Skip to main content

What an amazing summer I've had...

It's very easy to go overboard on the superlatives when you're up here, but the fact of the matter remains that it's true. This is truly an amazing place and it's very hard not to have a really great time.

Let's use this last week as an example.

I had a buddy from Germany come visit me and while I had to work for half his stay, I did manage to pull some crazy stunts and do some awesome stuff while I was off. I had a great four course dinner at my job (the chefs are really, really good) last Saturday with a bunch of other co-workers and other mates, spent a lot of time down in the village and also managed to pull a full work-week in 3,5 days... in other words, I was busy.

But the real fun (for me) didn't start until Wednesday when my four day weekend started. First, we rented some ATV-s and goofed around for a couple of hours, trying to take in as much as possible of the 50 km of road we have up here. This proved to be quite the challenge, since they don't go much faster than 80 km/h, not really enough for our extended tour.

Then came Thursday and with it our true highlight of the week; a two day tour of Barentsburg. So we got up early and headed out on the Polargirl with not very many other passengers. A few hours later we arrived and were left behind with a two Danish guys and our guide from St. Petersburg for company. We then headed out on a great exploratory trip in which we even managed to find a passage into the coal-mine; apparently a feat only a few outsiders have managed before us.

How we did it?

Well, since we don't read russian and there were no signs in any other language, we simply followed the train-tracks into the underground. Since nobody was there, unless you count two guys who simply waved at us and let us pass by, we followed the tracks for a bit until we got bored and then we left through the mining company HQ.

Tada!

Then there was dinner and partying with the aforementioned guys.

Good fun!

The next day we headed back to Longyearbyen and made the decision to take another boat-trip - this time to Pyramided - on Saturday, which would be my buddies last day here. So off we went, to visit this abandoned ghost town. Tres cool! Pyramiden used to be the creme de la creme site up here and you could really see the faded glamour of the place; kinda sad to walk around knowing that just over ten years ago there were kids running about, having a good time.

Still, time goes by.

Saturday was then rounded off with a shrimp-fest for dinner and a good old party throughout the night, 'till the airport-bus picked him up at 6 AM.

Then I basically slept through Sunday.

So you see? Even tough this week might have been a compressed version, full of awesomeness, there's just so much to do up here that you'd have to really try to be bored.

And I promise not to take this long for my next update ;)

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Världens läskigaste spindel

Goliath Bird Eating Spider It's frequently described as "larger than a dinner plate," presumably because spider-scientists don't want to freak people out with the significantly more relevant "big enough to fit over your face." It's a foot across and, when it's in the mood, brings down entire birds and eats them. It doesn't make webs, or leap great distances--it just slowly sneaks up behind things and jumps on them. Yes, just like in your nightmares. Go ahead and check behind you. We'll wait. As if a giant spider that can bring down a moderate-sized flying animal wasn't bad enough, it's one of the "hissing bastard spiders" (that's actually its full scientific name), the creepiest creature to exist outside of a horror novel. At this point, evolution clearly just started piling in everything nasty that could possibly fit: Its spit can dissolve flesh down to the bone AND it can shoot invisible hairs that cut your eyes and mo...

Smyger igång lite...

Jag har visst ställt om lite på sistone och har skaffat mig en ny "hobby"... ...nämligen hållbarhet och ett skönare, lugnare och stressfriare liv. Och visst har jag tankar på att skriva något om det framöver - men just idag blir det ett gnällmail som jag just skickat till Järfälla kommun om dessa förbaskade lövblåsare. Så vi inleder min återuppståndelse på detta forumet med det. Lovar i sin tur att återkoppla med svaret, om och när jag får det... Hej, Då jag lämnade min yngste son på förskolan i veckan reagerade jag på att det satt en lapp uppsatt på grinden till gården. På denna lapp meddelade er Entreprenör (Svensk Markservice) att det var dags för höststädning på gården och att det därför bla. kunde vara högljutt när denna städning utförders. Jag blev då påmind om härom veckan när jag gick med den äldre sonen till skolan och (gissningsvis samma) Entreprenör utförde höststädning på skolgården. Då går det män med bensindrivna lövblåsare (vissa av dem med munskyd...

Årets bästa poddavsnitt

(Inser efter förra inlägget, att jag ju självklart måste skriva detta inlägget också :-)) Innan jag kommer till årets i min mening bästa poddavsnitt, måste jag börja med förra årets bästa. Med bästa i den mening att den gett mig mest att fundera på och som jag själv mest tipsat om. Podden är Magnus Carlssons (han från Weeping Willows) Sommar i P1 . Och den handlar om följande: “Magnus Carlson ringer upp forskaren Elin Röös, metrologen och naturskadespecialisten Pär Holmgren, debattören och ordförande i företagsforumet Circular Sweden: Anders Wijkman och flera andra för att få svar på hur vi kan göra för att lösa de problem som hotar miljön. Svaren han får handlar om både vad man som enskild kan göra i det lilla, och hur man kan göra för att påverka beslutsfattare i de stora frågorna .” Har du inte hört det; gör det omgående. Men då till årets poddavsnitt, som delvis är i samma tema, men ändå inte. P3 Dystopia har många riktigt bra (och läskiga) avsnitt, men det ...