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4:52 PM
"Lava rock is a kind of stone from a volcano, formed from lava cooling on the surface of the Earth.
"Lava rock function:
"1. Clean, sanitation, high efficiency and start-up rapidly. Easy to control the heat place and heat temp, balance the temp for cooking food. Especially used for barbeque.
"2. Convenience, no-smoke, no-dust, does not pollute the environment, more suitable for the health conception.
"3. While barbeque, it is neat and delicious. Who dose not like eat neat and dainty food?
The food is more tender and non-adjust."
The other two items were just things that made me laugh. "Bishop's Finger" is probably the last thing I'd like to have as a cold, refreshing drink and a "Japp" candy bar is not the most PC thing I've ever seen.
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4:48 PM
Kathy asked that we post these photos of the house. She'll add descriptions to each photo, so you can click on them here and see a bit of the description or follow the link to Flickr and read the whole thing there.
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6:08 PM
We got up this morning to meet with my boss Chris and his family about 9:00am to drive from Luleå to Haparanda and then on to Kukkola. Kukkola sits on the Tornio river, dividing Sweden from Finland. Chris had heard that there was some sort of fishing festival in Kukkola and was looking for something to do. The drive was about 2 hours so we took the dog and on the road we went.
The day was warm (80ºF or so - 25ºC) and sunny, better than last weekend where it rained most of the time.
We arrived, smelled smoking fish and watched these guys stand out on the docks with long-handled fishing nets, skimming for spawning white fish. Apparently, they used to fish for salmon here too, but the signs said salmon amounts had diminished. They also get a form of caviar from these fish, little yellow eggs that I've had in the local restaurants. Because of the general Swedish tradition of a lack of trespassing laws, we could walk all over the property and see the Fiske Museum. We walked around, saw the cabins for rent and some of the private saunas (see the little building with the tall, hobbit like roof), and watched the fishermen pulling in about 5 to 10 fish an hour.
Chris walked over, got some of the smoked white fish and we all plopped down to have some. It was excellent; fresh, salty, and moist. The flavor varied a bit, depending on where you pull your piece from, but all in all, good stuff. Then, Chris got two of the white fish that were on wooden spits, broiled against the fire. Again, we dived in with full American gusto, fingers pulling at the white meat. This was much more consistent and definitely worth the trip. As we finished, we looked around and saw the Swedes all eating the fish with flat bread and potato salad. However, as I always say at Fogo do Chao, "Salad is for suckers".
There was a nice fishing musem with the old saw and grain mills. We watched the rapids for a while and then decided to drive home. Stopped at Ikea and it looks exactly the same though the restaurant seemed to have a wider selection! Got some burgers and then pushed homewards.
P.S. The dog arrived on Thursday as you can see her in the photos. Our household goods arrived on Friday, a little worse for the wear but mostly intact. The power supply on the computer died immediately, even though it says 115/230V, I didn't see the voltage switch and when we plugged it in, we fried it. We'll figure this stuff out eventually.
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6:49 PM
Sunday, after church, we drove from Luleå to Pajala. I offered a 10 kronor prize to the first person to see a reindeer and 100 kronor to the first to see a moose. It wasn't 15 minutes into the 2.5 hour drive before they saw the first reindeer.
Our first stop on the trip was in Överkallix; we could see the tall, dark grey church steeple from the highway and I had wanted to stop the several times I'd seen before. There was an open market that travels from city to city (like the carnival) that was closing up as we arrived. Not much to see, but a couple of photos in front of the church, the local kulture hus and the river.
We resumed the drive, saw plenty of reindeer and arrived at the Lapland River Hotel, having just missed dinner. The hotel is owned by a gentlemen named Per-Arne who is a local celebrity, having been THE bachelor in the Swedish version of The Bachelor. Oh, and by the way, the name of the show is Frusna män söker kärlek, or "Frozen men seek love". The hotel restaurant is known for gourmet food but we arrived too late, so ended up eating at the only place in town still open after 8pm on a Sunday: the Sibylla at the bus station. It's a lot like White Castle, a Taco Time, or a 7-11, nothing great. However, it's all that was available so we did just fine.
