|
|
*** SWEDEN 2013 - WEEKS 3~4 *** |
||
This week's
Photo Gallery |
Bottom of Page |
Return to
Index Page |
|
|
Leaving the peaceful rural depths of Dalsland, we journeyed along the north shore of Lake Vänern's inland sea towards the city of Karlstad but with only occasional glimpses of the huge lake from the road. On a quiet Sunday morning, Route E45 was virtually deserted and we made good progress, turning eastward onto E18 at the point where the E45 continued north becoming the Inlandsvägen which later in the trip would be our principal route up to Swedish Lapland.
Back in the centre, Karlstad's 18th century Domkyrkan, rebuilt after its destruction in the 1865 city fire, stands in Kungsgatan. Further along, the pleasant open central square of Stortorget is dominated at its western end by the unnoteworthy Neo-classical Rådhus (town hall). But of greater interest was the austere Peace Monument, unveiled in 1955 to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the 1905 peaceful dissolution of the union between Sweden and Norway which was negotiated in Karlstad (see left). The female figure holds aloft a broken sword and tramples underfoot a military-helmeted skull, the rather pious inscription on the statue's plinth translating as Feuds feed folk hatred, peace promotes people's understanding. Were that it was so! Along at the river, a statue of Karl IX holding the town's founding charter stands facing the elegant Residentset building (Photo 1 - Statue of Karlstad's founder King Karl IX), the former provincial governor's official residence which now houses the Sverige-Amerika Centret. Unfortunately closed on Sundays, this holds records of Swedish emigration to America, particularly from Värmland from which in the 19th century one third of the province's population left to find a fresh start in the New World fleeing poverty and starvation at home. Karlskroga, home of Alfred Noble and Bofors
Armaments Industries: we needed a campsite for tonight after our visit
to Karlstad, since those closest to the city were over-priced, over-crowded
holiday-camps. The Swedish Camping Association's free listing of sites suggested
a cheaper, more straightforward alternative near to Karlskroga in The delightful town of Örebro:
30kms east we reached the outskirts of Örebro where the girl in the TIC earned
the town its first accolade: with good understanding, she answered all our
questions, provided street plans brochures not only for Örebro but also other
places on our itinerary, and was able to suggest free parking from where we
could walk into the centre. Although not a prestigious town, the responsive and
intelligent staff in its TIC did Örebro credit. Following her directions, we
found a
Örebro had proved a gem of an attractive town and with the help of a first class TIC, we had enjoyed an engaging and educative afternoon. We now saved ourselves the outrageously expensive cost and ghastly experience of staying at Gustavik Leisure Centre, the king of all monster holiday-camps with rip-off prices and overwhelming crowds to match, by driving 30kms north this afternoon to stay at Trängbo Camping at Nora.
4 kms out of Nora, we drove along the wooded former iron mining and smelting valley of Pershyttan, passing the red-painted wooden residences of the community that grew up around the mines. With all mining operations now long ceased, these highly desirable residences had passed to private ownership and become the province of estate agents. We had the excellent English version of the booklet Old Pershyttan Mining Community from Heléne at Nora TIC as our guide, and followed a path up from the railway sidings which led to site of one of the industrial scale mines, the Åker Mine one of the youngest in the valley which opened in 1820 and closed in 1966. The shaft's headstocks and winding gear built in 1917 stood aloft on a mound surrounded by spoil heaps (see above right), and surviving rusty rails descended at a 45° angle into the fearsomely black hole of the 300m deep shaft where tubs of extracted ore were once raised. This hell-hole was securely fenced off and a sign warned Gruvhål - farligt område (mine-shaft - danger area) (Photo 7 - Åker former iron mine headstocks at Pershyttan). The remains of the mine and its spoil heaps were now a peaceful setting surrounded by birch woods, but a little further we passed more fenced-off and horrendously black pits from earlier centuries; to what depths these fearsome holes dropped, and by what means families of miners descended into the darkness, and what primitive extraction techniques were used defied belief. Here among the spoil heaps we picked up a small sample of the sparkling black and heavy iron ore. Further along the track, we reached the spoil heaps of the Kettil Mine, one of the oldest in the valley described in a document of 1739 as 'ancient beyond memory'; its production closed in 1905.
A long drive north across Bergslagen to
Sollerön at Lake Siljan: north from Nora, a 240km drive took us across
the heart of the Bergslagen, Central Sweden's former iron-mining region. All the
mines are now long gone, but a glance at the map shows that their heritage is
preserved by occasional mining museums and the number of place names of
attractive villages ending in -hyttan from
Mora and Tällberg Camping at the SW end of
the Lake Siljan: we crossed from the northern side of Sollerön island
into Mora, the town at the head of Lake Siljan to get details from the TIC of
the weekend's cycling event, the 120km Siljan Round around the lake, an annual
race with 3,000 riders taking part. While in Mora we also visited the museum
devoted to the Vasaloppet, the world's longest and most challenging 90km
cross-country ski race held annually in
With a final cheer to the ever-passing stream
of participants, identifying empathetically with the struggling amateurs, we set
off to walk around Tällberg
The church-boats of Lake Siljan:
back into Rättvik, we tried the public library, open on Sunday afternoon in a
civilised country like Sweden, to learn more about the meteorite impact crater
which had created Lake Siljan; the displays however raised more questions than
they answered. But at the northern end
The meteorite impact-crater which produced
Lake Siljan: still seeking understanding about the meteorite impact
whose crater produced the huge Lake Siljan, we drove around to the SW corner of
Lake Siljan to the village of Siljansnäs with its Naturum Nature Centre and
observation tower set high on the hill-top of Björkberget overlooking the lake.
