iXploretheworld.com – … and the adventure never ends!

Visingsö and Gränna

Posted on July 18, 2018July 18, 2018 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Roadtrip Sweden:

In late August last year (2017) we decided to go somewhere on a mini vacation with our half year old daughter Wilma. We decided we wanted to go somewhere calm but still nice and not too far away from home. Some place we could reach within a couple of hours drive and Visingsö seemed like a good place to go. I’ve been here before, but I was very small so I don’t remember much. Visingsö is an island located in the middle of the second largest lake in Sweden, called Vättern.

Our first and only real stop at our journey from home to Visingsö was at Gyllene Uttern, just outside of Gränna. It’s an old inn with a stunning view over Vättern and Visingsö. Basically it was just a stop for lunch and a way to spend some time waiting for the ferry that would take us from Gränna to Visingsö. We had pre-booked a slot time on the ferry to make sure we would fit. Getting on the ferry was easy and the ride only took about 25 minutes.

We had booked a room on a pension (lodging) called Visingsö Pensionat and it was situated just a couple of minutes driving from the harbour, right behind the church. After checking in we got informed that we were just off season (missed the season with justone week) so much would be closed on the island (restaurants and hotels). So we made our way into the small community of Tunnerstad and the grossery store there to buy some food for us. It was a quite quiet evening considering we have a 7 month old baby.

Waking up the next day to a stunning day we took off exploring the island a bit. While Sofia slept in a bit me and Wilma took a walk (I pushed Wilma in her stroller) in the oak forest before breakfast. We begun to the south and passed an mulberry groove which was cozy but not much to see really. We continued soutwards until we reached the southern part of the island. Here we found Näs castle ruin that clings on to the erroded cliffs. Parts of the castle has already fallen down into the lakes cold water. This castle was once a home to several of the Swedish kings in the early ages. The castle ruin has a quite interesting history to tell.

Turning back north again we stopped at Sverkers Oak, a place where king Sverker is said to be slain by his enemies. We also stopped at a cist grave but found it was not much to see there. We headed back to the docks as it was time for lunch and one of the few places still open during the off season was Restaurant Solbacken. Had a good lunch and then we took a stroll down to Visingsborg castle ruin, which ones both housed Swedish nobility and later on russian prisoners of war. After this we took the car northbound on the island but did not really find much of interest there. We were looking for a store that was supposed to sell clothing but it had closed for the season so we turned back home to the pension again.

During a walk in the afternoon/evening we came upon a nostalgia museum (BP gas station). We spent some time looking at the incredible collection. The museum is free of charge but volontairly donations are welcome!

The coming morning I took Wilma in the stroller again and took a walk around the Brahe church and got some gorgeous shots of it in the early morning sun. After breakfast we checked out and took the ferry over to the mainland again to explore the town of Gränna. Gränna is mostly famous for their peppermint rocks and the Gränna Museum with it’s exhibit about the Andrée expedition to the north pole. We entered one of the many peppermint rock stores/factories but the show off how the candy is made was closed for the season (seem to be a curse following us here). We bought some candy and then decided it was time to go home. At first we had planned to visit Brahe hus, yet anther castle ruin but the weather started to turn from nice to bad so driving home felt more appealing.

Check out the gallery for some more pictures from Visingsö and Gränna.

Visingsö official: Visingsö

Trafikverket: Ferry tickets, prices & time table

Gränna official: Gränna

Gunnebo castle

Posted on July 12, 2017July 15, 2018 John1 CommentPosted in Göteborg/Gothenburg

Todays excursion took us to Gunnebo castle, it’s just 15 minutes drive from central Gothenburg. This castle from the 18th century is surrounded by a park and a beautiful forest. It’s possible to go inside the castle, guided tours are available. At our visit, they were restoring the facade of the castle so half of the building was covered in working platforms. Luckily, it’s only the main building undergoing a face lift, the rest of the old buildings were untouched and very enjoyable to watch.

They also have big gardens where they grow their own crops and vegetables, which are served in the cafeteria. All is organic too. There is also a small shop at the premesis where you can buy locally produced food and some hand crafted stuff. After having walked around for an hour or so we decided to have something to eat in the cafeteria. Very delicious food for sure.

The castle have an interesting history and small signs here and there tells parts of it, I guess you will get an even better introduction if you take the guided tour. We declined due to having the stroller with us and the castle inside has some stairs. On the outside, there are both stairs and walkways so it’s easy to get around, even with a stroller or wheelchair.

Link: Gunnebo Castle

Parking: Not free, but affordable

There are some more pictures in the gallery.

I got gold fever!

Posted on June 26, 2017June 18, 2017 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Gold Prospecting

Over the years me and my wife has enjoyed the TV-series about gold miners in Alaska and Yukon. After a while I started to feel that it would be nice to try it out. It’s kind of one of those things that you should do in your life if you’re an adventurer like me. I’ve spent countless hours reading about it, watching videos on youtube, reading on forums and so on. I even bought a book from one of the more prominent gold miners on the forum and as a “lottery price” he had attached a small gold nugget in the book. That kind of got me hooked. For real!

It didn’t take long after that until I bought a gold pan, some paydirt and a bucket just to try my hands at gold panning. It didn’t take long for me to get the hang of it and craving for more. It turned out to be a good hobby during the winter and my wife’s pregnancy.

Since it was in the middle of the winter there was no chance to go out and actually try my luck in the local creeks but plans were made and carefully prepared. A colleague of mine is a geologist and has helped me stake out some interesting places where I should try my luck. And with his help I have also found some interesting sites on my own. My plan this year is to try some of them out and see if they yield anything.

Spring in Rya Skog

Posted on June 20, 2017June 18, 2017 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Göteborg/Gothenburg

Last year in early May me and Sofia went to a small patch of forest right in the middle of one of Gothenburgs mostly industrialized areas. This forest is unique in many ways, but I think it’s mostly famous for the fact that there are many plants that grow there and no where else in the area. From my own experience this little spot of green in the middle of harsch industrial enviroment is best during the late April and early May. According to sources this is the remains of a very old forest and is worth saving!

Official information: Rya skog (in Swedish)

To get there: Google map

Free entrance / Free parking

Accessible by public transportation (bus stop is Rya Skog)

More pictures from this wonderfull forest can be found on this gallery page: Göteborg/Gothenburg

News and changes

Posted on June 18, 2017 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Random posts

I havn’t made a post for a long while now. Mostly due to the fact that we havn’t been travelling anywhere really and that is because in the middle of Januari our daughter was born and that had a huge impact on our lives. Everyone says that having a child is a huge change in their life, it’s just so hard to understand how big the change really is until you get a child yourself. But we manage, we are getting used to the new routines and most of the time we can appreciate and enjoy our new life as parents.

