White water rafting on the Vindel River

The people bold enough to participate in today's white water rafting gathered at the University 8:45. We split up among the cars and drove then inland. About 90 minutes later we arrived in Ekorrsele, where the rafting company "Forsknäckarna" (The River Crackers) has its head quarter.

We started with some boiled coffee prepared over a wood fire. This kind of coffee might some times be like a full meal due to its thickness, this time it was quite okay. Other groups arrived and when we were all gathered (a total of 21 people plus guides), we changed our clothes to wetsuits, including a (ice hockey) helmet and of course a life jacket.

About 5 km upstream we boarded the inflatable boats, after some safety instructions. First it was quite calm, but after a while we entered the first rapids (class 4). We had to paddle like crazy in order to have the boat following the right line between (and of course sometimes through) the waves. Quite exciting!
When the water calmed down again, we landed on the shore to do some rapid swimming instead. We walked upstream about 300 meters before the stream pulled us down to the boats again. You really have no choice were to go when you are in the middle of the rapid, without a helmet and life jacket it could become quite nasty.
Before we came back to the company, we passed another area of rapids, but this time you had time to relax a little bit between them.

We had some more coffee and snacks when we were back in "civilian" clothes again. The guides told us that another tour, somewhat harder according to the whitewater rafting rating scale, takes place even more upstream at the rapids called Mårdseleforsen. Since we were only about 30 km from that place, we decided to go there before we went back to Umeå. Most of the road was gravel, but not so dusty. When we arrived at the rapids, we first had something to eat before we took the walking tour around the area.

During our walk we found these quite flowers, to Maria's joy. Moreover twinflower ("Linnéa") is the flower of the county Småland, but also she has another relationship to the name.


Back in Umeå we concluded the day with Ice Age 3 in 3D. It's the first time for to see a movie in 3D, more dramatic than normal.

(We thank Maria's friend Pernilla for contributing with photos, we forgot our camera).