The wooden open-top lookout tower (utsiktstorn) gave a superb 360° panorama of
the lake and its surroundings (see right) but with the weather now overcast and hazy,
distant views were
Completing the circuit, we took a brief look in the mining museum housed in the rococo-style former mining HQ building. The top floor showed the conditions and primitive surgical techniques of the mine hospital, and indications of the appalling working conditions and risk of accidents in the mine and of the insanitary living and social conditions in the town for miners' families. This had been the most expensive and least informative mine visit ever; we learnt nothing and returned to the surface with all our many questions unanswered. If you go to Falun, be warned about cost versus value for an underground tour! But you can wander at will and at no cost around the brim of the Great Pit, and like us, try to piece together your own understanding of the mine's development and its ore extraction techniques. A final night at Lake Siljan: we drove back over to Rättvik and from the hilltop above the village, the magnificent panorama of Lake Siljan in its meteorite created crater opened up before us. Our final night at Lake Siljan was spent back at Sollerö Camping, now almost deserted after the weekend cycling crowds had all returned to the cities. We were welcomed back like returning friends and settled in again at our pitch by the lake shore where the lingonberry had opened out from tight pink buds to fully formed flowers. Tonight we enjoyed another lakeside barbecue (see right); tomorrow we should begin the next stage of our journey with a long northward drive to the alpine valleys of Idre, Funnäsdalen and Åre, hoping for good weather for mountain walking and wild flora photography; our boots were well-waterproofed as an extra precaution. Our next edition will follow soon, so add the site to your Favourites and join us again then. Next edition to be published quite soon
|
CAMPING
IN SWEDEN 2013 - provinces of Värmland and Dalarna - Karlstad, Örebro, Nora, Mora and Lake Siljan,
and Falun:
Karlstad, provincial capital of Värmland:
turning into Karlstad, traffic was thankfully
light on a Sunday and we were able to park in the city centre close to the Värmlands Museum.
Karlstad at the head of Lake Vänern, Western Europe's largest
lake, is the capital city of the province of Värmland. The city was granted its
charter in 1584 by King Karl IX but has had the misfortune, in common with so many
Swedish towns and cities with their predominance of wooden buildings, of being
destroyed by fire 3 times in its history, the worst in 1865 when the
entire city went up in flames with only 7 of its buildings surviving. The town
was rebuilt with wide street and open spaces to act as fire break insurance
against future fires, and we parked next to one of these areas of parkland where
local families strolled on a sunny Sunday afternoon.
We crossed the park to the Museum hoping there
to learn something about the history of iron ore exploitation in the remote
parts of northern Värmland. The smelting of iron ore using charcoal was the
economic mainstay of Värmland until competition from Britain's industrial
revolution with coal as the driving force made smaller scale iron
production in Sweden uneconomic. Resulting economic hardship and growing
population forced vast numbers from Värmland to emigrate to the USA in the 19th
century. Entrance to the museum was expensive at 60kr each, and since only a
fraction of the exhibits about iron ore and emigration were of interest to us,
it scarcely seemed worth the cost. The girl at reception understood our
hesitation, suggesting 'Why don't you just take a quick peep'. We were grateful
for her empathetic reaction, and even more grateful after our 'quick peep': it
was one of those modern museums ie all show and superficial appearance with
little substance. Within 15 minutes we had completed our visit learning little
about Värmland's iron-smelting history and the economic causes of 19th century
emigration. The highlight was film of the 1969 moon-landing played on an ancient
TV since Buzz Aldrin's family had emigrated from Värmland - local boy made good,
so to speak, as the Apollo 11 lunar-module pilot. 
We now had a couple of hours on a pleasantly
sunny Sunday afternoon to amble around Karlstad. The city's originating raison
d'être was as a port at the mouth of the Klarälven River which drains down
through northern Värmland to flow into Lake Vänern. We crossed the main city
bridge to walk along to the Östra bron, Sweden's longest stone arched-bridge.
The 12 arches span 168m across the wide river and half way across a plaque dated
1687 commemorates the bridge's builder, Anders Jacobsson who threw himself off
his bridge and drowned in the river in despair that his work would collapse. In
fact it still stands today, a sturdy and lasting structure with modern buses
crossing it regularly (see above left).