We will not stop travelling, we just want to see how things works out a bit. In the meantime there is plenty of new things to do and a lot of things to re-discover in our proximity. I will dedicate a new category for this, called Göteborg and here I will write about things to do and see in Göteborg (Gothenburg).

Another new thing is the Instagram feed which I hope will bring something new one way or another.

Tally so far

Posted on November 16, 2016November 9, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Geocaching

Okay, here is the tally so far. I think the challenge of finding 100 non traditionals in a row kind of ruined geocaching for me. I prefer it to be something casual but now it became totally non-casual so I’ve decided to abandon this quest for glory. Yes, I admit to being not 100% devoted to the quest either. And now that the cold and snow has hit Gothenburg I see the chances of me going out geocaching decreases with each grade below 0.

But at least it made me try some new chaches and I got me some new experience. I will most likely get back to geocachig in the spring when the weather is nice and I can take my daughter out in the trolley. I guess that is a good reason to fiddle around in the bushes!

Below is the tally. Turned out to be 34, so I managed to do a tad bit more than a 3rd of the amount. Not to shabby after all!

– 3
– 8
– 1
– 1
– 5
– 14
– 2

= 34

2011 South East Asia #10 Hong Kong – Rave party at the 20th floor

Posted on November 2, 2016October 11, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

Today, or this day I spent mostly just walking around and I wanted to go and see the large Buddha statue. I took the train to the place where it was, found out there was a very long line of people who also wanted to see it. I gave up on that idea and took the train back again. Went into a small store to buy a soda and discovered I could pay for the soda with my Octupus Card. That’s nifty. When I got back to central Hong Kong I mostly spent my day walking around looking at the town, I found a H&M store and bought a sweather. Funny, I would proably never buy anything in a H&M store in Sweden. In the evening I texted Kevin and then we meet up to go to Ned Kellys Last Stand. We met some of Kevins friends there, turned out he knew one of the guys in the band that would play during the evening. It was a jazz band and it was really great!

Later that evening I got a text from a friend of mine, Francine, and we decided to meet up. First we had some drinks in a bar along with some of her friends and then we ended up on a rave party on the 20th floor of a skyscraper. That was quite cool to be honest! After the rave party there was some after party in an apartment somewhere until sunrise. About then I decided it was time to head back to the hotel since I wanted to sleep. So I started walking back in a still dormant Hong Kong. It was quite nice to see the city slowly awaken and how the noise slowly increased. Even big cities are quiet in the early morning.

I arrived at my hotel about when they started serving breakfast which suited me fine. I had some and then went to bed. I woke up about noon and went out for a walk. I ended up in a shoppingmall not far from my hotel, looking for anything that would catch my eye. I didn’t really have any real plan for the day so I ended up going to the movies and saw Sucker Punch, it was the only one playing at the moment. After the movie I walked back to my hotel and packed my bag, went down to the lobby and checked out. It was the same guy checking me out as checking me in some days before. He asked me what I thought about Hong Kong and if I had enjoyed my stay. I liked Hong Kong very much and I did really enjoy my stay. And still to this day I think Hong Kong is one of the best cities I’ve ever visited.

I think the flight left something like 11:55 pm or so and having not slept so much turned out to be a good idea since I managed to sleep almost all the way to Amsterdam. As all good stories has an end, so do this. And if you’ve counted the days you’ll see that it was roughly 6 weeks spent. Roughly. 😉

The full gallery from my trip in south East Asia can be found here >> 2011 South East Asia

2011 South East Asia #9 Hong Kong – Food

Posted on October 30, 2016November 3, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

Flying from Kota Kinabalu to Hong Kong took roughly 3 hours and costed me about €50 since I booked like the day before, as I’ve done during this trip. I could probably get it cheaper if I had booked in advance, but I like the flexibility. I arrvied in the evening to Hong Kong, about 9 pm and then the immigration process and getting out from the station took maybe 30 minutes or so. It all went very smooth. I had gotten an advice from one of the other passengers on the plane to get a Octopus Card for the tube and pay with money on trams and buses. I don’t remember the reason why now but I think in the end it would save me some money. So I got myself a Octupus card and then got on the tube into central Hong Kong. First train ride was easy, it was when I changed line that things got complicated. The train from the airport was not crowded, but the new line I wanted to get on was full. So I missed the first train. No biggie, next train came just minutes later.

I managed to squeeze myself in and then ride to Wan Chai station somehow, getting up to the street level I found a McDonalds which offered free Wifi which was good. I needed to check where my hotel was, I know it was somewhere on Queens Road which is not too far away from Wan Chai station. So I managed to figure out which way to Queens Road and I started walking. Then I found Queens Road and it’s here things got messy. I started walking in the wrong direction. After having walked for a while I started to suspect I was walking in the wrong direction. Trying to find a cab proved to harder than I thought but finally I found one and he could confirm that I was walking in the wrong direction. I had almost made it to the end of Queens Road, the wrong end that is. My hotel was located in the other end.

I decided to not walk so I let the taxi take me there, he even offered to wait in case I had gotten to the wrong hotel. Turned out it was the right hotel (Cosmopolitan Hotel) so I waved at the taxi and he drove off. Checking in was quickly done, they asked if it was the first time in Hong Kong and I said yes, so they gave me a room with a view. On the 26th floor or something like that. I had a very nice view of Hong Kong by night. The next day, a friend of mine, let’s call him Howard picked me up in the lobby. He had made great plans for my first day in Hong Kong. We were to explore the hong Kong cuisine and all aspects of it. We started by walking to a nearby breakfast restaurant. There we had some tea and a pinapple bun. It was a quite noisy place despite not many people where there. Then we proceeded to another place to have fishball soup and some kind of fried bread. Next stop, a dessert restaurant and some black and white sesame soup.

Howard had thought of it very well, we only went to restaurants that didn’t have menus in English, only in cantonese which made it very hard for me to figure out what we were going to eat. Then we took the tram somewhere and into another restaurant. This time it was some kind of fast food restaurant that served noodles. Howard wrote a note for me on this place, because he said it was a good place to have lunch and with the note I could order what we had for the moment. Nice, was my thought, this was a really good lunch. But it turned out to be only a pre-lunch meal. Next restaurant we entered was a dim sum restaurant and the noise in there was immense. Howard showed me how to clean the chopsticks with the tea, and then we started to order stuff! Everything was delicious but some things was also very strange. I guess the chicken feets was the most strange.

