After 3 days taking a good rest in Kiruna, I fully recovered and well prepared for my next journey to get deeper inside the world of Arctic. My target is to get to Abisko, which will put me closer to the Norwegian border. I felt that I cant wait to be on the road again, staying 3 days inside the hostel making me to feel bored and I started to miss being on the road. It is nearly 100km away but when I looked at the profile map, it is a good downhill and I was confident that I can reach it within a day. The gravity will be my friend and will push me fast towards Abisko. When I left the hostel in Kiruna, it was around 10 am and once I reached the road, I saw dark clouds in front of me and very strong headwind. Awww its a bad day to cycle, I said to myself.

I then just started pedalling fighting the wind, it seems endless and really slowed me down even though it was a good downhill from Kiruna. After some 15-20km of riding, I saw a man stopped his car at the roadside some 300m in front of me, standing still while holding his badass huge 600mm Canon lens and kept snapping my photos until I passed him. He then drove far in front of me and stopped again at the roadside and kept snapping my photos until I passed him. Again for the third time, he went far in front of me and stopped again, and kept snapping my photos. Mannn this guy just couldn’t get enough of it. That third time, I decided to stop and talk to him, asking him if he can email me the photos. He must have good pictures of me with that huge prime lens, which is basically a price of a car. He is actually a professional photographer from Sweden, who has been all around Scandinavia photographing the landscape and the Aurora Borealis and the Midnight Sun in the Arctic. After chatting for some 5 mins, I then continue cycling further and he told me he wont bother me anymore hehe. Mann I don’t mind at all actually. While I kept pressing further, 2 more guys did the same but with normal compact camera, stopped at the roadside in front of me to photograph me while I’m riding. Hehe they really made me feel like a superstar lol. They said its really amazing to see a cyclist at this time of the year and were really interested on the spiked tyres that I used to ride on snow and ice. One of the guy told me that to be careful, there gonna be a snowstorm in few hours in the mountains in front of me soon from the forecast reports. I simply gave him my usual automatic answer, “Don’t worry, Ill push slowly”. And when I left, I could hear the sound of the camera from behind, the guy just couldn’t stop snapping my photos from all possible angles lol!

Riding towards Abisko feels like forever, I don’t feel like Im going downhill. The headwind was way too strong and I had to pedal very hard, I was actually panting even going downhill. Worst… my mouth was so dry and I kept drinking every few minutes since the wind got inside my mouth even when my scarf covered all over my face. I couldn’t wear my balaclava since its not so cold anymore, it was just around -5c so I had to use my scarf instead. The wind blew more and more fiercely the further I go. After some 50km of ride, I crossed the mountain areas in the arctic tundra and had a bad snowstorm. I felt really tired even when riding downhill, the fierce Arctic wind seems much stronger than the gravity. I took so many stops, I stopped every 5km of ride, just stood still while holding my handlebar and kept my head down to prevent the wind from getting through my mouth. But I couldn’t stood still for long, even though the temperature was only around -5c, but this fierce Arctic wind made me feel much worst than being in the -20c! I stopped only a while, a few seconds just to let my breathing back to normal before continued fighting the wind. I went slower and slower after each kilometre and reaching Abisko on the same day had become a distant dream. After some 65km of ride, there was a big climb and I was really struggling, now I’m fighting 2 enemies, the gravity had change side and became an ally with the headwind.

After the big climb, I looked up and was really amazed by the very beautiful view, the landscape had totally changed. There is no more forest up here, it’s the Arctic Tundra… its mountains after mountains and frozen lakes in between. Whenever I see beautiful view, it gives me extra strength. I ignored the endless headwind and riding slowly enjoying the scenery. The sun was at the horizon giving very special lights to the landscape, makes it look really dramatic and I feel like Im in a fantasy movie. The mountains look mystical with the special sunset lights, I then decided not to get to Abisko on the same day but went scouting for a place to camp in the wild to really enjoy the beautiful sunset. I kept pedalling only for another 5km which put me really close to Abisko, only some 20km away which I can do easily the next morning. I then found a very nice spot, it’s a big parking place at the roadside with free public toilet and has heater and running water inside. Nearby the parking place there was a wooden table and a BBQ place to make fire, I then dig some soft snow out and pitch my tent near it. I felt really comfortable camping here knowing that theres a toilet with a heater and running water. It is not so cold now anymore, at night the temperature went down maximum to only -8c and I slept sooo comfortably inside my -29c rated sleeping bag.

