Schlagwort: winter

  • 06.01.2022

    Unsere erste Wintersaison

    Da die Vorbereitung unserer ersten Wintersaison so viel Zeit in Anspruch nahm, blieb leider keine Zeit mehr, den Blog zu aktualisieren. Aber wir hoffen, dass ihr uns auf Instagram oder Facebook folgt, um regelmäßig neue Fotos und Videos aus unserem täglichen Leben zu sehen. 

    Bevor wir mit einem Update zum Start des Winters fortfahren, wünschen wir euch allen ein frohes neues Jahr. Nehmt all die guten Erinnerungen aus der Vergangenheit mit und geht hoffnungsvoll und glücklich in neue Abenteuer und Erfahrungen; dann hat 2022 gar keine andere Chance als ein gutes Jahr zu werden 😃🎉🥳

    Wie ihr vielleicht wisst, hat Corona unsere Pläne, den Kennel für längere Touren mit Hunden und Gästen aufzubauen, gebremst, aber trotzdem wollten wir mit unserem Business starten und haben beschlossen, diesen Winter Halbtages- und Tagestouren anzubieten. 

    Während der Schnee ❄️ auf sich warten ließ, war die Kälte schon am Anfang des Winters präsent. Von Mitte November bis zur ersten Dezemberwoche hatten wir tiefe Temperaturen von -20°C, viele Tage viel kälter mit -30°C bis -35°C zu Hause, was auf dem Trail noch kälter bedeutet. Da nicht viel Schnee da war und den Boden isolierte, hatten wir die ganze Zeit etwas Angst davor, dass die Rohre in der Hundefutterküche einfrieren. Es sah ganz gut aus… bis zum letzten Tag dieser ersten Frostperiode. Als wir am Morgen raus gingen, um das Hundefutter vorzubereiten, wartete die böse Überraschung: kein Wasser in der Hundefutterküche und in der Gästetoilette 😬 das bedeutete viel Arbeit, um die Rohre aufzutauen, bevor sie kaputt gehen. Da es unter -30°C war und Raffi in der Hundefutterküche arbeitete während Yvonne nach Arvidsjaur musste, haben wir die Elektroheizung im Haupthaus und Zusatzheizungen in der Hundefutterküche angestellt. Während Raffi alle im Internet zu findenden Tricks (neben einem Wärmekabel im Rohr) ausprobierte, wie Salz oder Rödsprit in das Rohr zu schütten, schien der Stromverbrauch das Maximum des Möglichen zu erreichen… und am Nachmittag war dann sogar der gesamte Strom ⚡️ für einige Stunden weg 😖 und das bedeutete auch, dass man das Haupthaus nicht mehr heizen konnte. Diese typischen alten Heizsysteme in Schweden können mit Feuerholz (was wir die meiste Zeit tun) oder Strom betrieben werden. Klingt so, als ob Strommangel kein Problem wäre. Das dachte ich mir vor unserem Umzug auch, bis ich erfahren habe, dass man auch beim Heizen mit Holz Strom für die Pumpe braucht, weil sonst das Wasser nicht durch die Anlage transportiert wird. Ok, also Decken nehmen, das Wasser laufen lassen, damit es nicht auch im Haupthaus gefriert und warten, bis der Strom wieder kommt 😏 zumindest war der Strom nach einer Weile wieder da und Raffi versuchte die Leitung bis halb elf Uhr abends aufzutauen… bis dahin ohne Erfolg. Aber die Maßnahmen griffen über Nacht und morgens hatten wir wieder Wasser 😀 aber das war erst Anfang Dezember und es sollten noch mehr kalte Tage kommen. 

    Aber euch interessiert wahrscheinlich mehr, etwas über die Hunde 🐕 und Touren zu erfahren. Bereits am ersten Wochenende im Dezember haben wir unsere ersten Touren mit Gästen gemacht. Die Trails waren holprig und schwer zu fahren, da so wenig Schnee lag, dass es schwierig war, Trails zu finden, auf denen man überhaupt schon fahren konnte. Aber die Gäste waren motiviert, nach der Motivation der Hunde brauchte man sowieso nicht fragen und wir hatten ein paar schöne Touren mit einem Hauch von Sonne ☀️ und ja, meistens kalte Temperaturen. Seit Weihnachten ist Hochsaison und wir haben täglich Touren – außer an den Ruhetagen der Hunde natürlich. Die Hunde machen einen tollen Job, immer motiviert und happy. Vor einer Woche hatten unsere Puppies ihren ersten Geburtstag, also sind sie offiziell keine Puppies mehr. Und tatsächlich sehen sie weder aus wie Puppies, noch sieht man einen Unterschied in der Arbeit. Aber sie bleiben unsere „Puppies“ bis wir die nächsten haben 😂