After the dim sum restaurant we felt kind of stuffed so we decided to walk around for a while and do some sight seeing instead. We came by the college and Howard showed me the “panic flowers” that always bloomed in the end of spring semester, thus the name; panic flowers since everyone had their finals to think about! After having explored parts of Hong Kong by foot it was time to eat again. This time we aimed at another fast food place. A window in a wall that sold fried stuff mostly. My stomach didn’t like the fried stuff so much, I had a very “interesting” hour there. When things had calmed down we aimed for a more fashionable restaurant where we had Peking duck for example. And a dish with boiled cabbage and some salt pork. Also very tasty.

After that late dinner we were absolutly full. We could not squeeze down anything more so we decided it was time to round up the day. We walked down to a pier somewhere and took some pictures of Hong Kong by night and then we split up. Me going back to the hotel and Howard going back home. The following day I tried to get up early but I over slept. I skipped breakfast at the hotel and set out to a fast food restaurant, the same kind that Howard took me to the day before (where he wrote down what we had) and I walked in, happy as ever after and showed them my note from Howard, paid, sat down at a table and waited. The waitress came in with a hughe bowl of the same kind of noodle soup we had had the day before. But it was even bigger than the one we had shared. So there I am with a bowl of noodle soup for a whole family. Obviously something went wrong with my order (I called Howard afterwards and asked him, he said that probably she wasn’t so good at reading and misread the size or something).

To my rescue came a man in suit who asked if he could sit at my table, sure I said. “Have some noodle soup if you like, I seem to have ordered more than I can eat!” I replied. Sharing food with strangers is nice, you get to talk to people and learn a bit about their life. When we were done eating there was still like a 3rd of soup left but I think we did a good job! I started to move through town, I was on my way down to central pier 4 where the ferries to the nearby islands are. Howard said I should visit Lamma Island which was supposed to be very beautiful so I wanted to go there. The ferry ride didn’t take too long and soon I found myself in a very cozy place. I just walked around on Lamma Island for some hours before I started to get hungry. I found a restaurant not so far from where I had landed earlier and sat down to have something to eat. I ended up ordering fish soup which was delicious. And I had a beer to that. I was sitting in the sun and one beer quickly became 4 beers and I felt that life was generally very good.

After returning to Hong Kong and my hotel I felt I was not entierly done with my day. So I took a walk from the hotel towards the Hong Kong Jockey Club. When I arrived there it wasn’t as exciting as I first thought it was so I decided to walk in another direction. After a while I started to feel hungry again so I just walked in to the first place I found which turned out to be a sports bar. I ordered the only food they had, a hamburger with fries and a large beer. I had more or less just finished my plate when a man next to me started talking to me. “Names Kevin, I’m a flight mechanic from California!”. And then I ended up having a long conversation with a man I didn’t know about more or less everything and nothing. We decided to met again in the afternoon the next day to go and listen to some jazz music at a place called Ned Kellys Last Stand.

2011 South East Asia #8 Malaysia – Borneo, week 2, High up, down below

Posted on October 27, 2016October 11, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

Early morning we left Poring Hot Springs and once again we took a taxi, this time to Mount Kinabalu national park main entrance. Today was the day when we should climb, or rather walk up to the base camp on Mount Kinabalu. There we checked in our backpacks and just took the most essential stuff with us. I think we begun our walk up to the base camp around lunch, and 3 hours later we arrived at our destination. Our mountain guide (which is required to walk on Mount Kinabalu) told us that 3 hours is the “mountain guide speed”, the time it takes for a mountain guide to walk up alone without visitors. Normal is that you take 4-6 hours depending on your physical fitness. I guess we did pretty good then because I didn’t feel very fit.

The trek up to base camp provided a lot of nice views, more than enough of changes in the weather and both hot and cold. I’m happy we had rain jackets with us. Still, when we got up everything was soaking wet. We learned that it was possible to pay the mountain guides a little and they would dry your shoes in their cabins. It was about 10-15 degrees up in the base camp and everything was moist so paying for some dry shoes seemed like a good deal. Dinner at the base camp was basic but nice, then we had as much hot tea as we would like. We started to prepare for the final trek to the summit. Our guide would come and get us around 2:30 in the morning so early sleep seemed like a good idea.

About 2:30 the guide arrived at the cabin where we were staying and we could witness a long snake of flash lights struggling up the steep mountain side. Feeling a bit frustrated by the slow movement we asked our guide if there was any way to get passed and he knew a way. So we started on an alternative path alongside the others. Soon we reach the “head of the snake” and passed by them. Now we were surrounded by total darkness, the wind and sometimes the occasional cloud which would drift by. The view from the mountain was great, we could see villages and towns far away as small flickering lights. And then suddenly we’ve reached the summit. And we were the first ones to get there. 4095 meters above the sea-level!

After a few minutes we got company from a Norwegian couple who had been to the other summit first, and then went for this one. Turns out they started after us, and we were among those we started last, but they had walked past us in the darkness and climbed both peaks. Well done! The idea was that we should sit here at the summit and watch the sunrise, but as we waited the wind blew colder and it became cloudier and cloudier until we realized that we won’t see much of the sunrise at all. So we decided to descend and get an early breakfast instead. During the walk down the steepest part I hurt my foot a bit. The last part was not so fun. Back at base camp I stabilized my foot and then it felt okay again. We had some breakfast before we started the long journey down again. It took a bit over 4 hours to walk down again to the entrance to the national park.

I recall riding a minibus back to Kota Kinabalu, checking in to our hotel, the shower, then going out for some steak to eat. But first a massage, that turned out to be a bad idea though since we were extremely sore , specially in the legs and feet. After the massage we went out for food. The first place we went to didn’t have any meat at all, that was a bummer. Then we walked around the corner to a new restaurant and tried our luck there. The waitress promised to ask the chef if they had meat, when she came back she said that she was sorry, specially if we were the guys who asked in the other restaurant. Obviously they shared the kitchen! But we don’t give up so easy. Finally we found a Japanese restaurant that had steak! Victory!

The day after Ove left, he was going back to Thailand and then back home to Sweden. Myself, I took a flight to Tawau on Borneos eastcoast. From there I took the bus to Semporna, a small town that mostly lived of fishing and diving. From Semporna I had to take a 10-15 minute long boat ride to a place called Singamata Reef Resort, located on a reef, as the name suggests. Here I was supposed to spend some time, learning to dive. The first evening I read a lot of diving theory, and the next day I took the test which I passed. Then in the afternoon it was time for my first dive ever. I still remember it, despite being on only 3-5 meters depth and just around the “house reef” as they called it it was amazing! Yes, we spent a lot of time trying to master the art of diving and I think in the end I got the hang of it.

no images were found

In the evenings the diving instructors would catch giant prawns and and other seafood that you could buy if you wanted something extra. Very nice indeed. After having a couple of training dives it was finally time to make the final dives and the “just for fun” dives as they called it. This we did around the wonderful island of Sibuan. We did 3 dives around this island and had a lunch break as well giving us some time to explore this little gem. Walking around the island was pretty quick, I think maybe 30-40 minutes, maybe less.