I stopped 3 days in Kiruna… resting and recovering since I felt a bit ill when I first reached Kiruna. I guess the incident that I fell inside the frozen river made me felt a bit sick since I was cold for the night. My body was feeling weak and I spent most of my time lying on the comfortable bed. This is the first time I paid full price for a dorm since Im in Sweden. Sadly, the hostel was fully booked and they gave me a bed in the basement with the same price as the normal bed in the dormitory. But I feel really comfortable, I was alone in the basement and its quiet down here, which I always like. Always feel good when Im lying on a bed and the heater is just next to me so I kept warmed at all times.

the view outside my hostel in Kiruna

the centre of Kiruna. Small and peaceful town

Sami hut, looks almost similar to Kyrgyz yurt but much more simpler

On my 3 days staying in Kiruna, I met many exchanged students mostly studying in Stockholm who are now on a short semester break. Most of them are from Europe and I also met a girl from China, Wen, who is studying in Berlin. Its good sometimes to meet some other tourists as well. Theyre doing short trips around northern Sweden and they had totally different experience than what I had. It made me think, from the experience that they shared with me, surely they look at things at totally different perspective from me. They experienced things that I never had. During their 3 days staying in Kiruna, some went for horse riding trip, some went for dog sledding trip and made a visit to the famous Ice Hotel nearby Kiruna, which is really famous tourist attraction here in northern Sweden. I couldn’t experience any of these since it is so expensive for me. Theres no way I can spend thousands of Swedish krona a day like most normal tourists… so I just enjoyed looking at their photos and videos of doing dog sledding and stuff.

very strong northern lights all over my head!

Surely there are advantages and disadvantages living the life on the road for a very long time. Traveling for a long time, I really have to be careful with my financial, the less I spend the longer I can travel… which means I can go further and see more. But to have the same experience on what normal tourists have is something difficult to have. I just live my life on the road and took myself really close to nature, as close as I can. Tourist attraction places, I can just look at it from far… from outside the fence. When I first started my journey on a bicycle years ago, I always have a target on how many kilometres I should go, places that I should visit, starting and ending point etc. But now after being long on the road, I realized none of those matters. Theres no difference if I cycled 20 000km or 200km. The most important is the experience I gain from it, what I see and what I learn and how it changes me. I usually don’t go to cities or even tourist places. But here in Kiruna, it’s a tourist place. So it feels weird when other guys who stayed in the hostel are busy with their activities doing horse riding, dog sledding and stuff for the whole day while Im taking a good rest on my bed reading books. At first I was thinking to visit the famous Ice Hotel here near Kiruna but since I heard they said its expensive even to go in to snap photos, I decided not to go. I can always look at the photos on google. I don’t consider myself as a tourist but when Im traveling, I consider the road as my home, the forest and mountainside as my bedroom… the stars as my ceiling and the moon as my bedroom lamp. Many people that I met along the way asked me how long it took me to save up the money to do this long trip. They really thought that I spend a lot of money to do this. Shockingly, I spent more when I went backpacking a month around Thailand Laos and Myanmar 5 years ago compared to a month here in Sweden. Back then, I took train, bus and van to move from places to places. I sleep in guesthouses everynight and eat in shops every meal. Here, even its much more expensive in Scandinavia, I sleep in the forest or hosted by kind people, I cook myself, drink the boiled water from the snow in the forest and move slowly with my bicycle from village to village, hills after hills.

I never let even a single panadol to get inside my body since my school days whenever Im sick, to train my body to use its own power to fight the sickness. So I drink a lot of hot water and a good enough rest is the key to feel better again. Once in a while I walked around town and the nearby hill to film a timelapse video of the beautiful sunset. Its really getting warmer now, sometimes the temperature can go above 0 degrees and the sun is really shining now. It is already spring now, it feels sooo good! But each night when the sky is dark, I went to hunt some Aurora Borealis with the guys in my hostel. We were really lucky, for 3 nights we hunt the northern lights, we were successful for 2 nights. Actually we saw the magic lights every night here but we saw really strong northern lights for 2 nights. The first night was the strongest. It was all over above our heads for many hours and for 2-3 minutes, it gets really strong and it was the combination of green and pink color above our heads. It was the most beautiful thing ever. Sadly I missed the strong green and pink color lights on my camera since my camera was filming the same lights on the horizon. It was all over and moves really fast, very hard to predict where the lights dance.

