Wednesday July 13, Ornskoldsvik

 

The impressive Ting1 building in Ornskoldsvik

We have certainly left the Wilderness behind today and into town life!

There were a few spits of rain as we left the campspot this morning and a two hour drive to Umea on the coast. We were talking to the Swedish couple a few days ago about the cost of data when you are on the road. They suggested we went to Telia or one of the other service providers and see what sort of deals were available, we certainly have to watch how much data we are using. Noticing this year that our sim cards we bought from 3 Network in UK are disappearing quite quickly, or maybe we are used to using a bit more data. Found a very large shopping mall at Umea that had phone companies, as well as plenty of parking.

I am never a great fan of shopping malls, but the mall today was superb, it was so clean and quite upmarket. We wandered around and found a dealer and he was most helpful and couldn’t really do much for us but suggested we went to the Phone Shop a bit further along. We were so fortunate to find a really helpful guy, who took us under his wing and sorted out an amazing deal with heaps of data as well as a phone that will take us all over the EU during the next few months. We got the Sim card from his shop at no charge then he took us along to another general store where we bought the data plan, then he sat with us and got it all sorted out. We certainly couldn’t have done it without him. Dogga told us he was from Kurdistan and had been in Sweden since he was two.

Stopped for some lunch in a café then had to visit the IKEA store…..and a big purchase, a NZ$7 replacement small non stick frypan!!

Back on the road south again to a place we had found down on the water at Ornskoldsvik, just a carpark but right in town and only $1 for the night!. There are two big cranes on the edge of the water, but seems it is many years since they have been used. Also noticed a big ski jump on the hill above the town, gather it’s quite busy during the winter.

The town has some very distinctive architecture, the most striking of which is Ting1, which was designed by Swedish architect Gert Wingardh and finished in 2013. Interesting it is built within the centre of the Courthouse courtyard and they are separate, and contains 50 apartments which are painted in shades of red, yellow and green. I was able to get some good shots of the building when we went for a walk around town. So tonight, we are sleeping in a carpark…such a contrast from the last week!

The every so helpful Dogga

Ikea entrance from the mall.

 

Waterfront

Town reflections

A different side to town!

These cranes form quite an
impressive focus.