Though my mind recently has been overshadowed by my cars speedy demise, now that I'm done thinking about that I'll write about my actual vacation.
Because it has been real good. Up and down like always, but in general very good, and as always best towards the end. Since last blogging i spent a weekend on
Kirkevik and a whole week in
Ransberg,
Sweeden.
Kirkevik is
Juvente Norways holiday home, idyllically placed on a relatively hidden-away corner of
Nesodden in the Oslo fjord. Kristina arranged a pirate weekend, where the idea was to dress like a pirate and do
piratey stuff, and the execution was to relax for a weekend in the sun. Like every time i go to a
Juvente gathering, i meet new fine people, get hugs and have a nice time. The sun was extreme, and the bathing temperature was simply the best i have experienced outdoors. We watched movies outdoors at night (warming each other as the night gets cold), and bathed in water and sun during the day. A very nice (literal?) warm-up before the Active
Summercamp, possibly even better then the actual camp.
Which also was warm. Very warm. Each day was as sunny as the next.
Getting to the camp. I drove there in my car, alone as always, and i just followed my GPS. I typed in
Ransberg as the camp is in
Ransberg Mansion, and it found a small village south of
Karlstad. I drove by the GPS, and 2 hours after
Karlstad i was there, but i couldn't find the campsite. And as
Rasto helped me with finding some one who could give me directions, it became clear that
Ransberg Mansion is in
Ransäter, 3 hours in the opposite direction! I must admit i was rather angry with myself. But, eventually, 3 hours later and after nightfall, i was finally there. Put up my tent, met
Piia and
Kristiina from Estonia again, and
Rasto from Slovakia, whom i know from the Budapest seminar.
That night i discovered that i had actually put my tent on top of the water pipeline in the dark (
au), and with the morning sunrise it was evident that my tent does not remain cool in scolding hot sun. The next 3 days after i slept in the cooler forest under open sky.
There were activities like games, volleyball, car mechanics, first aid and a little what the scouts call 'hiking trip'. That's a 30 minute walk on a gravel road up to a lake. We had to make our own food every day in our cooking group,
which meant we spent many hours on that. I thought that to be nice. Every evening most spent in the night
cafè, though i mostly went to bed early. There was also a disco with very, very shitty music. And there was scouts. A lot of scouts. Active had the camp in
collaboration with the
swedish scouts, and there was about 700 of them there, as opposed to about 300 actual Active-members. Why do scouts always build so much?
I spent most time with the Estonians. They are nice people. I'll miss some of them, even though they talked a lot in Estonian. It's rather rude, really, when there's people who can't understand it around. I didn't talk
Norwegian to the
Norwegians or
sweeds when there was other people around. But i guess that is something you will experience with any multinational group. Also the Albanians only was with other Albanians, and the Slovaks the same. But again, to be expected.
I hardly used my camera this summer for some reason, i think i have only one picture to show you;
Melis, the Estonian hunk who enjoys walking around in hes underpants. He was quite happy that hes name means something sweet in Norwegian. Here on top of Piia. I think i owe him a massage.
Labels: active, freedom in living, summer, traveling
