The Orange Band - Answering the call of nature

I've talked about food and drink already, but there's another vital question to solve for long days on the trail.  What happens when you get a call of nature?  Which leads also to, practically speaking - how much toilet paper do you need to pack?  

There are a number of the stages on the trail that have facilities at the stage end - campsite, restaurants and similar.  That's your best bet for a date with a nice modern water closet. Don't miss the chance!  After that your choices get more primitive.  Each stage of the trail has a wind shelter somewhere in the middle and each of those has a 'dass' nearby -  a dry closet or composting toilet.  These are fully functional, and in Sweden quite common for older more remote holiday cottages, but aren't quite that pristine polished ceramic experience we've become used to.  

The good news is though that they are by and large well maintained. There are a number of local organisations that see that they are stocked with paper, emptied and generally kept in order. There is some variation though - some have lime or mulch to put in after you've been to help with smells and composting, some have niceties like a brush to sweep out the floor, some are well stocked with paper, and unfortunately some are not. People use it so it's not surprising that paper runs out sometimes.  Along the whole trail there were four spots with no paper - so around one in four.  That's what you need to plan for...   How much paper does that translate to for you? Let's do a  quick calculation.  

If the average European uses 10.3kg  paper a year (according to the interweb) that works out to about 200g per week. If you use the facilities provided and only need your supplies a quarter of the time - that's 50g a week or say, 7.5g per day.  Only you know if you are an average user though...  If it helps I think I had less than this and it worked out OK - but not with much surplus. 

But the bears though?  It can happen you get caught short with only the woods to turn to. When a man's gotta go a man's gotta go right?  I'm not going to write a treatise on the right way to poop in the woods - there are others available online already like this one in Swedish from the Bergslagsleden YouTube channel.   But, you are going to need something to dig a hole with, and you need to dispose of the paper properly afterwards.  You can bury it - but animals are good at digging it up. If there's no fire restrictions you can burn it, otherwise good 'leave no trace' practice is to double bag it and carry it until you can dispose of it properly. That is, unless you are going paper-less as discussed here by Andrew Skurka.  

Lastly on this topic, you did remember to pack some hand gel right?  Even bears clean their paws afterwards. 

The Orange Band - Food and Drink

 So how does it work with food supplies and water on Berglagsleden?

Food!  The trail is routed to avoid towns and keep you in the countryside.  This is great for that 'in the wild' feeling but is not so convenient for re-supply.  There are no supermarkets or grocery stores on the trail.  For the day or weekend hiker this is not a big problem but to through hike the trail you need to be able to re-supply somewhere (or hike longer each day to finish the trail quicker). 

So what are the options and how did it turn out?  The first choice for many is to send a food parcel for collection along the way (at e.g. Ånnaboda) - or meet up with someone you know to hand over your new provisions. I wasn't so organised and didn't have anyone to lean on so I took the other option.  Buy as I go. 

There are a number of places where there are supermarkets near the trail. Near here means between 1.2 and 3.5km off route- so between a 2.4 and 7km round trip to stock up. The three most interesting for me were in Kopparberg ('Lådan' 1.2km) , Nora (ICA ~2km)  and Laxå (Laxå Food Supermarket ~3.5km).  Other alternatives could be Vedlunds in Närkes Kil, ICA Trivselköp and ICA Nära in Mulhytte - but there are no that close to the trail. 

There are some spots along the way with a 'kiosk' - a small shop.  The ones I recall are in Uskavi and Ånnaboda. These had a very limited supply of staples like muesli, pasta and soup. Uskavi also had a some frozen foods, but not really targeting the hiker. Both were spots to stock up on snacks though. 

My plan A was to pack food for six days and then resupply on day seven in Nora, and then again in Laxå. When we re-planned in the first week it meant an extra day to reach Nora so we detoured into Kopparberg on stage 2 to buy food for an extra couple of days.  The shop there - Lådan - is on Google as a pound shop but in fact had a good selection of groceries. 

Nora has a normal supermarket a couple of km from the trail.  Plenty of choice, but the walk is in part by a busy road.  During the first part of the hike I ended up carrying around 2/3 of our food (for an equitable weight split) - so 5 days of dinner and breakfast for two, plus lunches and snacks for two for 3 days.  With that experience in mind I decided to skip the stop in Laxå and buy for the rest of the trip in Nora (eleven days) - everything except for snacks. In planning I'd never even considered carrying eleven days of food.... but it worked OK.  I was probably a bit under provisioned to be honest, but there was enough to not go hungry. 

