Our first morning in Älvsbyn began from a flight to Piteå for refuelling. Thomas was waiting for us, and everything was quickly done. Flemming with Thomas at the fuel station:
It was our last visit to the Piteå flying club (this summer). We thanked Thomas once again for their hospitality – we had stayed in the club house for several days, waiting for the suitable weather for Kiruna. And now we were slowly going back home, with stops in different new locations.
We waived goodbye to the Piteå flying club:
“At home”, in Älvsby flygkubb, we were alone. The weather was nice, we didn’t have any other plans than staying there and appreciating a relaxing day.
But then Peter came by, and he kindly offered us a trip to the biggest rapids in Sweden – Storforsen. We couldn’t resist! On our way, Peter made a stop by another rapids of Pite river – Fällforsen:
It was truly dramatic – we in Denmark are not used to that kind of nature. The fall height of Fällforsen is around 10 metres, and is very steep. A salmon staircase is created to help the fish move upstream.
Just to give you an idea of how big the Pite river is:
It is 400 km long, and is one of the four major rivers in the Swedish Lapland. The red arrow on the photo above points at the Älvsbyn where we stayed; green – at the Fällforsen; yellow – Storforsen rapids.
We arrived to Storforsen where Peter parked the car near a newly built hotel with around 100 rooms where half of the rooms have a magnificent view to the rapids. The place is very popular, and approx. 150,000 tourists visit it every year. The bridge you see on the photo below took us on a tour to Storforsen. This bridge (or parts of it) are destroyed every spring by breaking ice on the river. And every time the bridge is restored, of course, when the ice is gone.
Storforsen was wild:
The rapids stretch over a distance of 5 km in which it drops 82 meters; 60 metres of them are a single waterfall.
At its highest, about 1,000,000 litres of water per second (!) flows down Storforsen. The rocks surrounding Storforsen are fenced (in order to prevent accidents), and wooden ramps are built to get access to the public along the waterfall.
There were hiking trails, and lots of information about the place.
In some smaller waterfalls with lagoons, people were jumping to the water from the cliffs.
When Flemming said he was considering a jump, I thought it was joke – I would have never done it myself! But he fearlessly did it from around 10 metres!
I was a bit nervous, but everything went fine:
It was a nice place. There was a big cafe, a museum, and a shop (the latter one was closed due to COVID-19). In the forest – benches, bonfire places with wood ready, where many people were preparing their campfire food:
We also saw a number of potholes, some of them of such a big size – an adult could easily came in. This one was just a small one, with a diameter of approx. 30 cm:
After several hours by the Storforsen, we had our “fika” with Peter on the hotel’s terrace:
“Fika” is a Swedish concept, where you take the time to have a coffee break, normally in a good company – as we did. But do you know where this word comes from? Peter explained. In the old days, members of the FIK (an abbreviation for one or another Swedish military organisation) used to have a coffee break. They drank coffee from tin mugs, and when finished, turned the mugs upside down. On that upside down part there was a stamp “FIK”; hence they began call that coffee break “fika”. Today, it is an important part of the Swedish culture.
Peter drove us back to the airfield in Älvsbyn. Flemming and I did a small 50 hours service on our aircraft:
Later I did the laundry:
And Flemming prepared our favourite dish: local fish and veggies that we enjoyed on the club’s terrace:
