Which Tree is This?

Preface: due to recent shoulder replacement surgery this story was produced using Dragon dictation software as a training exercise. Since I don’t know enough of the editing commands yet, the types of mistakes that exist might be a typical of impromptu drafts.

Which tree is this?

I asked myself why am I in the Arctic Circle? My idea of a vacation is always been laying out on a beach chair on a tropical island. But now in retirement there’s nothing exciting about sunbathing and I gave into my wife’s desire to see the northern lights.

We picked up our Swedish SUV at the factory and drove it to Stockholm where we left it in storage while we were to train up to Kiruna, which is part of Lapland. After the train was a short bus ride that delivered us to a snow mist filled sky in the middle of an intersection that seem to lead to nowhere.

I showed the bus driver the name of our hotel and he pointed down the snowy street saying, “ you can walk.” I shot my wife an icy stair, grabbed the extended handle of my suitcase, and headed in the direction the bus driver pointed. The gravel covered sidewalk beneath the thin layer of snow was impossible to travel, so we walked out into the street which happened to have no traffic.

In less than ½ mile we saw the sloped roof of a château style hotel. It’s restaurant set catty corner to the main building and resembled a cross between fast food in the traditional diner. Diane and I were starved from the long train ride and ordered the only recognizable entry on the menu… FISK. I didn’t know whether to expect a plate of fish or a clenched knuckled foot from a moose. It turned out to be fish and it was delicious.

The hotel lobby was Spartan and since it was before tourist season, we were the only ones there. With no assistance, we walked with our 2 pounds room K key fob down darkened hallways to our room. The hotel was set up to turn banks of lights off and on as people were detected. The room was like an iceberg but they hate heating system 100 warmed it in less than 10 minutes.

Anxious to arrange a northern lights tour, we walked across the street to a ski shop with a tour desk in the back. The one employee looked up from his phone as if we came to rob him. To our surprise he spoke decent English.

Diane picked up a northern lights tour brochure and he ran right over to us. “I have to apologize my friend Max has taken ill and I am helping to cover the store. He normally does the tours.” Diane’s face dropped disappointment.

His face lit up. “My name is Sven and I have gone on many northern light tours with my friend. I have even done one already by myself last week and can do the same with you if you would like. But you have to understand is still a little early in the year for the best northern light shows.”

We understood that we were visiting a little early but had to meet the delivery schedule of the car factory. It was early November in the arts of seeing the northern lights were still pretty good. After making a reservation for the following day Diane paid for the private tour, and we went back to the hotel all site up for our adventure.

We spent the next day buying what turned out to be unnecessary Arctic hiking gear. At 7 o’clock in the evening we met Sven at the ski shop. The snow drizzle was a constant but pleasant form of Arctic weather. The temperature was just shy of freezing. We were told it was predicted to be a warm year.

Sven loaded us into a standard six passenger van with the ski shops logo on the side. I was relieved that we would not be going off road in a vehicle like this. Diane set with the open brochure on her lap. It depicted a Geodon made a Plexiglas with people staring up at the most beautiful display of northern lights. This dome was our final destination.

Our 30 minute drive took us deeper and deeper into the countryside. He parked the van in front of a dilapidated wooden shed with no Plexiglas dome insight. Diane and I looked at each other as if we were about to be kidnapped.

Sven waved us out of the van and undid a padlock on the door of the shed. He handed us each a oversized heavy waterproof jacket and matching snow pants that look like military issue, followed by his best attempt to match our shoes size with heavy knee length boots.

It took some effort to learn how to balance in this difficult get up, so Diane and I did some practice steps in the parking lot. He asked if we were in decent physical condition for a walk to the dome.

This is a hell of a time to ask, I thought to myself. We were actually in decent shape for our age and come this far so what the hell. He gave us each a high-powered lantern and led us into the dense forest. Even though it was still daylight, very little of the gray sky was visible through the forest canopy. Every step was followed by the obscene sucking sound of mud releasing our oversized boots. This made walking three times harder than on dry ground.

Sven was a strapping young man head taller than me and hundred pounds heftier. Diane elbowed me and pointed to a foot long hunting knife hanging from his belt. We had been walking for 15 minutes. Still no sight of the dome.

A dark expression of concern crossed Sven’s face and he stopped to examine a few trees in the area. I couldn’t help but ask what was wrong.

“My friend had marked the path very well with ribbons tied to trees along the way. I haven’t seen one lately.”

Diane sighed. My acid reflux kicked in. I asked, “so what do we do now?”

His face reddened. “I just did this last week with a group of Japanese tourist with no problem.”

Diane’s eyes flew wide open then she whispered to me, “I wonder where he stash them.” My reflux was coming to a boil.

“Wait here I’m going to have a look around,” Sven commanded. We were no position to argue so we stood quietly by a tree in mud up to our ankles in this creepy, ever darkening, nightmare of a woods.

After the longest 10 minutes of our lives, Sven emerged from nowhere smiling. “Follow me I found a tagged tree.” I looked down at my phone and saw zero signal. The time read 5 o’clock. I half-hour my ass.

We slogged along for another 45 minutes in both Diane and I were falling behind our guide. He looked back and said, “almost there.” I had my doubts.

I looked at Diane and said, “so, where’s the nearest Tiki bar?”

Five minutes later we came to a small clearing that looked like it had a treehouse. We followed Sven up some crude wooden steps that spiraled through the bottom of the treehouse where small wooden room was set up for accrued supper of tomato soup and hot chocolate. Sven lit the hotplate and while I gourmet meal was cooking he climbed a ladder that led to another level.

While Diane and I suffered the stink of burning tomato and chocolate we heard footsteps in the strange rumbling above our heads. When we talk later we both admitted to being scared shirtless of what Sven was up to.

Turns out he was pulling atop off of the jaded metric dome in preparation for our northern light show.

After forcing down our nasty liquid meal, we followed Sven up to the dome where we stood, next craned upward for almost an hour. Not a light in the sky.

Sven shrugged his shoulders, and said, “we didn’t see any with the last group either.”

It was a tense walk back to the van as Sven examines hundreds of trees and the temperature and lighting dropped. My phone said it was almost midnight when we emerged in the parking lot.

Diane and I hadn’t spoken for over ½ hour. I broke my silence and asked her, ‘how much was this tour?”