My ride through Sweden was interesting, filled with long days on the bike, some rushing and stress from self-imposed deadlines, lots of reflecting on my trip and why I’m doing it, and physically-demanding riding with a very sore butt by the end. In total, I rode from Grisselhamn to Gothenburg, covering 778 km (483 miles) over 9 days and cutting diagonally across the full width of Sweden.
The challenges of the ride began right from the start, as I was tormented by endless hordes of mosquitoes on my first night camping in the woods outside Grisselhamn. The trying introduction in Sweden continued the following day, as I was forced to ride on the razor-thin shoulder of the highway heading towards Uppsala, with cars charging next to me. To add insult, there was also a strong headwind, and as I pedaled hard against the wind, trucks vrooming past my left shoulder, I considered how it may feel for someone with disabilities when there is no accessible way to get where you want to go. My face in a grimace, I reflected on how aggravated and excluded I felt having no way to get where I wanted to go that was made to accommodate me (in this case as a cyclist). I acknowledge I cannot truly know how inaccessibility would feel for a disabled person, but the experience made me more empathetic for how I imagine experiencing inaccessibility could feel, and many people with disabilities go through this all the time (please remember to support my fundraiser for ENIL to work for greater accessibility for everyone with disabilities: link). Thankfully, once I arrived to Uppsala, I had a great evening meeting with Amanda (the daughter of a previous contact I made on my ride through Finland), who showed me around the city, and was a fellow PhD student so we shared stories of PhD struggles together. Later in the evening, I met my wonderful hosts in Uppsala: Jess and Lars (contacts from friends from Hotel Svala in the Åland Islands), who welcomed me into their beautiful apartment and generously cooked me a delicious pasta dinner. Thank you so much Amanda, Jess, and Lars! Your kindness and friendliness meant so much after the challenging day of riding, and my spirits were high again when I set out from Uppsala the next morning after a lovely breakfast with Jess and meeting Syne (Jess and Lars’ young son).
The peace of wild camping only broken by incessant mosquitoes
Thank you Jess for being such a wonderful host and for the nice conversations!
The ride from Uppsala to Stockholm was less dramatic, but I had to ride fast to make it for my meetings with a few independent living organizations doing important work promoting disability rights and providing personal assistance for people with disabilities throughout Sweden. Thank you JAG, the Independent Living Institute, and STIL for taking the time to meet with me, and teaching me more about the importance of personal assistance, the independent living situation in Sweden, and sharing your personal stories. It meant a lot to me! I will be sharing much more about my meetings with these great organizations very soon, so stay tuned.
Valuable meetings with great disability advocacy organizations (more stories to come in the future…)
Following these meetings, I had to jump back on my bike and ride far and fast towards Gothenburg, and unfortunately I didn’t have any real time to explore around Stockholm. I was in a rush because I needed to make a flight I had scheduled back to the USA for a short break from my trip. There was a big family event that I wanted to attend, but I had been conflicted on taking the break, and about the long flights back to the US, and I had initially not planned on attending. In the end, though, I made the personal decision that being there with my family for the event was worth it. This meant that I needed to get across the width of Sweden within a deadline to make it for my flight back to the USA. I was a bit disappointed having to ride away from Stockholm in a rush without experiencing much of the city, and I realized quickly how this deadline could affect my experience of the ride, somewhat restricting the flexibility and openness to new opportunities that had been so valuable throughout my ride so far. But being there with my family for this event was important for me, and so I jumped back on the saddle, and began pedaling to Gothenburg.
The second day of my ride to Gothenburg was Swedish Midsummer (Friday, June 21), and I was excited to experience the Midsummer festivities in countryside Sweden. Early in the day, I rode past a man in a fluorescent vest shepherding cars into a dirt parking area, and I heard music from the hill above. I rode up the hill and came upon a group of wooden cottages, with hundreds of people sitting out in the sun enjoying traditional foods and listening to live music. It was exactly the countryside festival I was looking for, and after some haggling with the older women at the entrance who were nice enough to let me into the festival without paying the entrance fee (I didn’t have any Swedish Kroners on me), I got to explore around the celebrations. There was an old museum showcasing historical horse-drawn carriages and the cozy interiors of antique Swedish cottages, and of course the Maypole, which would later be erected and danced around in traditional Midsummer celebrations. Unfortunately, because of the looming deadline to make it to Gothenburg, I needed to leave the festival early to make more miles that day. I hoped I would encounter many more similar festivals throughout the countryside, but, these other festivals never materialized, and I spent most of Midsummer simply riding along dirt roads in the forest, and snacking on peanut butter sandwiches.