One of the dives was a drift dive, where we floated along with the current. That was a very cool experience! And that same dive we also saw sea turtles passing by. They look very majestic when they swim by you. That evening it was some kind of party at the reef resort and we got hot pot for dinner. Very nice indeed. Feeling happy with my new diving experience and my PADI Open Water certificate I slept very well that night.

My time on Borneo started to run out, my time in South East Asia started to run out and I still had places to see, people to meet, food to eat and beer to drink! So I took the bus from Semporna all the way back to Kota Kinabalu for one last night. I met up with Zera for one final time to have some dinner and sing some karaoke for the last time on Borneo. The next day I stood in the airport ready to board my flight to the final stop on this journey!

2011 South East Asia #7 Malaysia – Borneo, week 1, People, rivers and jungle

Posted on October 23, 2016October 11, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

The flight from Kuala Lumpur to Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Borneo went smooth. But not everything in the world went so smooth. While in the air there was a earthquake outside the coast of the Philippines. It had a magnitude of 6.4 on the Richter scale and there was also a tsunami warning issued. Luckily no tsunami came but I remember seeing this on the news when I had landed. After a smaller stray on the airport in search of an ATM I finally was on my way to my hotel. Turned out I had struck a real deal on the hotel. Turned out to be a 5 star hotel, called Sutera Harbor Resort. At first I thought the taxi took me to the wrong place but it turned out to be the right place. I had a small suite with a fantastic view of the golf course, if you are interested in golf that is. That evening I had dinner at the hotel, I kind of regretted that because it was not a good deal for me. I guess getting good deals on expensive hotels has it’s downsides sometimes. After dinner I texted Zera (whom I met in Thailand some weeks ago) telling her that I had arrived.

The next day I spent the morning and mid-day with doing nothing more or less around the hotel pool. Reading the newspaper, drinking a beer and just enjoying life. In the afternoon Zera called and asked if I wanted to join her and some friends on a trip to a nearby island. Sure, why not I thought. She picked me up at the hotel an hour later or so and off we went. Turns out that tourists pay the double fee on the ferry to the island, so we made a temporary arrangement so I became a Malaysian citizen through marriage. We arrived on a small pier and from there it was just a quick walk to a very nice beach. After a couple of hours there we went out for food on a fancy restaurant, it was one of Zeras friends birthday, but she did not tell me that before hand. After dinner we went out for some drinks in a karaoke bar and NAME HERE asked if I wanted a beer. Sure I said, why not. He asked if a beer tower was okay. “What is that?” I asked. I was soon to find out.

A beer tower is a portable beer keg with a tap more or less. Filled with 4.6 liter of beer. I thought it was for all of us, but it turned out it was just for me. I didn’t want to be rude so I drank it all. Well, the others helped a bit, with one glass each or so. Then we went for a “Chinese McDonalds” as Zera called it. Chinese fast food which was very nice. It was a good night out, the day after I skipped breakfast and tried to stay in bed as long as possible until I really had to go up since I needed to check out from my hotel. Ove was due to arrive in Borneo the next day and we was to change location to something little more affordable. I found a nice hostel called Borneo Gaya Lodge along Jalan Gaya, or Gaya Street. This place, the street that is, was according to various sites on the internet a popular location for backpackers.

That night Zera brought me out to a pier where there was a lot of small restaurants with very much food. Some of the dishes I remember, like “fish fingers” which was some kind of pepper fruit stuffed with minced fish and cooked. Extremely spicy. Then we had some fried chicken, rice of some kind, some satay-like chicken and some more spicy stuff. All in all, very good, but very hot!

When Ove arrived the day after we mostly chilled and had a couple of beers in a nearby pub, playing pool. I still have some of the tokens from the pool table at home. The next day me and Ove went out to explore the town a bit and to find us some adventure. We had heard there was good white water rafting to be had so we sought out an agency that could book us for some the next day. Eventually we found one more or less right next door to our hostel and we booked for the next day!

The following day we had to get up early. First we had a couple of hours of bus trip, then we changed from bus to a clunky old diesel powered train that ran on very thin tracks through Borneo’s jungle. Finally we arrived at the white water rafting site and got our safety instruction, some testing of the raft and some final instructions before our adventure on the river begun. That was a full day of pure fun! We got to know a danish girl called Nathja, who stayed at a hostel next to ours and we decided to meet after the rafting for some beer. Our guide on the river also wanted to join, bragging about how good beer drinker he was. Who are we to resist such a challenge?

During the evening some guy from Brazil turned up with his didgeridoo, that was totally random but it turned in to an unforgettable evening in the end. The day after me and Ove set out on a quest to find some hiking outfit since we had decided to climb Mount Kinabalu. We booked the climbing same day as we booked the white water rafting. We found a store in a shopping mall that had what we needed, and if we joined their customer club we would get some discount on some items, so we gladly signed up. In the end we managed to reach a premium level as customer and was awarded 5 watches. Probably not the best watches in the world. We gave away those watches to people at the hostel.

Next day we left Kota Kinabalu for a place called Sabah Tea Garden, a tea plantation not to far from Mount Kinabalu national park. To get there we took a taxi, it proved to be a quite long journey that took several hours on snaky roads. Finally we arrived at Sabah Tea Garden, or so we thought. Turned out there was a good 2 kilometer of walking before we actually arrived at the actual place. I didn’t mind, the scenery was nice and we could see Mount Kinabalu looming on the horizon. After checking in to our small cottage named Alfred Dent. Nothing much happen that evening, but in the morning we went up early to see the sunrise that was said to be beautiful. Unlucky for us it rained in the morning. After breakfast we went on a guided tour on the tea factory and in the afternoon we took a small jungle trek up on a nearby peak. It was a good opportunity to see if our trekking outfits would do the job. And they did. During the trek we got to see a gigantic caterpillar and the flower Rafflesia, the worlds largest flower.

The following day we decided to relocate to a place called Poring Hot Springs which was a quite odd place to arrive in. The road just abruptly ended (I’ve heard it’s completed now). Then there was some hotels around the hot springs and not so much else. We checked out the hot springs but didn’t bath in them because the place was crowded. Instead we set out on a small trek again to find a cave that we had seen signs about. Turned out the cave was quite hard to access so we abandoned that idea and went back to have dinner. Before we went to Poring Hot Springs we briefly visited the small town of Ranau in search for internet connection to check some flights, but internet was down for the moment, that happens sometimes.

