Horne's Swedish Exchange: Kiruna

Hey all,

So I just got back from Kiruna yesterday and the trip was incredible.

Kiruna is Sweden's northern-most municipality, located 145 north of the Arctic Circle and at one time was the world's largest city in area. The municipality of Kiruna contains over 6000 lakes and the northern lights and midnight sun can be seen here. Along with Swedish and Finnish, some locals also speak Sami, the language of Sweden's reindeer-herding indigenous people, the Sami, some of whom still live in Kiruna.

We started off early Friday morning catching a train from Malmo to Stockholm. In Stockholm we had a 6hr stopover before our train to Kiruna was scheduled to leave. During this time we toured the city a bit on foot but didn't see a lot because it was very cold and snowing. At 5:00pm we caught our train and started on our 18hr ride to Kiruna.

We arrived Saturday morning at Ripan (http://www.ripan.se), the resort we were staying at and checked into our cabin. Later that day we went snowshoeing and dogsledding. Dogsledding was definitely one of the highlights of the trip. We were supplied special snowsuits before heading out then got into 4-5 person sleds pulled by 12 dogs. The sleds took us through an alternating mix of forest and open areas before we stopped for food and drinks in a Sami hut.

Sunday we took a taxi trip 18km east to Jukkasjärvi to visit the IceHotel. The hotel is rebuilt each year using ice taken from the nearby Torne River, specially chosen because of its pure water and steady movement, resulting in the clearest ice possible. It was very beautiful and bigger than expected. There are two types of rooms in the hotel: regular ones and specially designed suites. Both types of room contain two (or more/less) beds of ice and reindeer skin. All of the suites (there were probably around 30 of them) are designed by a different artist and have a different theme. We also had a drink in the IceBar then visited the icehotel church.

Sunday night we went cross-country skiing just outside the resort we were staying at. Kiruna annually plays host to Sweden's national cross-country ski team as they train for the upcoming world circuit so there were many ski routes to choose from. Each of these routes had ski tracks that were depressed into the snow by a grooming machine. The resulting tracks made the skiing much faster and smoother.

On the way back from skiing we saw a brief show of the Northern lights, a small, moving green circle appearing in the sky - very cool.

That night we slept in an igloo and most people agreed that it was their best sleep up to that point. We also had exclusive access to the resort's sauna Saturday night and Sunday morning which we took full advantage of.

Monday we went into town to visit the church of Kiruna and tour the city centre. After that we went on a tour of Kiruna's iron mine, the largest underground mine in the world. The mine belongs to LKAB, a Swedish mineral products company wholly owned by the Swedish governement. Last year alone, the company generated $1billion CAD in profit. The mine reaches 1km down into the earth and is the reason the town of Kiruna was founded in 1900 after mining began on Kiruna mountain. A bus took us underground where our tour guide took us through the mining process and showed us some of the machinery used.

Monday night Chris, Ivan and I rented some snowshoes and hiked up Kiruna mountain. We made it about 3/4 of the way up before our progress was stopped by a large chasm created by the mining process. The chasm was likely a kilometre wide and a couple hundred meters deep - from our vantage point it looked like a fjord and was impressive to see close up.

Tuesday morning we caught our 6:00am flight back to Stockholm then caught another one back to Malmo and a bus to Lund, ending the weekend's events.

A snow sculpture had been 'erected' over our residence's bicycle shelter two days before leaving

Ivan packed and ready to go

5:00am outside of our residence

Chris asleep on the train to Stockholm

Stockholm railway station

Arrival in Stockholm. It was snowing like crazy and very cold.

Our sure-footed sherpa from Switzerland took a spill on the slippery streets of Stockholm

The damage

More Stockholm...

An alley in the old part of Stockholm. Looks Italian...

Me on a balcony near the parliament buildings

Looking out the window of our compartment on the 18hr train ride to Kiruna

Arrival in Kiruna

The streets of Kiruna on the way to our cabin

Swedish-looking apartment building in Kiruna

An idea of the amount of snow in Kiruna

Kiruna mountain (the big hill in the background. This is where the iron ore mine is located)

Our cabins from the outside

Shot of the group during our snowshoeing tour

The group about to go on the dogsled tour.

The beasts (12 dogs pulled a sled of 4-5 people)

Closer up

Wayne and Phillip during our break inside a Sami hut. Food consisted of reindeer meat and coffee.

The dogs in their pen

After a hard day's work

Some weird Swedish movie that was on Sat night

Midnight snack

Another Swedish-looking house

Chris looking out the window of our cabin

Just outside the IceHotel

Entering the IceHotel

Hallway of rooms

Doorway into a room

Ivan laying on one of the reindeer-skin beds

Inside one of the suites

Chillin with the boys in the IceHotel

The IceBar

Our drink of choice: lingonberry juice and vodka

A bunch of Spanish students in the ice hotel's church

Some ice sculptures outside the hotel

Leaving the IceHotel

Getting ready dressed to sleep in the igloo

The igloos we spent Sunday night in. Each of us was supplied with a mummy-type sleeping bag good to -20C. The ceilings of each igloo were only about 4ft high and temperatures inside usually don't go below -2C.