On the second night we went again to another location, with much better views but not so good place to enjoy the lights since it was too bright there. We stayed for less than 2 hours and went back earlier since the guys were feeling cold. On the last night I was there, we went to another place which is dark and we managed to see it again. This year is actually the peak of the northern lights, something like the solar activity is most active for every 12 years cycle. So the next time where the maximum activity of the northern lights will be is the year 2025. This is one of the main reason why I choose to bike in the Scandinavian Arctic on winter this year. To see the magical Aurora Borealis has long been my dream. But we didn’t stay too late on the last night I was there, since I need to sleep early and wake up early the next day for a long ride towards the Norwegian border.

nothing interesting activity in the night sky in the second night

hours of waiting in the cold but nothing showed up

Its good to see the landscape dramatically change from forest to mountains. I see less trees after Kiruna, it looks like tundra up here. This is good, since Ive been cycling through forests for a month now. And now the landscapes slowly change into tundra and will slowly change to mountains and finally the grand legendary Norwegian fjords! Spring is really here already, I don’t feel so cold anymore, riding between 0c to -5c is really comfortable. And the sun… ahh… it feels… sexy!!.. to ride under the bright sunshine! Now I just hope that the wind will blow me forward, fighting strong headwind is really tough. And they said that the Aurora Borealis will still show up for another week or two up here, hope that I will get lucky to see it few more times before it disappear until the next coming winter.

The ride from Porjus to Gallivare was easy. Its only 50km away and the road was kinda flat. The wind was blowing me forward and I reached Gallivare early without feeling much tired. In Gallivare, I was hosted by Anna, whom I knew from Lena, my host in Jokkmokk. She was kind enough to cook me delicious dinner and let me to sleep in a warm room for a night before I keep pressing north towards Kiruna. She has adopted a cute playful young boy from Vietnam and working as a nurse in Gallivare. She is maybe my last host in Sweden, as my ride in Sweden will end soon. Norwegian border is getting closer and soon I will cross into Norway. The next morning, I woke up around 8 and realized Anna has gone to work and sent her kids to school early. So I just took my time having my breakfast and prepared myself for a long ride towards Kiruna. I left Gallivare at around 9.30am and the road was good for the first 15km.

After an hour of cycling, the road turned north and the climb started for me. The headwind started to blow fiercely and I was slowed down a lot fighting the wind and the climb. I realized that the road here is much busier, there were so many trucks passing by here. I guess most of these trucks are going to northern Norway and they chose the Swedish roads because theyre straighter compared to the Norwegian roads which snakes along the fjords. I was going slow with many climbs and headwind but steady without much rest. I realized that the day is getting longer now. So I kept pedalling until I finally reach the junction where I have to decide which route to take. Its been long that I tried to decide whether I should keep pressing north until Nordkapp (the most northern part of the Scandinavia peninsula) or finally turn northwest into Kiruna and the fjords of Norway. I actually stopped right at the junction for some 10 minutes to decide my next route. Getting to Nordkapp, I can brag about it that I have reached the most northern part of Europe, where there is nothing between me and the northpole except for Svalbard islands. But the road west towards Kiruna is exciting, plus getting to the fjords of Norway is another long dream of mine. So after few minutes of deciding, automatically my hand turned the handlebar to the left and my legs started pedalling again. I took the road northwest towards Kiruna!!!… and cycled for another 10km or so before I find a place to camp.

As usual, I scouted for a few minutes looking for a good place to camp. Usually I will camp in the forest, but that evening, I feel like camping near the frozen river, just to have a different view. So I went quite deep inside the woods, far from the road, to a very quiet place near a frozen river. From where I put my bicycle, I walked about 100 meters towards the river. Getting nearer and nearer the river, the snow was getting deeper and deeper. There is no way I can camp on very thick snow, so I turned back. Then I realized that I accidentally left my gloves near the river and when I turned back, the gloves fell into the thin ice in the half frozen river. I knew that it was dangerous to get there, I should have cut some tree branches and use it as a chopstick to get my gloves back instead of walking through the thin ice. But as usual, Im a clumsy guy, I just want to get things done. Hehe… I then walked towards the river and just about 2 meters away for me to reach my gloves, I stepped on a very thin ice. I could hear the ice broke and I fell into cold, very very cold water underneath the ice layer. I was surprised it was deep, I fell almost to my shoulder and I was struggling to get back on top. It was too cold and my legs were cramped only in seconds. Only my upper body still working. I tried to push myself up, but when I put my hand on the ice layer to push myself up, the ice broke and again I fell inside. Even when I put my  hand on the snow, it was too soft. There is no one there, I was alone in the wild, very quiet place, impossible for the people to help me out.

the half frozen river that I fell into. Looks beautiful yet deadly. Once u go in, theres no way out darling :)

