Luleå to Kemi mid-October last year

 Lulea sunrise or sunset I can't remember who cares it's perfect

(From 14 October 2019)

You’d think that travelling over a number of weeks in interesting places would be reason enough to blog – you sure can’t say ‘nothing’s changed around here’ – and in the last three or four weeks I’ve been in Scotland, Norway, Sweden and just arrived (15/10) in Finland. I have the prissiest, stupidest reasons for not keeping my loyal readers up to date with my activities and observations. They come back to that fucking password business again. This blog is associated with an old email address: can’t change that. And when you want to go between blogs, you have to move around passwords and log out and log in and it’s just a hassle. I told you it wasn’t a very good reason, it’s a terrible reason, I get that. 

So anyway this morning I took a bus from my digs in Luleå… no I didn’t, what am I thinking. That’s what I tried to do. The bus didn’t stop for me however, despite what ‘maps on my phone’ (I don’t actually think it is google maps – anyway, whatever it is) told me, the bus stop wasn’t a bus stop. So… I contacted my airbnb host, Carl, who had mentioned he was available to give people lifts to and from the little house I was staying. What he didn’t say was that he was an actual bona fide taxi driver. He actually came and got me in a taxi and took me to the bust station. Then I got a bus to Haparanda, then a bus to Kemi (where I am now, at the delightful Puttikihotelli) and in 25 minutes I’ll be on the train to Oulu.

I am not doing cartwheels of delight over anything right now mainly because I had a very bad night’s sleep because sometime over the last few days I caught a cold which is probably not that surprising – it’s cold here – but annoying, on the last leg of a long trip, it seems really unfair and harsh of the universe, but I guess tbh I’ve let myself get a bit run down as it is so I can’t really blame anyone else – can I? There are pluses, too – like for instance that no-one has to suffer me in my idiotic illness state. I’m imagining that once I get to my hotel in Oulu I’ll be just doing not much for the rest of the day and then tomorrow getting out feeling much, much better and doing heaps of field work. 

Now I’m at Kemi station and hanging out in this cafe I’m kind of thinking, I wish I could spend more time in Kemi. But I can’t, my time is winding up (I’m in Europe one more week, really – let’s say 8 days – OK, 8½ - and there’s still a lot to do, but I’ve hit most of my marks, and feel pretty positive about the overall. Thanks for listening.