With half a chance for sunshine, I did yesterday’s trip today. Which was, cycling along Mittåkläppsvägen to Fålåtjärnen and then follow the Nordic Ski trail to Ramundberget, and home.
The trees were not frosty when I left, but there was a little bit of new snow on the ground, which made me nervous at first – if the road was going to be slippery, then the trip was off. But it was just a thin layer of powder snow and the grip was good, so no worries then.
Somewhere at around 850m altitude, it had been cold enough for the trees to keep their frosty decoration, and it was amazing to zip along the beautiful road. Or well, zip and zip… this was constantly uphill, I can’t claim I reached any blinding speeds exactly!
The moose hunt was going on in the area. I passed by a hunter on his way to his designated spot, and shortly after that, I saw a big moose run over the road with a dog on its heels. It was running straight towards the hunter, and one shot is all it took. I trusted that my bright blue jacket would keep me safe from suffering the same fate.
When I got to Fålåtjärnen, it wasn’t just frost on the ground, but actual snow. Only about 1cm, but still. Down in Ramundberget it was maybe even a little bit more, and I found that the road was covered in packed snow. It could’ve gotten a bit slippery, but I avoided the problem by following the Nordic Ski trail on the west side of Ljusnan. There it was just powder snow again, it was fine for cycling. When I crossed the bridge to get back on the road, I found to my relief that the packed snow wasn’t an issue all the way to Bruksvallarna. My biggest problem really was that I was running low on energy, so I took every uphill very slowly to avoid killing my thighs, which were not very happy at that point. But I was ok otherwise, not completely dead when I got home, it had been a great trip and I’m so happy I did it!