the direction
of Örebro our next destination. We phoned to confirm it was open and set off
eastwards along the E18 motorway past Kristinehamn. Lunedets Camping set in
woodland on the shore of Lake Alkvettern was a small, quiet and sensibly priced
campsite which suited us well for a night's stay, and that evening the sun
dipped to give a flaring sunset across the lake
(Photo 2 - Sunset over Lake Alkvettern) (see right). The following morning we drove
into Karlskroga to find the Nobels Museum housed in Björkborn manor house where
Alfred Nobel spent his last years. Born in 1833, Nobel bought the arms
manufacturing company Bofors Industries here at Karlskroga in 1893. When he died
in 1896, he had 355 patents registered in his name including his most famous
invention dynamite. He made his fortune manufacturing armaments and explosives
including the Bofors heavy gun, and his will was ratified at Karlskroga District
Court, laying the foundation for establishment of the Nobel Prizes the first of
which was awarded in 1901. Nobel achieved his ambition of being better
remembered as a philanthropist; it is generally forgotten that the money for his
Prizes is tainted with blood from the sale of arms and explosives. As we left
Karlskroga, we passed the enormous Bofors industrial complex which shows that
the manufacture of armaments is still a highly profitable business.
small, free parking area by the Wadköping open air museum from where a
path led along the river bank, through the town park directly into the centre.
Örebro stands on the shores of Sweden's fourth largest lake Hjälmaren, its
foundation determined by its strategic position on the river crossing along the
main highway from SW Sweden to Stockholm, at a point where a build-up of gravel
made the River Svartån fordable; Örebro means 'gravel bridge'. The town
developed with German merchants attracted here in the 13~14th centuries by the
rich iron ore deposits. The Wadköping open-air museum was established in 1965
with 17~18th century red-painted wooden town-houses moved here from the
city-centre when philistine urban development threatened historic dwellings with
demolition. They now form a re-creation of the town's historical environment,
the name Wadköping taken from the writings of a local author, and the houses
contain craft-workshops, exhibitions and a café, with some still lived in. This
was the kind of skansen we favoured: free-entry where you could walk-through
without payment of rip-off charges; set on the banks of the River Svartån,
Wadköping was totally delightful with local people as well as visitors walking
or cycling through or sat drinking coffee in the café courtyard
(Photo 3 - Wadköping open air museum at Örebro). We walked on
into Stadparken, said to be one of the most beautiful town parks in Sweden,
where youngsters and elderly ambled through like us or sat on the park-benches
in the flower gardens under trees laden with blossom (see left). Stadparken was a worthy
credit to Örebro.
The riverside path led through the park, along
past the guest-harbour towards the centre, with the massive four-square bulk of
Örebro Slott (castle) dominating the view along the river
(Photo 4 - Örebro Castle). Built originally in
the troubled days of the 13th century as a defensive fort to guard the
river-crossing, Örebro Castle had been much-fortified and enlarged over the
following centuries (see right). The ne'er-do-well son of Gustav Vasa, Karl IX converted the
castle into a grand Renaissance royal residence, and the castle's present
appearance reflects over-zealous late-19th century restoration. We headed up to
the top of the elongated Stortorget, where young students sat squandering their
student loans on coffee, to the Neo-renaissance Rådhus at the corner. On the
opposite side stood St Nicolai Kyrka; again totally misplaced 19th century
over-restoration verging on aesthetic vandalism had totally stripped this 1260
foundation of all its medieval character, leaving it to resemble the sort of
non-descript church you might otherwise pass by with indifference. We would have
done just that, were it not that we knew this church had played a significant
part in Sweden's recent history
(Photo 5 - St Nikolai Kyrka, Örebro). It was here in 1810 that the Swedish nobility
met to elect one of Napoleon's little known marshals, Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte
to the Swedish throne. But why should this have happened in a small and
undistinguished provincial town like Örebro? The church was open and we enquired
of the attendant how Örebro had been chosen for this event. Somewhat startled to
be asked this by English visitors, he explained all: in 1809 Sweden was
in
turmoil following the loss of Finland to Imperial Russia when the incompetent
Gustav IV had led Sweden into the Napoleonic Wars and incurred total defeat by
the Tsarist armies. Gustav was deposed by the nobility but the country was in a
state of near civil war: the more reactionary faction of nobles wanted to
restore Gustav, but the radicals saw that change was needed. Riots had occurred
in Stockholm with deaths in the streets and the capital was in a state of
insurrection. As a result, the nobility met in a more secure place, choosing Örebro to debate the future of the monarchy. At such a time of crisis, the
country needed a military leader and Bernadotte, although obscure was a
successful soldier. Despite speaking no Swedish, he accepted the Swedish throne
and was crowned King Karl Johan XIV, founding the Bernadotte dynasty to which
the current Swedish royal family belongs; and Örebro earned its place in Swedish
history, as we now knew.
