Watery Sweden
Torpa - 22nd June
Today we travelled from beautiful Norway to dreary Sweden; it rained most of the way, fortunately for us not on the four occasions we needed it to be dry which were: packing the car, our lunch break, our only geocache/tourist visit and unpacking the car.
We are staying in unknown Torpa, and it doesn’t know that 2 days after summer solstice that it should still be light at 9.00pm, this isn’t helped by our Airbnb having amber filament bulbs on a dim flicker.
Our one cache and tourist visit was at Haverud, I’ll let the photos and the geocache blurb below explain what there is to see there.
Håverud is the only place in Europe where cars, trains and boats can meet in the same spot, at different levels. The Dalslands canal aqueduct was an ingenious solution to a major problem. It seemed impossible to build a canal and locks here due to the soft rock and the deep valley where the river gushed forth. The man responsible for the project, Nils Ericson, recommended that an aqueduct should be built over the most difficult section, and that the upper part of the canal should be placed on a shelf on the mounting – and that is how it was done! It was opened by King Karl XV in September 1868.
The aqueduct is a 32.5 m-long metal chute which is held together with 33 000 rivets.
One of these guys was extremely happy to be back in Sweden where petrol is cheaper and they make a fine beer, and better still its half the price of the beer sold in alcohol consumption-controlled Norway.
Unfortunately we are also back in the land of teenage boys in their 30kmph A-Tractors who cause nothing but chaos on the roads.
Today’s ABBA tribute is ‘Just a Notion’ (2021) for our last six Airbnbs where I felt like we were being watched. At Kristiansund we had cruise ships going past our window, Nordre Follo a man mowed the lawn outside the window at 10pm, and at Torpa the owners lounge looks into our kitchen. At Hustadvika, Dovre and Stange we were also staying on the same property as the owners and they were constantly walking back and forth in front of our apartment. There was nothing sinister about it, it’s a Norwegian thing; they finish work early, they eat early and then stay in the garden until 10pm to 11pm preparing for summer, that involves planting feel good flowers because they can’t leave plants in the ground with the winter snow.
Just a notion, that’s all
Just a feeling that you’re watching me
Every move I’m makin’