Vacation sweet vacation! I have two weeks off now, spending most of it at the cabin.

When I arrived in Messlingen, I was almost shocked to see that summer has barely started here. There’s lots of snow on the mountains and the birch leaves are not fully grown yet. So my first impression was that the summer is late (it has been a cold spring anyway) but now that I’m trying to think how it normally looks like during midsummer, I guess it’s fairly normal anyway. It’s just the surprise of it.

For the first time ever, I brought the bicycle with me. Now that I’ve figured out how to strap the tripod on it, it will be a very useful tool for approach stretches. I took it out for a spin already, first the big trail leading towards Fiskhålsgraven (I turned back well before the uphill started…), and then the road towards Ruvallen and checked some spots along the way. A good trip, totally unphotogenic (sadly, the weather forecast says that it’s gonna be unphotogenic for as long as the forecast reaches) but I found one promising spot towards Blåstöten. And I got the confirmation that taking the bicycle was a smart move, it’s a huge timesaver (and energy saver) as opposed to walking. Although I should avoid the smaller trails… I very nearly crashed when I took on a rocky trail with lots of pine roots. The helmet is at home.