It's an interesting experience shopping at a normal supermarket for trail food. You don't want to buy a kilo of this and a kilo of that and portion sized packages are hard to come by. I ended up with a lot of noodles and instant mash, with thing to throw in to make them more interesting - plus muesli, bread, cheese, salami, biscuits and other things for lunch and breakfast. And of course, plenty of nuts and chocolate. 

Food on the trail was happily complemented by being able to buy a proper lunch at a handful of places along the way.  Well, three in practice - in Pershyttan near Nora at the Tågkafé, in Mogetorp at the wärdshus, and in Ramundeboda at Café Sockerstugan.  All three made a great break from the hike.  

But...  there were other places that didn't deliver.  Both the resort at Gillersklack and the cafe at Stjärnfors have closed down.  On my overnight stop at Ånnaboda the bistro was fully booked - so no served meal there, and at STF Tivedstorp the whole place was closed for 3 days for a wedding. As a Swedish Tourist Association (Svenska Turistförening) member that latter one was particularly disappointing. 

Finally an honourable mention to the restaurant at Stenkällegården.  In the shoulder season they are not open every day, but they were open when I arrived at the end of the trail for a delicious 3 course waffle buffet. Stenkällegården also has a good small shop .. and beer ;)

So that was food - how about water?  If you check the details for the trail there is a water source identified on each of the legs, normally at the stage ends. Often this is tap water but there are some places where it's a spring.  At the wind shelter they also flag for many that the lake water is drinkable after boiling - the same can be true of the spring water as well.  In general the info was good and water was readily available - but we never found the water source at Stjärnfors (stage2/3) -probably because the cafe there has closed down. There was water at Gillersklack even though the tourist resort was shut - and the tap at Sixtorp recommended boiling, even though it was from a tap.

Mostly if the carry was not too long I/we would stock up on tap water and carry it for camp.  We did use lake or stream water several times though - finding running water wherever possible.  I was stingy on using fuel so I took a different approach than boiling to making it potable - filtering water and adding micropur water purification tablets. Filtering takes out solids in suspension and small organisms, but doesn't remove e.g. all the iron colouration in the water and on its own doesn't take out viruses (but should filter bactieria). More on the pros and cons of different methods here.

The Orange Band - Getting there and getting back

If you want to hike a long distance it's pretty basic that you need to be able to get to the start, and you need to be able to make it home from the finish. Even if you have a car it's not so straightforward to drive somewhere and then, two weeks later find yourself hundreds of kilometers from your vehicle. 

Bergslagsleden starts and finishes in Kloten and Stenkällegården.  What they have in common is that they're both out in the sticks and are not so easy to get to by public transport.  If you have someone that can drop you off and pick you up, great - but what works otherwise? 

Kloten in practice was not so hard.  The trail starts at an activity centre/canoe hire place.  They have hostel and cottage accommodation and a camp site near by. More importantly they provide a collection and drop off service from nearby railway stations (and it also says they can arrange travel from Stockholm!).  You can book directly on their website which worked smoothly.  We went by train from Stockholm to Kopparberg and when we got there there was a minibus waiting for us with a cheery welcome from one of the canoe center staff. We stayed overnight self catering in a room in one of the cottages - a nice relaxing way to kick off the trip.  There's no real food shopping on site (just snacks) but if you get a transfer there is an option to stop on the way at a supermarket. They do offer breakfast though so we didn't need that with us. All in all, well set up, nice accommodation and friendly staff.

Stenkällegården was a bit more of a challenge. Checking in advance there was no obvious public transport but how hard can it be to get a taxi to the nearest station? When I got near the end of the trail I rang ahead and booked a room (it classed as a stuga or cottage, but was a one room flat with bunk beds, a kitchenette and it's own entrance.  I could have pushed to be there sooner, but that was for a Sunday night as I thought travel back to Stockholm would be easier on a weekday. 

When I got there I could confirm there was no public transport - but also found that the local taxi firm only did work for the health services (according to the campsite).  And no service from Uber either..... Oh. Sugar.

Then I found there was actually a summer bus from Karlsborg to Tiveden National Park that stopped there once a day. But now at the tail of season it was only running weekends - and the Sunday I was there was the  last  bus  of  the  year.... and I'd missed it :(.  This bus is potentially useful if you are there over June, July and early August but bear in mind that the booking details say you can only take luggage you can have with you in your seat. Not so very helpful if you're hiking long distance.

So Stenkällegården...  no bus, no taxi, no Uber.  What's left are two options. Hike out to somewhere else (for me around 16km to get to a station), or ask kindly for a lift.  I opted to stay another night to be able to take up the second option. It was a bit more ad-hoc than at Kloten but there's someone there that can ferry you to nearby station if you cover the cost.  Ring ahead and ask is my advice - they were really helpful in trying to solve my logistics problem.