2011 South East Asia #6 Malaysia – Kuala Lumpur

Posted on October 20, 2016October 11, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

The flight from Krabi Airport left sometime around lunch and I landed in “KL” a few hours later. I remember the immigration process was smooth and that I read some signs telling arrivals that hippies was not allowed in Malaysia. Getting from the airport into town was easy. I had booked a hotel not too far from Petrona Towers. First day I was a bit tired so I only took a short walk around the neighborhood after checking in to the hotel. I spent the evening researching the Batu Caves which was my grand plan for the next day.

Getting there was easy, from Sentral I took a komuter train on the red line to the station called Batu Caves. Taking the train there cost me about 2 or 3 Malaysian Ringits, which equals 0.4-0.5€. going there with some kind of travel agency would become very expensive I had learned from my research. When I arrived the first thing I saw was this huge green and gold statue, and then I saw more and more of them. I saw temple like structures everywhere. And a set of stairs that looked both long and steep. Suddenly someone bumped into me, turns out to be a Japanese girl trying to catch everything in one picture. We started talking and decided to keep each other company for a while. This place is full of different Hindu temples, and we’re not even inside the “cave area” yet. At one such temple we witnessed what I guess was the end of a ceremony. I always feel uneasy around religious places like this since I don’t want to be disrespectful to the people worshiping or do something that would be disrespectful to the religion but here it seemed like for a small fee the gods and goddesses could would turn a blind eye to tourists false moves.

There is also something called the Batu Garden in this area. We were about to enter when a guy came out telling us not to, it’s just a restaurant to which you pay an admission fee and you get to see some kind of performance and then there is some shops inside as well. We decided not to go in there then. After having walked around the outside for a while I longed to walk up the stairs and into the caves but the Japanese girl was hesitant since she both was afraid of heights and was claustrophobic so we decided we should split up. Right below the stairs the gigantic golden statue of Murugan (a Hindu diety) is standing, reaching over 42 meters above the ground. And so my ascent begun up the giant stairs. It was really hot despite being a bit cloudy, I was happy I had bought a large bottle of water earlier. Reaching the top of the stairs demanded some sweat but I made it. It was way cooler inside the caves. And filled with even more temples, or shrines is maybe a better description.

It’s a pretty impressive place, Batu Caves, and after having walked around and looked at everything I could I decided it was time to leave. So I headed for the train station again, paid the ticket and went on board the train. There I started talking to a guy named Duncan (from New Zealand) and soon another guy joined us, Marcus, from Australia. It’s funny how you meet people all the time when you travel alone. Anyway, we decided to go back to Sentral together and then go to China Town (or Petaling Street) and check it out. It was about lunch time anyway and there was supposed to be very good food available in China Town. I remember the food indeed was very good, I had some kind of chicken curry and a beer. We had a look around and then decided we should meet up again later in the evening and have some beer. Turns out Marcus and Duncan’s hostels were in the Bukit Bintang area, which kind of is a bit like Kuala Lumpurs equivalent to Khaosan Road in Bangkok.

Hours later we meet up, and even more people from the hostel where we meet joins in. We are a merry bunch now and heads out to town to grab something to eat. We end up in some small restaurant somewhere in Bukit Bintang. Nothing special, just a nice place to hang out. Later in the evening some of us decide to go to Petrona Towers to try to catch the light up building on photo. So here I am in a taxi with a guy from New Zealand, one girl from Hungary and another girl from Germany, 4 people that just met. I like how the backpacking culture brings people together. We arrived at Petrona Towers and I managed to get a decent shot of it. It’s at times like this that I wished I had a better camera and was a better photographer. Well, I have a better camera now than I had back then, but I think I’m still as bad as photographer! 😉

When done taking pictures this funny little guy approaches us and wants to sell us “real Rolex watches”. I doubt Rolex does this kind of street business so I declined the offer. When no one wanted watches he picked up iPhones and Android phones out of his pockets. A versatile man no doubt. When he understood we did not want to buy anything he walked away and brought his business to some other tourists who where there doing the same as us. Taking pictures of the towers. When done we started walking back and passed a shopping mall with a Marvel Comics store in it. It was quite nice to look at all the things in there but I didn’t buy anything.

Around midnight I felt I had had enough for one day so I decided to walk back to my hotel. It was not that far away and it was still warm outside. Walking back I started to think maybe I should move on, go to Borneo instead? Borneo was the main goal of my trip to Malaysia. Said and done, back at the hotel I booked my flight and booked a hotel that seemed nice, with it’s own golf course mind you. The next day I checked out and headed for Kuala Lumpur International Airport 2, the AirAsia terminal for my flight to Borneo.

2011 South East Asia #5 Thailand – Back and forth

Posted on October 17, 2016October 11, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

Yet another early morning for me, but I had to get to the airport to catch my flight to Phuket, Thailand. The flight went well and at Phuket Airport I got myself a taxi to take me to Ao Nang in Krabi province. Or to be honest, it was more like 10-15 minutes outside of Ao Nang in some kind of sleepy village. I can’t seem to recall the name of the village now, but the hotel was really nice. I was supposed to stay here for a few nights and just relax and wait for my friend Ove to come over. At the moment he was living in Koh Lanta but had got fed up with it and wanted to do something else. Also, Oves friend Michael was supposed to arrive in a few days too in Krabi so the place was ideal for some resting and doing nothing.

At the hotel I met a lot of nice people, two Swedish sisters who didn’t realize I was Swedish also until I asked why we were speaking English. I also met an older couple from Ireland who was there to celebrate their 50 year long marriage and a couple from London who had sold everything they own, quite their day jobs to travel the world. The whole bunch of us took some tuk tuk’s into Ao Nang one evening to have some dinner and try to see if we could find something at the night market. I didn’t buy anything, but it was nice to walk around for a while. Ao Nang is a place where a lot is going on all the time. A busy place. And then one day Ove finally arrived. I think it was 2 days before Michael was supposed to arrive. We traveled to Krabi Town together where we met up with one of Oves friends from Koh Lanta and had a night out. Krabi Town is a quite boring place but there are some nice places to party at. We ended up in the bar where the guy from Job 2 Do use to hang and when we were about to go, he actually came there.

Next day we went to pick Michael up at the airport and brought him back to the hotel. It was Michaels first time in Thailand and he was anxious to get out and do something fun. We ended up in a local bar with only thai people. There was some live band playing and quite loud generally. I remember some guys inviting us to their table and offering us drinks of Johnny Walker and coke, mostly Johnny Walker though. At closing time we discovered there was no taxis available, that discovery two girls next to us also made. Turned out they were staying at the same hotel as us. So we started walking back to our hotel. Turns out the girls was from Kota Kinabalu on Borneo, Malaysian side of Borneo. Borneo was part of my plans, I will go there later on during my trip so I exchanged number with one of the girls, Zera.