Slept in the hotel (which reminds me of Bruno's in Gerlach!) and had breakfast in the hotel. I checked in with the Northland's exploration office in Pajala and off we went. We made a loop past our proposed mine sites in Kaunisvaara and on to Kolari on the Finland side of the border. We stopped at a gas station for a potty break and to look at souvenirs. We then pushed on towards Roveniemi with a stop on the wrong side of the bridge to figure out where we were. Finally decided that Santa's Village was actually in a place called Artic Circle and the map wasn't just referring to a general mapping device.
Arriving, it was mainly a village of gift shops and tourist traps but we were hungry. Had lunch at the restaurant (Kathy had reindeer with mashed potatoes and ligon berries) and began the exploration. Stopped in at Santa's Post Office to mail some post cards (with postmarks from Santa's Workshop), went through a creepy Pirates-of-the-Caribean goes to the North Pole exhibit only to realize it's a forced way to get you to pose for a photo with Santa. I figured if it was good enough for Bam Margera, it was good enough for me (his photo is on the wall!). They were starting to get on my nerves though after having paid for the Santa photo AND the museum guide, they decided to offer us a video documentary of the time in the crystal cave and talking to Santa. Total cost? Only 25 euros! We declined!
Spent most of the rest of the day looking at gift shop and tourist crap. Got in the car and drove south to Haparanda and on the way back to Luleå. A good way to spend a couple of days.
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6:42 PM
The other day, we were laying around the house and, in general, just being lazy. This point, Kylie comes out of here room, hands us some tickets (as shown) and promises an incredible time. There were some definite shades of Heather, I think.
These are photos of the tickets and highlights of the show. My personal favorite was the singing and dancing followed by a stuffed animal extracting itself from her abdominal cavity!
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6:34 PM
Before we left Salt Lake, we spent a day in Snowbird with Jake and Toni's family. A great way to spend your last day in the U.S.
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5:29 PM
I'm a little frustrated by the camera, some of the bigger "blue" flowers are actually a very deep purple. The camera somehow converted it to blue and didn't capture it.
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4:46 PM
We arrived on Tuesday afternoon. Our flights went without a hitch, Salt Lake to Chicago to Stockholm to Luleå, getting into town about 12:30pm. The only thing of note on the trip (besides my family's new fascination with business class!) was that two of our bags were lost when we landed in Stockholm. Of course, they were both full of Kathy's gear but it showed up the next day around 4pm.
We took a cab to the house, dropped off our stuff and then drove into town. Kylie was asleep by the time we made it to the Tax Office to apply for our ID number (personnumber). Without this number, we can't get our household goods out of Customs or even the dog Mandy. So, it was critical that we apply for that number immediately. I filled out the forms with the help of a very nice government official while Kathy and the kids dozed on the couch.
From there, we visited the Northlands office and met a couple of my co-workers. We had planned to do a little grocery shopping but by the time we made it to the store, both of the kids were asleep and Kathy was a bit punchy. So I picked up some Max burger and went home.
Upon arrival, the kids ate their burgers and then discovered the four or five volumes of Simpson's TV shows. I managed to stay awake until 6pm or so and went to bed. The kids decided a big screen TV and all the Simpson's you can watch was way more attractive than sleep. Finally, they wandered to their rooms by 10pm.
I woke up on Wednesday, went to work at 8am and left everyone sleeping. I called home about 2pm to check on them ... everyone was just waking up!
Wednesday was a quiet day at the house...lot's of unpacking.
Thursday, we went out exploring a little and bought some groceries.
Friday, I ducked out of work early and grabbed the family. We parked the car downtown and walked around the main shopping areas. Encountered my boss's wife, Karen, while wandering and chatted for a bit. Finished the afternoon by having an early dinner at the Waldorf, a Chinese restaurant overlooking a part of the sea. Nothing fancy but $120 for the 4 of us.
Saturday, we mowed the lawn, bought a two-stroke weed-whacker to replace the battery operated one I bought before, and bought a week's groceries ($300!).
We went to church today and were cheerfully greeted by the whole branch. Both kids had a good time and met some friends. Kathy had a group of women hovering over her when went to pick her up after Relief Society. The men were telling me about the finer points of moose hunting and how to get my hunting license. (In Sweden, each man is allowed to own up to 6 guns. After that, you must file a form with the government to justify why you should own any more than that!)
