Day 1: Strimasund – Gertrudstjärnarna

In late July 2014 I (Anna) and Christer hiked in the North of Sweden in Artfjället. There is no hiking trails to follow but with a good map and compass it is still a rather easy area to hike in.
This is our report, enjoy!

We arrived by car to Strimasund in the late afternoon. The sun was shining and we felt eager to start our hike in the Artfjället.

Anna and Christer on one of the bridges crossing Över Uman

We crossed Över Uman and followed the path through the forest up to the Same viste. We continued upwards and after a while we left the woods and came up to the open mountain landscape.

Above the tree line

The climb was very hot, we where happy that we brought some extra water with us as we didn’t pass any on our climb up to the cave, Sotbäcksgrottan. The entrance of the cave  is just a whole in the ground, you will need special equipment to visit the cave. At the cave the path ended and from now on we had to find our way with help of the map and the compass. We also had an electronic map with us with a GPS function, that worked really well.

Our goal for the day was Gertrudstjärnarna, which are located just above the  caves. We found a place for the tent, a bit bumpy ground but it was dry and soft so it was rather ok to sleep on. We washed ourselves and our underwear in the stream. And made a late dinner. A good advise if you don’t like Mosquitos while cooking and eating is to not wait to long, around eight the Mosquitos usually showed up. But we didn’t have any massive attack during our whole hike.

Making dinner at the stream between the lakes

Christer making dinner at the stream

We made bacon, vegetables (pre-dried) with mash potatoes, to dessert we made some chocolate pudding. We  had some whiskey before heading in to the tent to avoid the Mosquitos.