The next day it was time for us to leave, we had made plans to go to Koh Samui and then later Koh Phangan. To be honest, I don’t seem to remember how we got to Koh Samui but I’m pretty sure we took a bus to Surat Thani and then the ferry to Koh Samui. It was just a travelling day and so it got lost to me somehow. Anyway, we arrived to Chaweng Beach, Koh Samui in the afternoon and went to look for a place to stay. The year before me and Henrik had stayed at a nice little hotel right across the street from McDonalds but the only room available they wanted an insane amount of money for. So we found us another place to stay right over a bar. Not the most quiet place maybe. We only stayed at Koh Samui for one night before we proceeded to Koh Phangan.

We arrived right in between the full moon so no full moon party for us, but there was a black moon party that we attended. It was in no way as big or fun as the full moon parties are but there were still a lot of partying going on. We stayed at a place called Beer Bungalows (where me and Henrik had stayed the year before). We took a day in Haad Rin and at the Haad Rin beach before we decided that we should go back towards Krabi area again. We took the boat from Koh Phangan to Surat Thani and during the trip over the weather started to get nasty but we arrived safe and sound. Then we had a very boring trip to Ao Nang again. We had booked a hotel online that looked nice but when we arrived the hotel was a real disappointment. There were nasty stains on the sheets and mold in the bathroom. We only stayed the night in that place, first thing in the morning the day after we started a hunt for a better place to stay. Turned out all places were fully booked more or less so we ended up at a Blue Village hotel in the end. That same day we went to the shooting range and tried some guns just for fun. I was growing restless though and Ove and Michael wanted to go climbing on Railey Beach which I didn’t fancy so I decided it was time for me to leave.

2011 South East Asia #4 Singapore – A quick visit!

Posted on October 14, 2016October 11, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

I was a bit disappointed with Bali, I didn’t get the experience I wanted there. I think this was mostly because of the failure with the surfing. Maybe I should have tried harder, I don’t know. My next destination was Singapore. I took an early flight from Bali to Singapore and landed around lunch time. Getting out from the airport was quick, I getting a cab was also easy despite that I had read that getting a taxi in Singapore was one of the hardest things you could do. I asked the driver to take me to a internet cafe downtown so I could print my hotel reservation and the address to the hotel. I paid the driver and asked if he could wait for me and he said yes. But when I was done with my printing he was gone. So there I was, somewhere in Singapore and no one to drive me to my hotel. I begun a quest to get a new cab. Although I saw plenty of taxis driving by, none of them seemed interested in stopping and pick me up. Eventually I found one.

After checking in to my hotel I wanted something to eat. I found a small restaurant in a street corned and had some really nice food and a huge beer. After that I decided to go to the only place I really wanted to visit in Singapore. Raffles Hotel. While staying at Raffles Hotel was a bit out of my budget I could at least go there and have a Singapore Sling in the bar. I got myself a taxi after some trial and error, but something went wrong in the communication and the driver said: “Don’t understand! Good bye!” and drove off. I managed to get a new one but he dropped me like 2 blocks away from Raffles Hotel. No biggie, I just walked the last part and it was quite nice actually. When I arrived at the hotel I headed for the bar, but it was closed for the moment. But the outside bar was open. finally I got to order my Singapore Sling. The drink was nice but way to sweet for my taste. I tried some local beers as well. When I was satisfied I went back to the hotel, booked a flight to Phuket and a hotel. My mission in Singapore was done! I had had a Singapore Sling at Raffles Hotel.

2011 South East Asia #3 Bali – Sight seeing

Posted on October 11, 2016October 2, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

I over slept! I turned off the alarm on the phone! Then some other phone started to ring. The one in the hotel room. It was the lobby calling me to remind me that I had an excursion today. The driver was there too. I grabbed some clothes and more or less got dressed on my way down to the lobby. And there he was, the man I had struck a deal with the day before. Even though I was late he was smiling and very nice, I apologized and explained I had been drinking a bit the day before and he was okay with that. We we’re not that late and besides, he said, some of the places where better to see not to early in the morning anyway. Well, I don’t know, I have nothing to compare with. On the way I grabbed some food and off we went. The driver presented himself as Madée, or Madé, which was a quite common name on Bali obviously. The restaurant owner i Sanur was also named Madé. I might be wrong on the spelling here.

The first top was a place called Mandala Suci Wenara Wana, maybe more commonly known as Ubud Monkey forest. Madé got me some mini bananas that I could feed to the monkeys which were quite cheeky and rather stole bananas than waited for them to be handed over. The temple it self was pretty cool. Built in lava stone some 1500+ years ago most of it was covered by green moss it was a quite spectacular sight to see. I tried to get some good pictures at some kind of bridge but found a tourist woman trying to sneak into all of my pictures there. Hrmf!

After have spent some time at the temple grounds we continued our trip through Bali. We went to see the famous rice terraces, or some of the famous rice terraces at least. They look more spectacular on the pictures I’ve seen, the same pictures that made me to want to go there. In reality they were not so great. Well, they look cool but not that cool. And the locals around where quite annoying trying to sell souvenirs to me at all costs. We left that place quite quickly. On our way away from the rice terraces we got stuck in one of Balis infamous “police controls”. My driver however managed to convince the officers that there was no point in doing this today, not at least with just one person in the car. And soon enough a large bus came around a corner and the police became very busy and let us go.

We made a stop in some village where there was a silver smith making very small and delicate silver jewelry. This was obvious a place meant for me to do some shopping but I did not really find anything to buy. But I got a nice guided tour of the jewelry shop. Next stop was a coffee & tea plantation which sparked my interest. First a small guided tour of the tea/coffee and spice garden, then some sampling of the various products they had. I think I tried something like 4 different kinds of coffee of which included coffee with chocolate in it. Then some different kinds of tea as well. After that, they took me to a cage where they had a Luwak (or Asian palm civet). Some kind of animal that eats coffee beans and poops them out. Then people collect their poop and makes the worlds most expensive coffee from it, Kopi Luwak. Needless to say, I bought a small jar of Kopi Luwak to impress my family with!

Next stop was not planned. But we passed through a village where there was a funeral going on. It meant that all people in the village followed the deceased to the grave yard in a long procession. Madé told me about their traditions during our wait. When the road was clear we drove towards the huge volcano that lurked in the distance. I don’t remember how long it took to drive there, but when we finally arrived at the so called view point for the volcano I realized it was just one of these places where you have to pay for a good spot to take a picture. What I mean is, there was a lof of restaurants built along the ledge of the mountain we were at and all restaurants had a great view of the volcano from their terraces. Well, I had a coke and enjoyed the view for a while before I decided it was time to leave the place. Obviously it is possible to walk to the volcano and climb to the summit and look down in the crater but that would take a full day and I’ve already spent half day so far.

