Hay guise!
I was out paddlin with 2 friends last week for a full week and i thought that i
should perhaps let you guys in on this since i arranged that we all could
hang in hammocks for this trip.
The whole trip was kind of spontaneously put together when i layed my eyes
upon an group of islands called "Djurö" in the middle of Vänern (a big lake!)
and i thought "ooh, shiny! want!". So with that in mind it didnt take many
seconds of persuation for my friend in Malmö to tag along. A few weeks after
that, another friend showed interest in joining so after that we started our
trip planning, buying stuff we needed for the trip and getting a hold of
3 kayaks for us to embark on our little vacation trip!
I´ll break it down for you on a daily basis.
Saturday (whole trip was between 14th to 21st of April)
I wake up early, a bit tired from work + packing equipment from the day before
and look out the window and notice that we received a few inches of snow
during the night... great start i thought and made some coffee. I packed the
last of my gear and took the commuter train to Stockholm Central Station, and
switched to our train bound for Mariestad. The weather went from Snow/rain
to sunny skies without a single cloud in sight. Fortune smiled upon our journey!
We met up with our Friend from the south and had some lunch, a quick supply
run at the grocery store and went out to the docks to meet up the man with
the water vessels known as kayaks.
It was getting pretty late in the afternoon when we were done with all our
packing so we plotted a course a few miles to the southwest for our first
camp.
The conditions were perfect! Practically no wind and about + 8c! Pure Awesomeness!
We arrived at our first camp about 6 pm. A small beach with a fire place arranged for
our enjoyment!
We had some "refreshments" while the sun was setting.
Sunday
This is how our camp looked like in the morning. We tried to combine all 3 tarps so
we could chat with eachother before we went to sleep, but the chatting part failed
since we all pretty much crawled into our sleeping bags in total silence and dozed
off quite fast after that ^^
Our plan then was to head to an island called Onsö and that required us to cross a bit
of open water perhaps 1/2 mile or so. But we still had the weather on our side so we
werent so worried. Take note of the "Still" in that last sentence...
Another stunning sunset! 2 for 2 so far!
Monday
Monday morning! all snug & secure in our hammocks. My 2 friends made due with
DD Frontline´s, and i was pimping in my Exped Ergo
We had some rain the evening before but we countered it with a redicoulusly big fire.
So we had warmth!
We found a good spot for some lunchin on our way to Brommö.
Later that day we arrived at our destination.
We did not have time enough to watch the sunset that evening since we were
losing daylight pretty fast and wanted to get our hammocks up before it got dark.
Tuesday
We decided to stay at Brommö the entire day since we were quite exhausted from
the effort of getting there. So we just layed on the beach, made a fire and lived
the easy life the entire day.
Wednesday
Our luck with the weather is officially over. The weather started to change. We didnt
See the sun for the entire day and the wind started to pick up some speed. So we focused
on getting as far as possible before making camp so there was no mood for taking pictures
on that day. We did start snapping some when we got our hammocks up though.
Thursday
We slept very long and woke up around lunch time. Here is how our camp looked like.
This is the part where we started to get a bit nervous.
We were crossing between two islands called Dillö and Onsö and were pretty well protected
from the wind. But as soon as we got through those 2 islands we got smashed in the face
by hard winds and waves that only got worse as we got further out on the open waters.
After maybe 20 minutes in those conditions, we decided to head for the safety of land
and try to take shelter from the wind until it would calm down.
So we rigged a tarp as a wind block but it transformed into a sail as you can see.
We waited on that island for about 2 hours and did not see any change in weather.
So we decided to head out anyway so we could get a bit closer to Mariestad since
we had an schedule to keep so we didnt miss our train ride home!
I think it was about 7-8 pm before we decided to give up and make camp. The conditions
were horrible. Strong winds, it had started to rain and the sun had already set so we hung
up our hammocks in darkness. It wasnt pretty, but good enough to sleep in.
Friday
The last full day of our trip. By now we noticed that we were a bit short supplied and we
were missing some food for our dinner that night. It was quite depressing...
But after sitting under my tarp for and half an hour or so, we started to brainstorm
and remembered that there was a camping site located just a mile outside of Mariestad.
So we called them and reserved an cabin for the last night of our trip. This mostly due to most
of our gear being moist/wet due the rough weather. And when we packed up the last of our
gear and headed towards the kayaks. We noticed that the winds were even stronger than
the day before. We got slammed by waves coming from our left side constantly and got
even more soaked than the day before.
It took us 3-4 hours of paddling in rough weather before we arrived at the camp site.
All 3 of us were completely exhausted and freezing our butts off. Soaked wet from
top to bottom as a bonus! ^^
But the effort was totally worth it! We went to get our key, loaded in all our gear for drying
and took a hot shower. After that we went to raid their little store for loads of
Beer, Chips and sweets! We slept good that night i can tell you!
Saturday
We woke up around 7 am and paddled the last mile or so back to the harbour.
The sun blessed us with its presence and the wind speeds had dropped again.
So all in all a very nice trip, but we could have skipped the 2 last days perhaps!
I dont have many things to complain about regarding gear/setups for the entire
week. But the only thing that bothered me was my frozen feet! I must have woken
up several times each night with my feet frozen stiff. Dont really know why this is
happening since my sleeping bag was warm and cozy for the rest of my body.
Maybe i´ll get some pointers from fellow forum members at our international hang
this summer in Stockholm on how to keep my "little piggies" warm!
Oh well, thanks for Reading and hope you enjoyed it!
Best Regards
Hank ze Tank
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