Nora with its first class Tourist Bureau and
excellent campsite, Trängbo Camping: just 1km from the centre of the
small town of Nora, we were welcomed with genuine hospitality by the family who
run the small municipal campsite. At a very reasonable 215kr/night all in (no
messing about with coins for showers) and lovely setting overlooking Nora lake,
it had all we could ask for except
wi-fi internet; it was a perfect spot for a day
in camp. The following day we drove back into Nora and down to the town's
magnificent red-brick 1900 Romantic-style former railway station (see right), now converted
to the TIC (Photo 6 - Nora's 1900 former railway station), to try to get details about the historic iron mining and smelting
valley of Pershyttan. Down by the lakeside, rolling stock and railcars were
parked in sidings which now form part of the Nora Bergslagen Veteren Jernväg,
the preserved railway at Nora which
was Sweden's first standard gauge railway
opened in 1856. The line closed in 1965 but was taken over by the NBVJ
preservation society which now runs steam-hauled trains in peak-summer. At the
TIC, we were treated to feast of understanding and information provision by the
assistant, Heléne Sommar; not only did she answer all our questions about Nora
and Pershyttan with a detailed history of mining in the Bergslagen area, but also
provided booklets for areas as far north as Kiruna from her well-stocked library
of brochures, and gave us an enthusiastically detailed description of what we
should see at Mora and Lake Siljan. A graduate of Luleå University, she showed a ready
understanding of our wish to learn, constantly correcting our mis-pronunciation
of Swedish in her impeccable English. We have encountered several first class
TICs during our Swedish travels so far, but it will be hard for any to come up
to the first class standard of Nora which almost certainly will receive our
award for Sweden's best Tourist Bureau, and our compliments and thanks go to
Heléne for her help which made our visit to Nora so much more meaningful. Before setting off to explore Pershyttan, we eat our lunch
sandwiches by the old railway carriages which now serve as Nora's youth hostel
and walked along the tracks to see the round-house engine shed and turntable
where the railway preservation society now stables its collection of steam
locomotives (see left).
Pershyttan former mining valley:
for some 700 years, from the middle ages until the final closure of industrial
scale mining operations in 1960s, the valley of Pershyttan had been one of 100s
of iron mining and smelting communities in the Bergslagen region of Central
Sweden. Bergslagen's iron production from its many small foundries had been the
mainstay of the country's historic prosperity and by the mid-18th century was
responsible for a quarter of Europe's iron smelting. Although Sweden had rich
deposits of iron ore, still vastly exploited in the north around Kiruna and
Gällivare, the country had no natural coal, and historically depended on
charcoal from its endless supply of timber as power source for iron smelting. Mining developed where 3 essential
natural resources were available together: iron ore locally available without
need for transportation, running water to power mills to drive bellows for
blast-furnaces and pumps for deep mines, and timber for charcoal production for
the firing of smelting furnaces. Here at Pershyttan, all 3 components were
present in quantity, making the valley a favourable location for iron
production. Until the mid-19th century, iron mining and smelting had been based
on small scale production based around share-holding iron-master families using
one village furnace. Only later from the late-19th~20th centuries did industrial
scale production develop with mining/smelting companies taking over as at
Pershyttan. But charcoal based smelting was always vulnerable to competition
from coal-fired technology as in Britain, and the last mines closed in 1967. The
surviving relics of the historical mining industry at Pershyttan, remains of
mines, spoil heaps, blast furnace, water-wheel and beam-drives, are now being
conserved by the same society responsible for the preserved railways. There are
also well-preserved
examples of wooden dwelling, from the large houses of
wealthy mine share-holding families to the humble terraced cottages of mine
workers and charcoal burners. In such traditional mining communities, mining and
iron production and farming went hand-in-hand with a regular cycle to the
mining/farming year: winter was the time for smelting with the blast-furnace
used in turn by the share-holding families; the furnace was shut down in spring
when farming took over and trees felled for autumn's charcoal burning; during
summer, the whole family took part in mining ore, and in the autumn crops were
harvested and charcoal produced, all ready for the annual seasonal cycle to
begin again.
Back to the valley lane, we inspected the
preserved remains of Pershyttan's blast furnace, fired by charcoal with
air-bellows driven by water-wheel. Crushed ore, charcoal fuel and limestone flux
were poured into the upper part of the furnace and the molten iron smelted from
the ore tapped out at the
bottom to flow into mud-lined pig-iron moulds. The
blast-furnace (hytta) was built in 1856 and was in operation for 100 years,
fired for the last time in 1953
(Photo 8 - Preserved 19th century blast furnace at Pershyttan mining valley). Alongside stood the large wooden building of
the charcoal store. The furnace consumed vast quantities of charcoal: 1 kiln's
load would last just half a day and it took 3 weeks to char a stack of timber.
Over centuries of mining and smelting, the surrounding forests at Pershyttan had
been cleared and by the time the railway had reached the valley in 1873,
charcoal was being imported from Norrland in the north. The fast-flowing
mill-stream ran behind the furnace and was channelled by a wooden flume to the
wheel-house; through its open door we could see the huge wheel turning inside.
The drive from the wheel was connected to pumps at the distant mine by
beam-drives (stånggången), an ingenious system of interconnected wooden
rods which pivoted back and forth like an engine's connecting rods (see right). Part of this
fascinating apparatus was in action to show its working to transfer motion over
a distance. Even though the restored areas of Pershyttan's mines and smelter
were not fully open at this time of year, we had been free to walk around and
learn much about this significant part of Sweden's industrial heritage which had
played such an important part in its economic development.
