There’s one trail in Funäsfjällen that is advertised as the ”sunshine trip”, solskensturen. Called so because in the spring when you ski it from Ramundberget to Tänndalen, you’ll have the sun on your face all the way. It’s a long trip (23 km) and I’ve always wanted to do it but reluctant to do it alone. I was happy to finally find company for the trip so today was the day!

The weather looked half promising, it was very windy in Ramundberget and there was snow in the air but the cloud cover was breaking in places so I hoped that it would improve.

We got to the Össjöstugan cabin before it opened, so we just continued towards Walles. There would be a trail than branches off from the Össjö valley going south towards Tänndalen, but when we got there we found it was completely oversnowed and there wasn’t really any trail visible at all. So we used Plan B and skied via Kariknallen instead, and this is when the weather got really tough. There’s quite an uphill from Bruksvallarna to Kariknallen and as if that wasn’t enough, we had the wind in our faces and the snowing had intensified so we got beaten by these small needles all the way. The wind also meant that there was quite a snow pileup on the trail so at first we had to pulse through that soft snow but once we got higher up, the exposed tundra was almost free of snow instead so we concluded that it would be easier just to pick up the skis and walk.

We enjoyed a much needed lunch at Kariknallen and the energy levels thus restored, tackled the second half of the trip. It felt like the wind had only gotten worse while we were eating and it was starting to get a little bit miserable, actually. But we persevered through the oversnowed trail (with hindsight, the trail we passed up was exactly like this but we thought it was through lack of use and not the force of nature) and after Svalåstugan when the trail made a slight turn, we got the wind from the side instead and it gave immediate relief. The closer to Andersborg we got, the better the weather and we suspected that it had been like this all day – the wind and snowing was on the north side of the mountain plateau while here on the south side we finally got a taste of the name of the trip.

I was hungry again so I ate a waffle and all the sugar in the jam did miracles for my energy. I had started to feel the effort we had put it so far and I had a tough time going up the hills, but I wasn’t otherwise tired as such. What should’ve been a 23 km trip turned out to be 28 km because of the Kariknallen detour and that’s officially the most I’ve ever skiied in a day. The strange part is that I wasn’t exhausted… it’s only those uphill parts that got my thighs complaining but other than that, I could easily have skied further.

A very good trip; it wasn’t all the sunshine as in the advertisement but I wouldn’t have it any other way. Awesome to have done it!