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I often wish to be heavier
The challenge with the winter trails and my struggles with the snowmobile My team of 12 sled dogs runs silently through the snowy winter landscape of northern Sweden. Only the sliding of the sled runners and the steady trot of the working dogs on the freshly fallen snow can be heard. The cold winter air cools my cheeks, the rest is wrapped in warm clothes from head to toe. I stand on the sled and enjoy being pulled through the white landscape by my beloved dogs. Together we are an unbeatable team. It’s just a wonderful feeling to be out and about with the dogs. To explore new areas and…
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Luna – The End Of A Sled Dog Era
It´s February now; the sun is back and casting long beams over our homestead in Swedish Lapland. Our huskies are howling, as Johanna and her small team of sled dogs have set off on a short tour across the snow-covered lake. Only one voice in the choir is missing. Luna´s voice. A few days ago, Johanna and Luna went together on the last trip. The destination was the local vet in Töre who put down Luna for her final sleep – calmly and respectfully. During the last few weeks, when it slowly became clear that Lunas time was coming to an end, one sentence kept coming up repeated times: “With…
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Hola Diego, brave, cute little puppy
We have a new family member! Of course, it’s a dog! A real sled dog. Who would have thought that?! ? He is a male, his name is Diego and is now 15 weeks old.We hadn’t planned to bring a new puppy into the kennel right now.But when does it go the way you plan it …? Ok, let’s start from the beginning. A few weeks ago, a friend asked me if we can take over a puppy. My first reaction was: “No, not now when everything is so uncertain. We do not even know how next year will look like.” But I could not help asking about his pedigree…
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Colourful autumn has arrived in the North
Like every year, it comes suddenly ?. Here at the Arctic Circle, the leaves change color from the end of August, the nights become cooler and the first frosty nights are not uncommon. Meteorologically, September 1st is the beginning of autumn. Here in the north it feels very appropriate. With autumn, winter approaches, my absolute favorite season! The wintertime in the life of a musher like me is the most intense and beautiful that I can imagine. Give me snow, give me dogs and you can keep the rest. (Knud Rasmussen / polar explorer) But before we go on the sled, we start on four wheels in autumn. At the…
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It is good to change your perspective occasionally
I was on vacation. Ok, it was “only” 3 days of hiking around Skaulo (3 hours by car from our home in Miekojärvi). But these 3 days felt like a break, a reset, a long vacation from my current everyday life. As most of you know, we have been working in tourism for the past few years. Many people experienced with us our Arctic Life in Northern Sweden. We loved to show and share our favorite landscapes and longing places with others. Our home was the starting point for many tours and a visit to our kennel with the huskies was often the highlight for our guests. But where and…
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The stillness that follows the storm
Summertime Time is a strange thing. Especially the time division in days of the week. I grew up on a farm and I know Saturdays and Sundays, but even on these days the daily routines with the animals were done. Even back then I thought it was beautiful and absolutely natural. Animals and weather provide the necessary work. Up here in northern Sweden the conditions are more extreme, the weather is harder, and the seasons determine many of my daily jobs. I love that. There is something deeply satisfying, be it sawing, stacking and splitting wood to have enough firewood, shoveling snow in winter, fishing in summer for us and…
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Leo – a difficult farewell
Leo, our house dog, said goodbye forever last week. Leo was the only non- husky in our kennel and truly Johanna’s dog. He respected me and after several month after his arrival at our place we even became friends. But he belonged to Johanna. They found each other. I will let Johanna write this post about Leo. How she feels about the loss and she is also sharing the beginning of her book with stories about Leo. REST IN PEASE, my stubborn, beloved roommate. Johanna´s thoughts It did not come as a surprise. It had been emerging for a while. And yet it does not make things easier. Farewell to…
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The mysterious 33rd dog
Bamse How is it that I am always talking about 33 sled dogs and one cat and only 32 dogs are presented on my website www.8seasonshuskies.com? When we started the rescue operation for our sled dogs 3 months ago, one of the first challenges was to take beautiful pictures of all our dogs.It was important to me that you get to know the dogs and to learn a little more about their so diverse personalities. In the middle of the planning of the website, Bamse, one of our seniors and “super-mom” of the kennel, was doing very badly.She had an ulcer in her vagina that caused heavy bleeding during her…
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Game over
Or restart It’s not even 11 weeks since we realized the full impact of the corona crisis on our life and company. And tomorrow, after less than 3 months, all the auctioned items from our company’s bankruptcy estate will be picked up by the buyers. Time is a strange unit of measurement.Sometimes it feels like this bankruptcy sh… does not stop at all and then I suddenly find myself with the feeling – yesterday everything was still okay – when did it all happen? But I’m starting from scratch … On Saturday, May 16, Johanna and I drove to Haparanda with Kitkat and Rubin (two of our young dogs) and…
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Donation-Stories No.01
We got a phone call… Most of you know that we asked for help to support our dogs in end of March. If you are new on my blog here is a short summary about the last weeks: Due to the Corona crisis we lost our income from one day to another – all our tours got cancelled – now until September 2020. We usually offer nature-based travels to Northern Scandinavia, canoe and hiking tours around our homestead in Miekojärvi and trekking tours on the Lofoten Islands are just some examples. To be honest, I was shocked for a while. The fear to not be able to feed and take…
