Day 16 – today we're really going back to the Swedish mainland!

So I packed up our mats and sleeping bags – we've been sleeping in the hut on the airfield at Kumlinge, haven't seen a soul yet, they leave it open. The day looked bright and all was well. The Julian checked the weather & I went out and looked up. Oh. So then Julian started looking into going East to Finland instead, hmmm. We're basically in the middle of a high (came through last night with rain) and a low, here now, which means that the weather is less ideal across Scandinavia. So we had a think about what to do and I got ready to go swim at a nearby beach I'd scouted out from the air as we came in to land yesterday. And the thunder started, so I got Julian to come with me before the weather got too bad. Hmmm the rock entry to the water (no reeds the other nearby entries to the water are obscured by reeds) takes us past 2 houses, both of which appear not to be habited. Luckily in Scandinavia you have a right of way across all land, even private. So we were 5m from the water when there was a massive lighning bolt accompanied by really loud thunder which made me cover my ears. I was behind Julian who saw the lightning strike the reeds on the other side on the lake area we were trying to swim in..... So since the rain was pretty heavy by this time we decided to take our wilderness wash (non-toxic to the environment) and have a rain shower. Julian washed and rinsed out his hair before I decided that I would manage this feat too, which I did. Luckily the rain here is warm unlike the cold Melbourne rain and it really was just like taking a shower, apart from the splashback of tree bits up our legs.

Back at the hut I got bitten behind the knee by a horsefly, which over the course of a couple of hours blew up to 20cm diameter and 1cm deep and really quite sore, why do all the bites etc. happen to me and none to Julian? This is definitely an ad against expensive hair removal, maybe hairy legs would have saved me????