about one fifth of the area is covered in marshes and bogs. (Here’s a bit more about Estonian nature for the non-Estonians among you.) Many of them have plank paths for hiking, and some have raised viewing platforms.

Luhasoo has a hiking trail of about 5 km with a very nice plank path through the bog, to and around the lake in the middle of the bog. Many of the planks had started rotting – not so much that there was any danger of ending up in the bog water, but they were springy enough to notice when walking. Which I actually rather liked.

At intervals along the trail there were educational boards with information about the ecology, plant life etc of the bog – really well made and interesting. I learned that bog water is so acidic that it harbours no bacteria and is therefore very safe to drink, and for the same reason peat moss can be used to cover wounds. I also learned that the correct English name for the wild berries that in Swedish are called “blueberry” is not actually blueberry but bilberry.