An Average Friday in Sweden

Nearby Östersund is the river Indalsälven, one of Sweden's largest. Upstream from this cozy city are countless cascades, falls, rapids, and whirlpools famous enough for me to skip Swedish class and visit them. (since nice days are precious gems up here!)

Vasilli and Seb at the foot of Tännforsen, Sweden's largest waterfall. 

So on a chilly Friday morning, I woke up early and headed downtown with friends Seb, Vassili, Stefano, and Raja to pick up a rental car. In most countries you have to be 25 to drive one; it seems that Sweden is more trusting. And rightly so, this car was a Volvo that could actually drive itself. To an extent... it was certainly the fanciest vehicle I've ever ridden in!

First stop was ICA Maxi (Swedish for "biggest and greatest supermarket ever") where we loaded up on snacks for the day. Including the first lussekatter of the year; saffron buns traditionally made and eaten around the holidays. The local equivalent of Halloween decorations in July. 

We ate 'em all before any pictures were taken; enjoy this stock image.

Tännforsen was our first waterfall of the tour. And if you think you've seen big waterfalls, think again. This one shakes the ground and creates a perpetual mist around itself. I've never been to Niagara Falls but I imagine this must be pretty similar. 

At the base of the falls. 

I think waterfalls as a tourist destination are often overhyped, but not here. All the ones we visited today were regular parks on the side of the road, no guardrails either as you can see!

Next was Handölsforsen, (forsen means "rapids" in this language, what an understatement) another hour down the road. Now we were properly up in the mountains and close to Norway- that meant snow! 

"Maximum three people on the bridge at a time", the sign said. 

Looking downstream from the bridge

And upstream, at the next set of falls! It really felt like winter up there. 

After a nice picnic and conversation with curious Swedes (Which was a first! They wanted to know what we were doing there on a weekday in the offseason) we checked off the final two cascades. It feels repetitive to dive into all the details of these falls, so I'll let the pictures say their thousands of words:

Our lunch spot at Handölsforsen, on top of the turbine house. Of course no vertical drop is left unutilized for hydroelectric power here- they're just efficient like that!

Tegeforsen and Ristafallet. After the other two these were rather underwhelming but in any other location they'd be jaw-dropping. 

You'll be glad to hear that nobody fell in! Considering that one slick stone could be fatal around so much falling water we were lucky in that regard. Maybe that's the American voice in my head talking; people should be smart enough not to get close to this rushing water. Anyways, we got back to Östersund at sundown (5:30 these days!) and with 2% battery remaining in the car. Perfect timing and what a trip! 

On the plate for the coming weeks is a school trip down to Stockholm from the 27th the 31st; to see the city and all its sustainable systems, green roofs, museums, etc. Until then!

Stefano is also quite a good photographer; this was from another day but it's still one of the better pictures taken of me here.