In the meantime, the shop at Stenkällegården does have a rather nice bottled beer....  And the sun was shining too... It's a hard life. 

The Orange Band

So here we go -  or rather here we went.  I'm back at home after 18 days on the trail after hiking the whole length of Berglagsleden. This is what they call the 'Orange Band', notionally because the trail is marked along the way with orange markings on trees, posts and stones by the trail. 

This is the first of several posts where I'll talk about the experience on the trail, and share some details on planning and the resources along the way. 

But first - why Berglagsleden?  Berglagsleden is a trail running 280 kilometers through central Sweden from Kloten in the north to Stenkällegården in the south in seventeen marked stages (both of those are really small places so you won't have heard of them).  It runs almost exclusively through natural terrain - rarely on roads, sometimes on forest gravel tracks but mostly in trails through the woods - and had a range of cultural sights with remains from the ice age, iron age and its industrial history as an iron working area.  Although it meanders around a number of small towns on the way you spend your time immersed in the landscape. For me it offered a get away from it all break that was fairly accessible from Stockholm - and with options to bail if needed.  (My foot's been playing up over a long period and I didn't know how it would handle multi-day hiking).  

I talked about my outline plan in an earlier post - but let's look at the reality. 

For the first week I hiked in company, and then hiked on my own for the rest of the trip.  Daily distances are modest. I'm happy with shorter stages (on average, 15-16km), and as I said above I was a bit wary of over-stressing my foot. Even so we adjusted our plan in the first week to shorten our days which resulted in a re-plan on food and re-supply. Originally I planned for us in that first week to reach a bus-stop called 'Berglagsleden' outside of Nora (on stage 6).  Instead we got as far as Uskavi (end of stage 4) and could get a taxi to Lindesberg for bus/train to Stockholm. 

Each stage has a similar set up - a stage start and end point which may have a hostel or other accommodation, and normally access to fresh water.  In the middle (-ish) of each stage there's a wind shelter with a fire place, wood, and a dry toilet, and often usable water. The base plan then was to hike between these wind shelter and use them for sleeping. In case they were full we had a tarp, and for use in hostels, silk bag liners.

In practice this turned out as four nights under canvas, including one on a campsite at Ånnaboda, three nights in hostels - Kloten (at the start), Nyberget and Uskavi - and the remainder in wind shelters.  We were travelling at a quiet time of year but there were several times we shared the evening camp with others - so when I/we had the wind shelter and someone else camped nearby.  

When to go?  I was on the trail from mid August to the end of the month.  Apart from fitting in with my work I like this time of year for hiking. It's not too warm but still not yet too chilly, and the mosquitos  have mostly gone which makes it nicer sitting out by the lake in the evening.  The downside is that this falls off the end of the Swedish vacation period.  Many facilities shut from mid August so for instance in Uskavi the hostel was open but the restaurant was not. As I discovered to my cost, transportation can also be more difficult our of season. 

It also means there are few Swedish hikers on the trail.  Most of the people I met and talked to were tourists from other parts of Europe - Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Switzerland.  Most days I met very few people on the trail, but it's noticeably busier at the weekends.  If you plan to stay at hostels over the weekend it is worth booking ahead. 

The spring has flowers and birdlife, May and June has the delight of very long days, but late summer has it's attractions too.  The woods have a comfy feel and are full of blueberries and lingon in fruit, and more rarely, wild raspberries and blackberries.   There's also a plethora of mushrooms and fungus that can supplement your rations if you know your stuff.  Plus, it gets dark at night so you can get some sleep ;). 

So now we are started.... on the next post: Food and drink

Prepping for the trail

There's still a few weeks to go before I set out on Bergslagsleden. That means a few more weeks to plan and pore over maps and equipment.

Route planning seems under control. The route is what the route is, but I have a basic plan to hike between wind shelters with a modest 15 to 23km per day. Food supply seems the trickiest part unless you ship food ahead. Currently I plan for two detours to resupply, in Nora and Laxå. The first is about 2km off route, the latter is around 3.5km off route so that will add a good bit onto that day's mileage. Kopparberg is in easy reach too but that's going to be on day 2 so hopefully we won't need resupply by then(!). With my leisurely pace that will mean carrying up to six days of food so I'm also fiddling with a spreadsheet to get good balanced nutrition for under 600g per day.

On the equipment front I'm mostly settled. We are two for the first week and will use wind shelters or use a tarp. For the rest.. well I saw a Gatewood cape in the sales. :) It will be that and some polycro. I've tested setting it up a couple of times and it looks like a nice little shelter.  The weight penalty the first week is small as its my rain gear too and I save half a kilo by not having the tarp the rest of the time.

