…and a 5th one I hate! I call it “constant melting and freezing process”. It can last 2 months like last year, or be almost done in two weeks, like it seems now! Snow starts melting and retreating, and is no longer snow, but a dirty mix of mud, oil, sand and ice! Even if there is some gravel on it, it can still be very dangerous to walk on! You never feel safe, you never know when your feet will slide. It´s even worse when you are carrying stuff or downhill (I fell a couple of times thanks to the precious help of gravity!). Besides being dangerous to walk (I don´t even know how people dare to bike, they must have special powers…), it´s awful looking at something that was once pure and white, and now looks like shit… I absolutely recommend people not to visit Sweden during this period 🙂 And that is way I chose to take holidays exactly from tomorrow onwards!
After spending a complete Winter here, I can definitely say that it is totally worth enduring those short and dark days, in order to have 6 months of “no switching on the light at home”! Yes, it might be extreme, but I´ve realized I like extremes. Winter and Summer are my favourite seasons, and you will never experience a real Winter if you don´t come this far North! A cold and sunny Winter, with plenty of Northern Lights and fresh snow every day, to do some quality skiing 🙂 A warm and never-ending Summer (long days) with possibility of, even after a full working day, going to the beach or to a lake, and still enjoy the day for another 8h! I cannot imagine how boring it might be to have the sunset and sunrise at the same time, every day! Besides, the twilight here lasts for so long, meaning you can watch the sunset for hours, until it fades away gently. Have you ever thought about how fast is the sunset in Dubai, India or Brazil?
Last Spring doesn´t bring me back so good memories. I think it came for 2 or 3 weeks before Summer, when some flowers decided to blossom. Hopefully, this year, when I´m back from holidays, Northern Sweden will look like a Van Gogh painting! It is a bit different in Southern Sweden, where Winter is shorter and Summer longer. But they don´t really have a Winter anymore, it´s almost as mild as in Spain or France!
Welcome back Summer!
laplandalltheway 