In the final weeks of December 2007, fleeing an impending divorce, I thought it would be a good idea to take the train in Stockholm to Jämtland. Finally, after a long train journey, and a lift from a Swede in a Volvo, I ended up in a mountain hut in the Vålådalen Nature Reserve. There I bought all the pure alcohol I could find - for cooking! - and then walked into the woods. After half a day of walking I set up my tent.

The nights were long and deadly dull. The sun set at three in the afternoon, only to rise again around nine in the morning. Eighteen hours a night I lay in my sleeping bag with Melville's Moby Dick as the only distraction. However, the short days were spectacularly beautiful. Didn't meet anyone in all those days. I saw one elk and a few birds. With temperatures of minus 15 degrees Celsius it was a relatively mild winter. Merry Christmas mr. Haas!