Nora - delightful historic town with even
nicer ice-cream: back into Nora we parked in the cobbled central
square opposite the church, but before beginning the town walk to see the
historic wooden buildings, we had to sample another of the little town's famous
institutions, Nora Glass, the ice-cream hand-made locally since 1923 by a family
firm to a secret recipe, freshly made each day in 3 different flavours, vanilla,
hazel nut and a flavour of the day. We bought tubs from the kiosk by the square
and sat in the afternoon sunshine at small area of benches amid flower-troughs
to enjoy it - how very Swedish! (Photo 9 - Enjoying hand-made Nora Ice-Cream)
Following the town walk leaflet, supplied
naturally by Heléne at the TIC, we set off around Nora's cobbled streets past
the low wooden houses with their attractive courtyards (Photo 10 - Traditional wooden houses at Nora), an enjoyable hour's
ambling bringing us round in a circle back to the central square by the church.
Thanks to Hélène's well-informed help, we had enjoyed a superbly instructive day
in and around the lovely little historic town of Nora, a happy stay at Trängbo
Camping, and learned much about its iron mining and smelting history.
the 100s of small smelters
traditionally worked by share-holding families of miners. Immediately on leaving
Nora, we were into comfortably familiar countryside of endless spruce and birch
forests interspersed with lakes; it was like being back in Finland again. We
turned off into the former mining village of Grythyttan and parked under the
shady trees of the village's churchyard. The large church had wood-shingle walls
and slate roof from the local slate quarries, and a dedicatory plaque over the
door showed it had built in 1632 during the reign of Gustav II Adolphus. This
had clearly been a prosperous community of farming/mining families from the
church's opulently decorated interior (Photo 11 - 1632 church at Grythyttan mining village), and the English version of the history
leaflet told us that half the parish population had been Finnish and the church
still had a Finnish bible printed in1642. We could at this stage get no further
explanation for this. Across the street was Neerings ice-cream parlour, a small
firm with a growing reputation for the excellence of their glass
(ice-cream). We sat in their garden to enjoy their produce, and indeed it was
good (see right). More interestingly, the lady-owner who spoke excellent English, ignoring
her other customers gave us an explanation for Grythyttan's Finnish inhabitants:
in the mid-19th century, many Finns emigrated to Sweden fleeing poverty and
starvation in what was then Russian-controlled Finland. Their skills as farm
workers and charcoal burners was in great demand in Bergslagen. Our delicious
ice-cream and history lesson had been an unexpected bonus to our visit to
Grythyttan.
Driving on through the endlessly forested
terrain, we reached Långban, another iron-mining village with the preserved
remains of the later industrial scale mining. The mining museum was closed at
this time of year, but we were able to walk around the remains, a flooded early
mine shaft and the head-stocks winding-gear and surface equipment from the 1920s
which had descended into a 300m deep mine, all now totally abandoned. Continuing
on the peaceful road, there was the first feeling of moving significantly north
with the spruce and birch forests stretching away endlessly in unbroken vistas
to distant forested hills (see left); we felt quite at home, especially when later we
passed our first snow-mobile warning sign! Beyond the little town of Vånbo,
Route 26 merged with the E45 Inlandsvägen which we had left several days
ago near Karlstad (Photo 12 - Endless forests on E45 Inlandsvägen road north). We had now moved from Värmland into the province of Dalarna,
and shortly further north turned off onto the quiet lane which
ran around the eastern side
of Lake Siljan getting our first glimpse of the
huge lake which had been created from the flooded crater of Europe's largest
ever meteorite impact aeons ago. At the beautiful village of Gesunda with its red-painted Dalarna cottages
and small log-built huts we turned off again to cross the causeway onto Sollerön,
the island in Lake Siljan for tonight's campsite. With a smiling welcome to
greet us, we booked in, but the bad news was that all places were taken for the
weekend with a large-scale annual cycling event around Lake Siljan. We would
stay tonight and move to Tällberg at the southern end of the lake tomorrow.
Although slightly more expensive at 230kn/night, Sollerö Camping is a large but
friendly site, well-run by the Swedish Caravan Club. We selected a delightful
spot right by the lake-shore looking directly out across the still waters of
Lake Siljan to the distant forested hills beyond, and to give total perfection,
on the embankment behind the pitch the first lingonberries of the trip were just
coming into pink bud (see right). In the warm late-afternoon sunshine, this was a
glorious setting, and another first of trip, we were able to sit out for supper.
We also experienced the first forays of this year's midges, and later as the sun
dipped we heard the distinctively plaintive call of the Great Northern Diver across the
still waters of the lake. It was still light when we turned in at 11-00pm; what
a day filled with wonderful travel memories.