Madé wanted to show me the Uluwatu temple so we started to go south again. Finally we arrived at the site and before entering I had to get a sarong so I would not offend the people worshiping in the temple. Luckily there was “sarongs-for-rent” just outside. I think I spent about an hour just walking around looking at stuff before Madé told me it was time to go to the amphitheatre for a show. It was not what I was used to, I can honestly say that. It was kind of noisy and a lot of screaming and drumming. A small pamphlet explained the story. During the show it was getting darker and soon it was pitch black. After the show Madé drove me to a beach where there was a lot of restaurants. I have no clue on where this was, but it wasn’t so far away from the hotel I think. Anyway, I had a very nice BBQ’ed seafood dinner there. This day kind of concluded what I wanted from Bali so back at the hotel I booked both a flight and a hotel on the next destination.

2011 South East Asia #2 Bali – I’m not a surfer, obviously!

Posted on October 7, 2016October 2, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

After something like 12-13 hours in the air from Amsterdam a technical stop in Singapore was very welcome. Even though we were only let off the plane and into the adjacent building it was nice to stretch my legs for an hour or so. Then we were off for another 2-3 hours in the air before or so until we landed i Bali.

I landed in Denpasar around 9 pm, immigration took about 1 hour or so and then suddenly I was there, in Bali, the place I had dreamed off for some time. I got myself a taxi and hoped I would not be tricked on the price because I was newly arrived and also I was going for quite a bit. I was heading for a place called Sanur and the hotel Swastika Bungalows. Yeah, the name makes you feel skeptic but remember, the swastika has been widely used all over the world for more than just killing other people. Here, on Bali, it’s like a lucky charm, you can read more about swastiskas here! I arrived to the hotel some time around 11 pm or so and I didn’t get so much ripped off by the taxi driver as I had feared (I had checked before hand what it should cost me to get to Sanur from the airport and he only upped the price a bit).

Anyway, the day before my departure I sent them an e-mail telling them I would arrive late, probably around midnight or so, I got their reply when I was somewhere in the air so I had no chance to read it but they said they would wait for me. And there, at the entrance there was two people standing, waiting for me. One with a small tray with refreshments. And I swear to you, it was the best juice I’ve ever tasted! After checking in to the hotel they escorted me to my bungalow, lit some kind of “anti insect wire” that was slowly burning on my night stand. I have seen those before in Thailand and I know they are quite effective on keeping insects away from you when you sleep, if you can stand the smell. Lucky for me, I’m not the kind of person that insects like so much.

My bungalow then, it was a small palace I thought. The main room was spacious, then I opened the door to the bathroom and took a step out, into a small garden. The shower and bath tub was open air, but the toilet was inside a small “shack”. All surrounded by a wall the height of me plus some more for privacy. I went to bed almost directly. The following morning I found my way to the restaurant and have a delicious breakfast, then I explored the hotel area a bit. Found a nice swimming pool, went back to my bungalow and started to read a book on the porch. And suddenly it was evening and I had missed dinner. With several hours.

The guy in the reception told me there was some restaurants on the street that was still open so I went out for a walk. Found a place, simple, but very nice food. Got stuck talking with the owner for a good hour or two and then went back to the hotel to sleep. Second day I went down to the beach, but it was low tide so no swimming in the sea for me. Had a walk for an hour or so and then went back to the hotel. I finished my book and this time I had dinner at the hotel. I decided it was time to leave this place, even though it was nice and beautiful, I wanted to do something more. I had heard Bali was the place to go if you wanted to learn how to surf and Kuta Beach was the perfect place for that.

Once again I found myself inside a taxi and on my way to a new place. I had found a hotel in a place called Legian Beach I think. The hotel I had chosen was in no way as pleasant as Swastika Hotels and to be honest, it was a quite bad hotel. I don’t even remember the name of it. I just remember that the pool looked like it was full of Mountain Dew. But I didn’t go there to spend all my time at the hotel, I went there to learn how to surf so off to the beach I went. Worst mistake ever! As soon as I stepped onto the beach I was approach by probably 10-20 guys offering me surf lessons. Okay, I wanted to learn how to surf but I did not want to get almost molested doing it. So I did the only rational thing to do. I fled!

I walked in a fast pace along the beach constantly drawing the attention of more and more surfing teachers for every step. Finally I had enough, I found a opening in the wall diverting the beach from the city and quickly sneaked away. I’m very good at sneaking, so good that I managed to enter a cafe or restaurant so silently that no one noticed me there until I subtly cleared my throat to call for attention of the nearby waiter. I ordered some nice seafood and had a beer. Bintang. I started to talk to a french girl who came in soon after me. She was also there to learn to surf and had had her first 2 lessons already. I told her about my incident earlier and said that I maybe did not want to learn to surf after all. She lost interest as soon as I said that. Oh well, at least I had someone to talk to during my lunch.

I made a new try at the beach but the surfing teachers was to aggressive in their ways that I got turned off. I can see that it’s their way to support them self and maybe their families but doing it like that must also make them loose customers. I walked towards the town again and ended up at the memorial place for the Bali bombing in 2002. Then I found some bar in the nearby area and started talking to 3 guys from New Zealand I think it was. They asked me if I surfed, I said nay and then they lost interest in me. I guess surfing is the big thing here in Kuta Beach and if you don’t surf you’re not interesting. I guess I could have tried harder but my time on Bali was to precious to spend it on something I now felt maybe not was my thing. I started to walk in the general direction where my hotel was and came upon this small travel agency and thought I should try to see something more of Bali than Sanur and Kuta Beach. I came upon an agreement with the owner that he would take me around Bali during the next day and show me the best parts of Bali for something like 400.000 Indonesian Rupiah (should be something like €27). Now, this is a part where my memory get’s a bit cloudy so it might have been the double.

I went back to my hotel, had something to eat and then went down to a nearby bar for a beer or two. I think I ended up having like 20 beers, or at least it felt like that. I met some guys from Russia who had taken like 3 magic mushroom shots and now the stuff was kicking in. We had some odd discussions about life and other things. Then I guess it was time for me to sleep so I went back to the hotel and got ready for the night. Realized I could not find my phone. The horror I felt! So I went back to the bar and and asked them if they’ve seen my phone, they had not. I went back to my hotel and felt a bit sad because I thought I’ve lost my phone.

At 8 am the alarm clock in my phone went off. I had put it on my night stand. Phew!

2011 South East Asia #1 The Prelude

Posted on October 3, 2016October 2, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in 2011 South East Asia

Since my wife Sofia is pregnant, 5th month or so, I think travelling is out of the question for now and some time forward. Until then, I guess I’ll have to resort to remembering things I’ve done in the past. And this is one such trip. I had 5 or 6 weeks off in the early 2011 and I choose to spend them in South Eastern Asia. On my own. Below is my travel plan.