But the good thing was, I wasn’t so panicked. I was panicked only for a split second when I fell into the ice but while I was struggling to get on top, I was actually telling myself, “Wow, macam dalam movie siot” and instead of panicking, I imagined Jaguar Paw inside the movie Apocalypto when he fell inside the quicksand hehehe. After a few seconds of struggling, I finally got back on top and feeling so relieved that I was still alive, I just lied down on the snow looking at the sunset while taking deep breaths, ignoring the cold for a few seconds. I was wet all over, luckily it wasn’t so cold. The thermometer reads only at -6 celcius so I think I will survive the night. I then quickly pitch my tent nearby, make fire and dry all my clothes near the fire. The temperature dropped to the lowest at -13c that night and I was really hoping that it wont drop further below -20c or I might suffer for the whole night. I couldn’t sleep much that night thinking of the incident, I would have died there inside the river. The next morning I woke up early and had a quick breakfast before riding another 40km towards Kiruna. I really need to get indoor again and wash and dry all my clothes. I realized not only the day is getting longer, but its getting warmer now. The sun is shining proudly everyday now and the temperature is always between 0c to -8c during daytime, which is really good. Only at night is still quite cold but rarely reach below -20c anymore. Spring is really coming in this part of the world it seems. Only after 3 hours of easy climb, I finally reached Kiruna and for the first time, I paid the full price to get to a hostel here since I was in Sweden hehe. I will take a good day rest here in Kiruna since this is my last town in Sweden before I cross into the Norwegian border very soon. Now, I will really enjoy the good shining sun and warmer air here. Spring is really coming!! :)

I left Jokkmokk very late at around 2pm since I slept so late the night before hunting the northern lights. I knew that I wont make it so far that day. The road is hilly after Jokkmokk and the headwind was blowing fiercely. The next village is Porjus which is only 45km away but I don’t expect to reach it on the same day. The wind was really slowing me down by a lot and I was struggling on each climb even though it is not so steep. I had my usual problem, I was thirsty but all my drinks were completely frozen. But at least the sun is shining more fiercely now, well, most of the time… I went slower and slower after each climb, I was hoping to reach Porjus on the same day but its getting darker and I still have some 20km to go. While I was climbing one of the hills, a car from the opposite direction stopped at the roadside. And a guy came out from the car shouting and laughing at me. I was shocked, it was Adrian, a Swiss traveller that I met in a café in Jokkmokk. He was actually hoping to see me again on the road. He is a very talkative and fun guy, always smiling and has a good characteristic. So I stopped there, had a good conversation with him and decided to camp there for the night. The ground was a paved road so it was impossible to pitch my tent there and since I was lazy to camp in the snow that day, I decided to sleep in his car. So we cook dinner together and have a long conversation before went to sleep early. It was surprising that it is also cold to sleep in the car, almost as cold as sleeping inside a tent and he had a very good sleeping bag as well. He is currently traveling all around northern Europe with his car from his home in Switzerland, mostly sleeping inside his car.

Adrian, a cool Swiss traveler, hope to meet him again on the road someday…

The next morning, after cooking our breakfast, we finally said goodbye to each other and I proceed a few more kilometres towards Porjus and he drove back south towards Jokkmokk. It was only some 13km left to Porjus so I took my time taking photos of the beautiful landscape in the Swedish Lapland. I arrived Porjus somewhere at noon, a very small village but there is one supermarket so that I can get some food and drinks. There was a hotel at the end of the village owned by a lady from the UK. Surprising, she let me to stay in the hotel for free for as long as I want. I guess she knows that I’ve been camping in the cold in the forest and really need a warm shower and a good bed to sleep. The rate for the room there is very expensive especially for me, who travel with very limited resource, but I was so lucky that she let me in for free. I had a big room complete with fast wifi connection, private kitchen and living room all by myself. I felt so thankful, traveling alone on a bicycle especially in the Arctic during winter is not something easily done, especially without much money. But here the local people are helping me everywhere!!… and this tough journey seems easy for me somehow, because of all the help.

me chilling the expensive hotel like a boss!!… doing some video editing for my upcoming film while taking a good rest…

the hotel was visited by some Malaysians and Singaporeans as well. Notice that theres a red pin there.. thats mine. Its red because she said Im the special one hehe…

beautiful sunset in Porjus

The hotel owner, Patricia, is actually an expert in photographing northern lights and has been living here for more than 15 years. She has webcam cameras everywhere near her house to detect the northern lights. Shes been photographing the northern lights for many years and had published a book on it called “Arctic Light – The Eyes of My Heart”. Please have a visit at her website, http://www.arctic-color.com/ . I’m promoting her now because she has saved me from the harsh -20 celcius for 2 nights and sleep so nicely with soft pillows hehe. Too bad I didn’t see any strong northern lights during my stay in Porjus. Only some very weak green aurora in the sky for a few minutes before it disappears again. The Aurora Borealis is very difficult to predict.

the hotel that I stayed…

some Nordic ski for rent

some photobooks on stunning Aurora Borealis moments

not so strong northern lights were seen in Porjus