Around Lake Siljan - the island of Sollerön:
we woke to a glorious morning to breakfast outside looking across the lake with
the forested hills reflected in Siljan's still waters (see right) (Photo 13 - Breakfast at Sollerö Camping on the shores of Lake Siljan). All the communes around
Lake Siljan issue free detailed maps of the area which can be picked up in TICs
or shops, and using Mora's edition, we drove up into Sollerön village with its
large Baroque church set on the island's crown. The red-painted cottages, wooden
barns and lane lined with apple trees in full blossom looked so appealing. Along
a back lane, a small skansen of old wooden farm buildings, the Sollerö Homestead
Museum, marked the start of a circular walk around Dalarna's best preserved
Viking period grave fields from ca 950~1050 AD. At that time Sollerön had a
flourishing farming community: the island was easily defended, the lime-
rich
soil fertile and well-cultivated, with deposits of iron ore from the lake bed
for smelting for tools. The dead were cremated and remains buried under stone
grave-mounds just outside the village. Some 100 or so such grave mounds had been
found and it was only when they were excavated to reveal rich grave goods that
it was realised their significance; they were not just heaps of stones cleared from the
fields over the years. A box at the skansen contained English translation
commentary-maps for the walk around the grave fields. On a sunny morning, this
was a gloriously peaceful setting with the lush meadows full of buttercups
against the backdrop of the modern village's wooden cottages. This was another
dual interest walk with archaeology set amid beautiful wild flora, and it was not
long before we
were down on muddy knees photographing lovely specimens of Water Avens, May Lily and Herb Paris
(Photo 14 - Herb Paris (Paris quadrifolia)). The lane led past the grave mounds to the site
of an early Christian chapel built in a grove near a former pagan sacred well,
just like the Christian adoption of the pre-Christian tradition of
well-dressing in Derbyshire. We followed the lane back around to the village of Bengtsarvet, itself built on the site of the former Viking farming settlement;
the peaceful setting of attractive red-painted cottages (see left) set among blossoming
apple trees was the day's highlight (Photo 15 - Red painted wooden cottages at Sollerön village of Bengtsarvet).
March. The race commemorates Gustav Vasa
fleeing on skis towards the Norwegian border after his abortive rebellion
against the occupying Danes in 1520. 2 men from Mora pursued him, persuading
Vasa not to give up the struggle; he booted out the Danes, established the
kingdom of Sweden, the rest is history and to celebrate this 10,000 competitors
now take part in the Vasaloppet ski race across the fells from Salem to
Mora. The museum shows an old black and white film of the original 1922 race
when the winner took 7.5 hours to complete the 90km skiing marathon using skis
weighing over 5kgs; compare this with the 2012 winner taking only 3.5 hours
with modern fibre-glass skis weighing just 3.5 kgs.
Outside the Vasaloppet
finishing line is marked by an arch-banner across the street (see right), with a statue of
the 1922 race winner in the nearby park. Returning round by the lake, we just
had to take a photo by the world's largest Dala Horse (see left); more about the Swedish
obsession with the wood-carved, brightly painted Dala Horses and their origins later! Later that afternoon, we set off around the
lane through beautiful birch and spruce forests down the western shore of Lake Siljan, through the little town of Leksand at the southern end, to reach
Tällberg and tonight's campsite. A narrow side-land led down to the lake shore
and ending at the delightfully straightforward and peaceful Tällberg Camping set
in a meadow looking out westwards across the lake under tall birches. We gladly
settled in and lit tonight's BBQ. True to expectation, by 9-30pm the sun was
dipping through golden-red tinged cloud, silhouetting the pine and birch trees
on a small off-shore island to give a thrilling display of a perfect sunset with
sparkling tail across the lake's still waters
(Photo 16 - Sunset over Lake Siljan from Tällberg Camping). After it had finally set, the
entire sweep of western sky was lit by a salmon-pink after-glow (see right). What a climax
to conclude our first day by Lake Siljan at this gem of a peaceful little
campsite.
Watching the Siljan Round cycling event at Tällberg village: on a
sunny Saturday morning, the day of the Siljan Round cycling race, we walked up
into Tällberg village unsure of timings and what form the event would take and
its impact on road closures. We need not have worried: as we reached Tällberg,
a steady stream of race-participants was struggling up the steep hill through
the village. It was clear now that the 120km circuit of Lake Siljan was not a
mass-start competitive event, but more an amateur endurance test. Clearly it was a popular annual event attracting
3,000 participants, ranging from enthusiastic cycling clubs with matching kit peddling competently
and speeding enthusiastically as a peloton,
through to individuals doubtless sponsored by friends for charity struggling
slowly up Tällberg's steep
hill according to their ability (see left). We stood looking down the hills at the passing
cyclists against the backdrop of Lake Siljan which gave its name to the
challenging 120km lake-round event
(Photo 17 - Race-participants in Siljan Round 120km cycling event passing through Tällberg).
village. Set on the steep hillside overlooking the
lake spread out below us, Tällberg was a thoroughly delightful place with its
beautiful wooden cottages scattered among floral gardens and blossom trees
across the green hillside
(see right) (Photo 18 - Tällberg's red painted wooden cottages on hillside above Lake Siljan). All of the wooden buildings were painted with the
preservative red-brown paint, seen ubiquitously across Sweden, from Falun in
Eastern Dalarna, hence known as Falun Red (Falu Rödfärg) which we were to learn
more about in the next few days. But the bright sun of earlier was turning to
rain, with stormy clouds gathering over Siljan's hills and distant thunder
rumbling around the lake. We hurried back down to the campsite through conserved
meadow land where information panels explained the importance of well-managed
meadows for 18~19th century villagers in providing hay as winter feed for
cattle. The meadows were bordered with the traditional diagonally set birch pole
fencing - gärdesgård - seen universally across rural Sweden and Finland, and the
path was lined with Water Avens, Bilberry and Lingonberry both in flower
(Photo 19 - Lingonberry flowers in bud).
We got back down to camp at the lake side just as the storm broke, and the rain
lasted the rest of the afternoon giving the pretext for time in camp to catch up
with writing and photographs.