I flew out from Gothenburg a cold day (it has to be a cold day, right), had a stop in Amsterdam and then I was on my way. A 16 hour flight to Bali with a technical stop in Singapore. I choose KLM since I’ve flown with them before and liked their service plus they offered fair prices for my “open jaw ticket” to Bali and home from Hong Kong.

I planned this trip as little as possible, the only thing I had in mind was things I wanted to see and do before my time was up. I booked all my flights and hotels, except for the first flight to Bali and the flight home from Hong Kong the day before I was going to fly. Well, I had also booked the 2 first nights in Bali at a hotel, because I did not feel like trying to find some place to stay the same day I arrived.

Disclaimer! Prices in this serie is based on my memory and with the current state of the world economics; I would take them with a pinch of salt. 😉

Roadtrip Sweden: Matfest i Västra Götaland

Posted on September 26, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Roadtrip Sweden:

Yesterday it was the Matfest i Västra Götaland event, an event that started 3 years ago. We were lucky with the weather, we have actually been lucky with the weather for the whole month so far. Today is the first day when they weather actually start to resemble the fall. Yesterday it was sunny, 20° and just a slight breeze on occasion. I met up with my best friend Marcus and his wife Anna in Kungälv and then we headed off to Tjörn and Orust. Before we went I got this photo below of Bohus Fästning.

Since Tjörn is closest this was the first stop for today. We arrived to Mällby Lantgård where we did a small quiz walk before we did some shopping in their self-service shop. My haul was some lemonade. Next stop was a farm called Johanssons Gård. Here we bought some marmalade and some organic potatoes. We also got a small tour in the garden which was nice. On our way to the south of Tjörn we passed a sour dough bakery (Alvar and Ivars Surdegsbageri) that this day decided to initiate their cider factory as well. Turned out to be a really nice place with a great view of the ocean. Next up, in the south of Tjörn we went to a sour dough bakery named Lottas Bak & Form. After that we drove to Skärhamn for a late lunch.

After lunch we headed north to Orust instead. Here we had planned to visit just a farm and a beekeper. Our first stop was Håvs Lamm & Delikatess. They had a really nice little shop, a very nice view and some very nice cheeses and a lot of different lamb products to choose from. On our way from the farm we saw another sign, Orust Must. We went there as well, and since we didn’t buy any cider on the last place we decided to buy some here. I got me a nice 3 litre bag-in-box. Then we were on our way to the beekeeper, Tavlegårds Honungsgård, where we would buy some more stuff. This would also be our last stop since the event would close at 16:00. Since the weather was so nice we decided to find some place to have icecream but luck was not on our side today. All the places were closed so we decided to turn back home again.

Some facts:

Matfest i Västra Götaland ran it’s third year this year. It spans over Västra Götalands län and promotes locally promoted food with over 200 locations to visit.

Below is my haul for the day. Cheese, honey, lemonade, cider in a bag in box, some candy, marmalade and smoked lamb. All pictures from today can be found here!

Diary of a quite bad geocacher

Posted on September 4, 2016October 2, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Geocaching

Dear diary, here are the results of my lazy attempts of geocaching the past weeks.

2016-07-27

– GC6HRAR – A place to meet

This one required some mean skills in Google maps to solve, despite beeing on the actual place to do some reconisance which I thought should be enough. Turned out it was not. However, after solving this one I saw that it was hidden at my old school but the timing to log it was not right due to the school beeing inhibited by hundreds of Gothia Cup kids. A week later the place was empty so me and Sofia could easily walk up and quite quickly find the cache and sign it.

2016-08-04

-The Lord of the Rings-The beginning (MMT#24)

This was the first ever WhereIGo I ever tried. This was over a year ago. I didn’t fully understand what to do or how to do it at that time. But, feeling encouraged by the previous success with a WhereIGo I felt I should try a new one. So I kind of took off where I stopped last time and tried to continue but came to a halt. I think that was due to a technical issue with the app. So I restarted. There was a lot of walking back and forth but finally I was on the right track. So I picked up Sofias and we took a nice evening walk for the final stages. Finally at the last spot Sofia found the cache in less than a minute. Well done darling!

2016-08-12

-10 lätta pussel

-Seriefigurer#2

-Postkontoret

Having spent some days in Karlsborg area I grew restless and wanted to go out and find some geocaches. During the spring/early summer I’ve spent some time solving mystery caches in the area, mostly puzzels and got coordinates for a lot I thought there was some easy pickings. Me, Sofia and her brother got into the car and drove along road 49 doing some quick stops for mystery logging. Then we also found a quite nice letter box. I think I got a tick there as well.

And as of now, there hasn’t been any progress. I’m starting to think maybe I should abandon this quest for 100 non traditionals in a row, else I probably will continue in this slow pace. It doesn’t help much with having some solutions done when I never get around to log them. Specially not considering that several of them are not even in my home area but some 2-3 hours drive away.

Happy Birthday to me!

Posted on September 2, 2016September 2, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Random posts

I turned 35 today. At the age of 35 I have had the pleasure to visit 41 countries in the world spread over 3 continents. I have dived in 2 of the Great Oceans, Lake Malawi and the Celebes Sea (east of Borneo). I’ve seen “the Big 5”, mountain gorillas and been to places like Cherobyl and Auschwitz as a contrast. I’ve seen plenty of wonders of nature and met people from all over the world during my travels.

Somewhere along the road I met my wonderfull wife Sofia and now we’re having a baby in January hopefully. I hope the next 35 years will be as wonderfull and that I will have the chance to at least visist another 41 countries during that time!

2 days of rain in Vienna 2014 Central Europe

A walk in the park(s) 2013 Ukraine

Or take a look at the newly revised About page!

My First WhereIGo cache

Posted on July 20, 2016July 20, 2016 JohnLeave a commentPosted in Geocaching

Today we had a clear sky and sunny weather finally. Today it felt like summer so we took the car for a ride to the other side of town to buy some food for the cat and then we stopped for a take away coffee. While walking around we also took the liberty to do some geocaching. A small multi at Kaggeledstorget called Våren. It was quickly done, it was only a 2 step multi and didn’t require much work. Although both the GPS and my phone acted a bit funny regarding the direction and coordinates.

Back home again we deiced to make a second try on the WhereIGo cache we had tried the day before but failed. First we searched in the area where we thought the chace was hidden but gave up after some 15 minutes realizing that we better do the WhereIGo game again. Since Sofia is pregnat she got to sit down on a bench while I was running up and down the “Castle Hill” playing the game. And of course, I had made a small error. A small error that put is a good 100 meters in the wrong direction. But after correcting the coordinates it was quite easy to find it.

– Våren

– CASTLEHILL Revival MMT#20