It was probably my most difficult decision during all my flying trips, whether to fly or not from Kiruna Sunday afternoon. The ceiling was low, it was marginal VFR. It was going to get worse, and we knew the rain was approaching. In the upcoming 10 days there wasn’t going to be even one day without rain all day long. We arrived to the airport earlier, before opening time, and were sitting in our car in the parking lot, anxiously watching the skies.
Flemming was monitoring the front development; I was thinking. Was it safe to take Flemming on this flight? I was aware of, we wouldn’t be able to land anywhere before Gällivare – but would we be able to reach Gällivare? We might not be able to turn back to Kiruna. And what about after Gällivare? All those doubts… We still had 3 weeks vacation left, and could stay in Kiruna longer. And the weather forecast was changing every hour anyway… Our destination was Älvsbyn, a small airport north of Piteå. Just in case, we had a PPR for landing in Vuollerim, a small airstrip close to Jokkmokk, where we could stay over.
When the airport opened, we got in. Our aircraft was ready, and we took off.
The ceiling was low, but the visibility was good. The weather was unstable, and we decided not to take any risks, not land in Vuollerim, but fly directly to Älvsbyn.
Meanwhile, the cloud mass became lighter. We flew over the wilderness of Lapland:
It was very beautiful, beside the fact that there were no roads (no potential place to land), only forests, lakes, rocks, and sump:
We were glad reaching Älvsbyn. Landing on runway 04:
At Älvsbyn, they had their last flying day before closing down for summer vacation.
Peter Christensen, Danish pilot and flight instructor, who lives nearby Älvsbyn, was waiting for us:
He warmly welcomed us to Älvsbyn, and asked whether we wanted to fly gliders. Flemming was so happy about this kind offer, and went for a flight immediately:
Club’s towing aircraft got ready:
And off they went:
Whilst Flemming and Peter were out flying, I moved our bags to the hut where we were going to stay. All of the huts were named after the well-known glider types. Ours was called “SF 25” – the type Flemming learned gliding in for 20 years ago or so. Our aircraft was parked beside the hut – it was pure luxury!
I also reached a tour of the airfield, hangars, and apron:
And soon Peter and Flemming landed:
Now it was my turn! The DG 500 was exceptionally easy to fly in:
After about half an hour we also landed. All aircraft went to hangars:
The rest of the evening we just relaxed.
Our original plan was to continue to the next destination in the morning, but we liked Älvsbyn so much, that we decided to stay there one more night, and enjoy the silence and nature of that nice place.