The southern end of Lake Siljan - Nusnäs,
home of the Dala Horses, Rättvik church-town, Siljansnäs observation tower, and
Leksand : after yesterday's rain finally cleared to give another
spectacularly flaring salmon-pink sunset across the lake, we woke to mist
lingering across the lake from our lake-side camp. Our plan with better weather
was to spend today exploring the settlements around the eastern and southern end
of Lake Siljan. First stop was the quiet and unassuming village of Nusnäs where
the original wooden Dala Horses had been carved in 1928 by 2 young brothers,
Nils and Jannes Olssson, to make a few kroner for their family. The jolly little
stumpy and brightly painted wooden horses caught on and now, highly promoted at
extravagant prices by a voracious tourist industry, have become a symbol of
Sweden. The Swedes are potty about them and every home has a couple of Dala
Horses on its mantelpiece. At Nusnäs there are now 2 workshops
operated by the
more commercially-minded generations of the Olsson family, mass-producing with
final finishing touches of hand-carving the bright red florally decorated little
chaps (Photo 20 - Nusnäs, home of the ubiquitous Swedish Dala Horse). Local people in Nusnäs must curse the hoards of summer tourists who swarm
here to stock up on their Dala Horses. In a side street we found the 2
side-by-side Olsson workshops, thankfully closed and deserted on a Sunday
morning, just to look with no temptation to part with good money for Dala Horse
commercial frippery (see left). Of more interest however was the local
church-boat
(kyrkbåt) on display under a wooden covering (see right). These double-oared long boats
had once ferried up to 80 local people to church across the lake at a time when
roads were impassable. In recent years a revival of interest on church-boats has
seen replica boats being constructed and races held at Leksand at the Midsummer
festival.
of the town by the church, we found Rättvik's church-town, a preserved collection of wooden huts which had once been
used a temporary accommodation for those travelling by church-boat from outlying settlements to
attend obligatory church services. Here at Rättvik, the wooden church huts were
clustered along the lake-shore by the landing stage where the church-boat bringing
church-goers would have been moored (Photo 21 - Preserved wooden huts of Rättvik's church-town). Down at Leksand at the southern end of the
lake, we passed the hollow bowl-shaped depression in parkland where the
Midsummer traditional song and dance festival is held around the Midsummer Pole
which today was laid out on the grass awaiting its 2013 summer decorations.
Leksand church, Baroque in form but dating from an earlier foundation, is said to
be one of Sweden's largest village churches (Photo 22 - Leksand Baroque church at southern end of Lake Siljan). The lakeside setting was
delightful, the lawned churchyard shaded with venerable overhanging spruce
trees, and down at the lake-shore we found the reconstructed log-built
boat-house where the Leksand church-boat is stored. Back at our lakeside camp at Tällberg,
the overcast weather meant it was unlikely we should have another sunset, but
instead there was another treat in store: the Tällberg church-boat crew, who had been out
on the lake practising for the Midsummer races festival (Photo 23 - Tällberg church-boat
crew on Lake Siljan), returned to their
boathouse down by the little marina and we watched them winching their kyrkbåt
ashore into their boathouse in the gathering gloom (see left).
disappointing (Photo 24 - Crater of Lake Siljan from Siljansnäs lookout tower). For a scientific agency acting as an
government funded information resource at national parks and nature reserves,
the Naturum seemed ill-provided with material in translation about the obvious
issue here at Lake Siljan ie the complex geomorphological consequences of the
meteorite impact that had produced Lake Siljan's crater. With the help of the
member of staff we managed however to piece together some understanding of Lake
Siljan's origin and topography. A 3km wide meteorite had struck the earth some
377 millions years ago causing a 40km wide impact crater. At that stage this
area of the earth's surface crust consisted of deep layers of sedimentary rock
overlaying more substantial granite bed-rock. The cataclysmic explosion
resulting from the impact vaporised the meteorite's material, pulverising the
sedimentary layer at the point of impact and throwing up disruptive clouds of
debris and forcing outwards the buckled strata upwards from horizontal to
vertical planes to form a ring around the impact site. Over aeons the underlying
granite at the point of impact has been lifted by pressure from within the
earth's crust at the point of disturbance to form a low dome of hills. The ring
of disturbed sedimentary strata was subsequently eroded by ice ages to form
trenches which were flooded by glacial melt waters creating the currently evident ring of
lakes, Siljan, Orsa and other smaller lakes, clearly visible from satellite
photos around the uplifted dome of hills.
The copper mines of Falun and Falun's modern
post-mining industry producing Falun Red wood preservative: we had been told that to learn more of
Berglagen's mining history, we should visit Falun, a small industrial town in
eastern Dalarna with a long association with copper mining. Turning off at Rättvik, Route 69 rose steeply from the bowl of Lake Siljan onto the high ground
of what would have been the
granite dome uplifted aeons ago at the point of the
meteorite's impact. This was a wide road passing through attractive birch-fringed spruce forests with frequent elk warning signs, and we were soon
approaching the outskirts of Falun, the town that had grown up around Falu
Kopparbergsgruva (Copper Mountain Mine). As we entered the town, orange-coloured
waste-rock spoil heaps from centuries of mining activity were evident
everywhere. During the 16~18th centuries, the scale of copper mining at Falun
increased as western Europe's demand for copper grew for armaments, household
utensils, roofing material, currency, tools, church bells; copper became
Sweden's major export commodity financing its rise as a major European power and
the trading centre that developed around the mines was second in size only to
Stockholm. As mining technology increased, ever deeper shafts were driven with
huge water-wheels to power hoists for removing ore and for pumping out water.