Midsummer festivities and the Maypole
Around 9pm, I chanced upon a group of friends sitting outside on a picnic table enjoying some drinks and soaking up the late-evening Midsummer sun. I stopped to ask if they knew of any good camping spots nearby, and after telling me about a nice lake, they invited me up to join them for a short drink at their table. I enthusiastically joined, and it was great to chat with them about Midsummer customs, as well as learn more about Swedish political ideology, and hear their personal stories. They even generously offered a bowl of ice cream with fresh strawberries (a Midsummer treat), which tasted great after a long day of biking under the sun. Eventually, though, I got the feeling it was time for me to continue on my way, and after thanking them all for being so welcoming and snapping a group photo together, I rode to the small lake close-by to set up my tent. I was so grateful for their friendliness and generosity, but I was left with a somewhat melancholy feeling sitting by the bank of the lake sipping on the small bottle of schnaps they had graciously given me before I rode away. It was such a privilege to have been welcomed to join their party, but it was only a glimpse into their full and different lives, and at the end, they continued their party and laughed and danced together as friends, and I sat alone watching the sun lazily set over the lake. It was a feeling I was starting to get accustomed to, saying goodbye to each new kind person or people or new friend I was meeting along the way, and always ending up back on my own, just me, my tent, and my bike. So much of the point of my journey is to build comfort and contentment within myself in solitude, but I’m still learning, and it felt hard as I laid my head down alone in my tent, close to tears with the gentle chirps of nightingales filling the ever-bright Midsummer night.
The yin and yang of making new social connections versus solitary moments
The next day I had a lot of time to get acquainted with solitude, as I needed to ride around 120 km to stay on track to make it to Gothenburg. The day was relatively uneventful, but it began to rain early in the afternoon and the rain only continued to intensify throughout the day. By around 9:30pm, I was soaked, tired, and pretty fed up, and was dreading the idea of setting up my tent and cooking my dinner under the relentless rain. I came to the last house of the small village I was riding through, and stopped my bike after seeing the small, covered garage in front of the house. Just to have some cover from the rain sounded heavenly, so I worked up the courage to knock on the door of the house to ask if I could set up my tent under the garage for the night. After knocking, I heard some grumbling and groaning inside, and after about 5-minutes, a tall older man with thinning grey hair opened the door, wearing only his underwear and a pair of socks, and with a slightly annoyed expression on his face. I realized immediately I had woken him up, and I quickly stuttered an awkward apology that I was so sorry for waking him. I told him I was on a long bike journey and had been riding all day in the rain, and was wondering if it would be possible to set up my tent under his garage to get some shelter during the night. He said, in a straight to the point kind of way, that he had a small guest cottage at the back of his house and that I could sleep there. I was so grateful to have a roof and a bed for the night, and thanked him deeply. Throwing on some slippers, but still in his boxer shorts, he showed me to the cottage, then went straight back to the main house and back to bed. After taking a moment to move my things from my bike to the cottage, my stomach started growling, and I knew I needed to still make myself some dinner. Just as I was finishing setting up my camping stove, the man came back out from his house, having seen me setting up to cook, and beckoned me inside. He said I was welcome to use the stove for cooking, and he even offered me some of his hard Swedish bread (similar to crackers) with butter. I wished there was something I could do to repay his hospitality, and I just continued to thank him over and over again. I had asked his name, but in my flustered, exhausted state I didn’t remember it at all. He told me he was a pensioner, but was still working hard on the farm across the road while his friend who owned the farm was away on holidays. He told me it was his 16th day of working in a row, and he was beginning to feel tired. Before he went back to bed, I thanked him for perhaps the 100th time, and he simply said: “don’t worry, it’s a privilege to be able to help someone, especially in this kind of weather.” These words continued ringing in my head long after I had finished my dinner and laid my head to rest on the cozy mattress, the rain pattering against the red sloped roof of the cottage.
My refuge for the rainy night
The next few days were mostly filled with long stretches of solitary biking, and peaceful wild camping within the Swedish forests. I rode my longest day of the trip so far (133 km [82 miles], with 1,200 meters [4,030 feet] of elevation gain), along beautiful Swedish countryside near the enormous Vättern lake, and the descents from the rolling hills down to the lakeside were a blast. I also had a phone call with a close friend, who helped me to realize that I had gotten too drawn into the posting and sharing part of the journey. I had to take a step back to see that the value of my journey didn’t come from sharing and posting about it, but rather that my personal experience of the trip was valuable in itself. I know there is a balance where sharing these stories of my journey can enrich the full experience of the trip for others as well as for myself, but I’m still finding this balance, and I think I ended up too far on the side of over-sharing and over-posting over the beginning of the trip. So, over these long days of biking through Sweden, I took some time to reflect, and turn inward, contemplating why I was doing the trip, and what I was doing it for. I’ll continue to experiment with how I share the story of my journey, trying to find the right balance to make the full experience more meaningful for myself and everyone following along (Thank you all so much for following and supporting my journey so far, though!). These days of self-reflective biking began to help be become more comfortable with the solitude of my journey, and I began to inwardly embrace those quiet moments of pedaling or sitting next to the road or outside of my tent, listening to the sounds of the world around me and observing the rhythms and flows of my mind.
Wild camping throughout Sweden was rejuvenating for my soul
Then, after 9 physically-demanding days on the bike (man, my butt was sore by the end), I arrived to Gothenburg, on the far southwest side of Sweden. It had been a journey with a lot of ups and downs, realizations about the restrictive impact deadlines can have on my experience of the journey and of how I want to approach my trip more openly moving forward, questions and reflections on why I’m doing the trip for myself and others, and a tough physical accomplishment to make it on-time. I celebrated in Gothenburg with a scoop of mint-chocolate chip ice cream, then caught my train to Copenhagen, Denmark where I flew back to the USA for the big event and short break from my trip.
Celebrations in Gothenburg
I will arrive back to Copenhagen in a few days, and I’m very excited to continue the trip, begin exploring Denmark, and see what new stories unfold as the journey resumes. Until then…
Pedal with Soul – Max