Cookware is the other shared part of the gear list. With two of us I'll be taking a stove and, reluctantly, a bigger pan - a 1.5l non stick Trangia pot. And two can't eat from the same pot so either kåsa or 'bowls' for meals. Bowls would be food trays from the local take away ;). I'll keep the set up for the solo parts and live with the luxury of oversized cookware. For fuel I'm budgeting 10g per person per day. I have limited experience with my little Vargo Triad, but ten grammes should boil a half litre of water.

Next on my list to look at... What do I need for first aid? Every little helps. 

The caped hiker

Some time ago I came across a Pinterest post on a WW1 mk7 cape/groundsheet. Basically its a groundsheet you can wrap round you and wear as a cape.  The design is fairly simple, with a large rectangular groundsheet with a triangle add to one half that drapes over one shoulder as a cape, and a large high collar inset into one edge. 

Interesting I thought. I have poncho tarps in different  models, but as rainwear they are known to be flappy and as tarps they are at the limit of usable size.  This can give a different combo... but  there are one or two things I'd like that the original doesnt manage.  Lighter for one, but also able to use with a quilt or blanket under, and with spray protection on the foot end for use in a small tarp.

So, after quite a few sketches I ended up with what you see above. The black fabric is tent floor material, waterproof and perfect as a ground sheet. It includes a fold flat footbox in a breathable Pertex ..and some reflex details in case Im on a roadside in the dark. 

The black material seems to be a heavier weight than what I ordered (which was a roll end) but I only found out once I'd made it. Target weight was around 200g... about the same as my rain jacket or my bug bivvy.  It ended up at 260g. Irritating but the resulting product feels fairly bombproof. 

For shelter use it doesn't provide bug protection so in Sweden it's best for use outside of June and July. For rain wear use, there's no hood.... I'm still considering options there.  I have a long neck so hoods often sit uncomfortably on my pate. A brimmed hat is likely to be the answer but a ripstop hood would be easy to sew as an add on. 

 

Orange is the new green...

 

2021 and the Covid pandemic is still with us. My big plan for hiking the GR10 is still on ice so this year is going to be a plan B. Something stretching here in Sweden... hiking Orangebandet - doing the full 280km length of Bergslagsleden. 

Compared to the GR10 it's not that hilly but it is fairly wild with relatively few facilities and towns on the route.  Food in particular looks to be a challenge with few opportunities to restock en route and even those that are there are two or more kilometers off route. 

Water is probaly easier, with one or more sources on each stage plus the possibility to use lake water. 

There are wind shelters on each leg and hostels and similar at several of the leg ends, so in principle you can hike without carrying a shelter. But for flexibility I plan to take a tarp, not least as a way to practice different set ups with the GR10 in mind.

I hope to have company for the first week but the latter part will be solo and travelling light. 

Skokloster by pushbike

As years go 2020 was one of those where bold plans got overtaken by life. A combination of Covid and a persistent foot problem put paid to plans for a summer long hike. But hej. Plans change... 

So I dusted off my bike, bought a saddle bag and tried something new. Cycle touring. Or is it called bike packing these days?  A three day weekend trip visiting Skokloster - one of the nearly local stately homes that litter the landscape in Mälardalen, the hinterland behind Stockholm. 

The first day was a brilliant sunny day and around 40km along forest trails and quietish country roads, doing my best not to wander into a big firing range and get shot at. I'd picked out a quiet spot in a nature reserve at Sandviksåsen to camp over. It's a glacial ridge on the shore of Lake Mälaren. It was, as hoped, really quiet and undisturbed, but the path through the woods was basically full of chunky round stones and not to be recommended with a bike loaded with packing.  The reward though was a lovely still glade looking out onto the lake and an evening to my self with just the odd angler drifting by. 

The second day was a day of two halves, meandering up through the countryside to reach Skokloster for a bit of touristing and lunch and then starting the homeward leg back via Sigtuna. 

Skokloster is nice, and I was there early with time to idle, take a coffee and ogle the big old American cars rolling in for an owners rally. But... 

Once there I got the tools out to try and adjust a squeaky brake and discovered two bolts missing from the luggage rack! And the other two loose....

Not good.  50kms from home and the somewhat loaded luggage rack was falling off. 

After some head scratching and some good fortune I took the mounting bolts out from the unused bottle holder spot and Yes! The right size! Trip saved. 

Lunch in the sun, and then I retraced my steps until I hit the road for Sigtuna. After idling my way along the waterfront at Sigtuna and indulging in ice cream I made it to my next overnight spot, near a picnic spot on the edge of some woods. I made some dinner and left pitching the tarp until near sundown when passing day trippers and trail runners had given up for the day. 