Increasingly extensive mining caused opencast pits to increase in size with
deeper mine shafts around the edge of the pit. As deeper mining increased with
unsystematic driving of shafts, drifts and
galleries, roof collapses, rock-falls
and cave-ins became a frequent hazard, culminating at Midsummer 1687 with a
massive scale of cave-in opening up an enormous pit, the Stora Stöten (see left
above). There
were no fatalities since workers were on holiday, but it seemed that this would
end Falun Mine's run of wealth. But the cave-in debris opened up previously
inaccessible veins of rich copper ore and the mine continued to expand. The most
prominent and innovative of Falun's mining engineers was Christopher Polhem in
the 18th century whose portrait now appears on the Swedish 500kr banknote (see
above right).
Underground working conditions for miners were appalling with 12 hour working
shifts; rock falls were frequent but the biggest hazard was sulphur dioxide gas
from the ore. The tourist hype makes much of the yarn of Fet Matts, a young
miner killed in a 1677 rock-fall and whose body was discovered 42 years later in
a perfect state of 
preservation from the mine's acidic waters. His body was
identified by his former fiancée, now an elderly widow, and put on display as an
early tourists attraction. Increased technology and improved engineering methods
led to deeper shafts during the 19~20th centuries and Falun copper mine
continued production until 1992 when the mines finally closed. The copper ore
spoil heaps still however yield a profitable inheritance: Falun is the centre of
production for Falu Rödfärg, the red-brown preservative paint used universally on Sweden's wooden buildings giving them their distinctive colour. The waste
rock with its mix of metallic minerals, principally red-ochre iron oxide, is
ground and roasted as the base material for the preservative paint and the Falu
Rödfärg works stand next to the former copper mine's deep pit (see left) (Photo 25 - Falu Rödfärg red preservative paint made from Falun Mine waste rock). The other
lucrative inheritance of Falun's mining is the mass tourist industry. With its
UNESCO World Heritage status, Falun attracts millions of visitors each year, and
at 210kr (£21) entry, the tourist industry must earn the Swedish state as much
today as the earlier mining did.
We followed directions to the Falu Gruva (mine)
site, and the size of the car parks indicated the scale of summer visitors; at
£21 each for entry, we had great expectations of Falun Mines ornate visitor
centre. The totally non-informative introductory video, doubtless targeted at
moronically incurious tourists and infuriatingly frustrating to visitors who
wished to learn something of the mine's history, was the first disappointment. A
copper mine was a new addition to our long list of mines visited during our
travels, and we kitted up with warm clothing and boots, expecting low
temperatures underground and orange filth underfoot, and waited for the guide by
the 100m deep Great Pit of Falun Mine. We descended to a viewing platform for an
uninterrupted panorama of the pit's sheer-sided crater which opened up before
us (Photo 26 - Great Pit of Falun Copper Mine), and were then issued with waterproof capes and hard-hats. Down a series of
stairs into the 67m level underground workings, for the next hour we were led
around labyrinthine galleries, drifts and tunnels (see right above) (Photo 27 - Underground at Falun Copper Mine). The former workings are still
accessible down to the 208m deep Creutz shaft but below that the later 20th
century 400m deep workings are now flooded. The Americanese-speaking guide's
so-called commentary was moronically bland and non-informative; pressured by the
tight schedule of lucrative hourly guided tours, she was immune to
information-seeking questions but doubtless had little knowledge to impart
anyway. Most of the party simply looked bored; a few like us ignored the
non-guide and peered around for ourselves trying to gain an impression in the
gloom of how dreadful working conditions would have been in the mine's
galleries. 
Having said that, we had at least had a brief,
albeit sanitised taste of the underground workings and were able to wander
freely above ground around the 1.5km track which winds around the rim of the
Great Pit where at least the information panels did offer some details. We
firstly explored the area of spoil heaps from which the Falun Red preservative
paint is now made in the nearby factory. There was no denying that the heaps of
waste orange rock glowing in the sunlight had an attractiveness, and it seemed a
total irony that the spoil heaps are now protected by law to prevent the
millions of tourists each walking off with a souvenir chunk of Falun rock. In
the sunlight, the sheer-sided 100m deep walls of the 400m wide Great Pit glowed
attractively with varied orange colours. The chaotic jumble of fallen debris,
rock and broken timbers of the first section must have been the site of 1687
disastrous cave-in, but we still had no understanding of the origins of the rest
of this enormous chasm, with the remains of winding-gear towers of 19~20th century
shafts around the rim (Photo 28 - Great Pit and mining buildings of Falun Copper Mine). We walked around the pit, taking photos as we went
looking across the vast chasm to the mine buildings on the far side. A track-way
wound down to the floor of the pit where excavators were still working, filling
quarry trucks with aggregate.