A pity then that it started to pour down just at the wrong moment... And the ground was like concrete, bending a couple of pegs trying to get them in. But.. the rain went over and soon it was just me and the barking of the foxes. 

And the last day.. cycling south on Mälardalsleden. Enjoying being out in the countryside, and then meandering in the suburbs until finally, glad to be home. 

It has its charm this cycling mullarky. :) 

Going to ground - shelter talk.

During Covid times there's not much happening in overnight stops for me - but there's plenty of time for browsing and thinking around gear choices. What works and what could be done differently?

Right now my thoughts are on shelters....

My basic configuration right now is a Hilleberg Tarp 5 and an Enlightened Equipment Recon bivy - that gives rain coverage, bug protection and splash protection - plus an enclosed space to give a little extra warmth.  Combo weight: 520g + pegs and any extra guys. 

I really like the Hilleberg tarp.  It feels robust and the novel five sided shape gives plenty of flexibility for different set ups - especially in the woods.

The Recon bivy gives a good package. It's not had a lot of use but so far so good.  The only downside is the lack of headroom.  It's a bivy. Once you are in you are in. So I like it, but I want to keep it in shape for longer trips.  For shorter trips then I could add a groundsheet to lower the risk of puncturing the floor,  or take something cheaper I don't mind getting trashed.

For warm weather, and short trips where the forecast is known there are definitely simpler options - the simplest (apart from cowboy camping) being a poncho/tarp plus a groundsheet - plus a mesh layer for the buggy times of year.

Right now my poncho/tarp options are a Sea to Summit Nano or an old Fjällräven Gömsle. The Fjällräven is a bit more coverage (though narrower) at circa 500g. The S2S poncho tarp is 265 x 145 and a miserly 190g (somewhat under the 230g spec). Using it as raingear as well basically gives me a weightless shelter - albeit with less coverage. The Fjällräven is heavier than the Hilleberg tarp but weightwise is about the same if I don't need a rain jacket.

Bugs is another question.  The only alternative I have right now is a headnet which is OK for sitting around but for sleeping out that doesn't seem enough. Mesh tent options are a bit limited to be honest if it's going to be lighter than the EE bivy.

On my list are:

Lixada Ultralight Mesh tent - Mesh tent with built in groundsheet @ 250g for just £21.  It is a tad heavier than my EE but reviews complain it is short and narrow.  (200x65cm)

Zag mesh tent - mesh with no floor - 200g for £15.  Roomier at 220 x 120 with 110 headroom.

S2S nano mesh tent. 82g for around £30 and a spacious 220 x 170.

Groundsheet

Survival emergency bivy -  Foil bivy in camo.  125g for £10

And a bag to pack it in...

I've been working on my packlist for a through hike trip in France. Between Covid and other constraints we'll see if it happens, but my gear list took another step forward with a new backpack, a custom Atom+ from Atompacks.

My original choice was my UD Fastpack 35. It's big enough, just about, for what I need (37L total) has good storage options with pockets up front. The downside for me is the weight distribution. The waistband mostly works to inhibit bouce, not to transfer weight. It's comfy over long distances up to around 8kg. I expect with food and water to be a tad over 10kg. Mindful of my 'not getting any younger' frame it would be nice with a bit more load transfer and support at the waist.

My other option was a Haglöfs Matrix 50. It's a good size and comfy on but at 1,5kg it's quite a bit heavier. It has that trad look with separate lid and zip access into the base. It doesn't though have pockets on the straps or the big stuff pocket on the front. At 50 litres it is also bigger than I want. Too much empty space is just an invite to take too much.

Anyway, to cut a long story short, after due consideration and a lot of surfing I decided on impulse to go for an Atompacks Atom+ at 40l. A bit bigger and heavier  than the UD but not hugely so, and with both a hip belt and a carbon frame hoop in the back. 

Like the UD it has pockets on the shoulder straps - albeit simpler ones - big side pockets and also a pocket on the base. Practical or just a gimmick? Time will tell. 

It's a custom build, which means I got to choose the colours and to add options like a yoke strap at the top and load lifters. It's also custom sized to my back length which I'm hoping translates into a comfortable carry. Atompacks were really helpful and managed to ship it out from the UK ahead of the year end - avoiding any Brexit complications. (Lead times are on their website). 

It turned out that adding load lifters meant extending the collar so this bag is somewhere around 46 litres. A bit more than I was thinking but it will mean I'll comfortably have room for gear plus resupply. 

So far it looks good... but I've yet to try it in anger. Soon...