    Mit dem neuen Jahr hat auch der Schnee seinen Weg zu uns gefunden. Bei Schnee und Wind waren die Trails in den letzten Tagen mehrmals weg. So stand Raffi morgens früh auf, um die Trails zu präparieren, um es den Hunden und mir auf der Tour etwas leichter zu machen. Aber ich kann nur wiederholen: Die Hunde sind so motiviert, dass sie auch durch Tiefschnee springen, als ob es nichts wäre, den Trail zu suchen und gleichzeitig einen Schlitten zu ziehen. 

    Heute haben die Hunde einen Ruhetag und neben der Pflege und dem Kuscheln der Hunde haben wir Zeit, noch etwas Schnee aus den Zwingern, von den Dächern usw. zu schaufeln 😅 dann haben wir noch ein paar arbeitsreiche Tage vor uns bevor es nächste Woche etwas weniger wird. Dann können wir hoffentlich noch mehr Trails präparieren und vielleicht noch eine private Tour für uns machen. 

    Für alle, die auf Bilder warten… hier sind sie 😉 und wenn ihr eine Tour mit uns machen wollt, nehmt einfach Kontakt auf und wir arrangieren etwas.  

  • 06.01.2022

    Our First Winter Season

    Since the preparation of our first winter season took so much time there was unfortunately no time left to update the blog. But we hope you follow us on Instagram or Facebook to regularly see new photos and videos of our daily life. 

    Before we go on with an update about the start of the winter we would like to wish you all a happy new year. Take all the good memories from the past with you and go into new adventures and experiences with hope and happiness; so 2022 has no other chance than to become a good year 😃🎉🥳

    As you may know Corona slowed down our plans of building up the kennel for adventurous longer tours with dogs and guests but anyway we wanted to start the business and decided to offer half day and day tours this winter. 

    While the snow ❄️ was waiting for the new year to come the cold 🥶 was present already in the early winter. From mid of November until first week of December we had low temperatures of -20°C, many days much colder with -30°C to -35°C at home what means even colder on the trail. Since there was not much snow isolating the ground we were a bit afraid of freezing pipes in the dog food kitchen the whole time. It looked quite good… until the last day of this freezing period. Coming out to prepare the dog food the bad surprise was waiting: no water 💦 in the dog food kitchen and guest toilet 😬 that meant a lot of work to defrost the pipes before they break. Since it was below -30°C and Raffi was working in the dog food kitchen while Yvonne had to go to Arvidsjaur we put on the electric heating in the main house and additional heaters in the dog food kitchen. While Raffi was trying all tricks you could find on the internet (beside a warming cable in the pipe) like putting salt or rödsprit into the pipe, the use of electricity seemed to reach the maximum amount of what was possible… and in the afternoon even all electricity ⚡️ was gone for some hours 😖 and that meant also that you couldn’t heat the main house anymore. These typical old heating systems in Sweden are possible to use with fire wood (what we do most of the time) or electricity. Sounds as if a lack of electricity is no problem. That was what I was thinking before we moved here and I learned that even when you are heating with wood you need electricity for the pump because otherwise the water is not transported trough the system. Ok, so take some blankets, let the water run to prevent it from freezing in the main house too and wait for the electricity to come back 😏 at least the electricity was back after a while and Raffi went on to defrost the pipe until half past ten in the evening… with no success so far. But the measures were taking effect over night and in the morning we had water again 😀 but this was just beginning of December and more cold days were supposed to come. 

    But you are probably more interested to hear something about the dogs 🐕 and tours. Already the first weekend in December we did our first tours with guests. The trails were bumpy and difficult to drive because there was so few snow that it was difficult at all to find trails you could already run on. But the guests were motivated, no question about the motivation of the dogs needed 😉 we had some nice tours with a glimpse of sun ☀️ and yes, cold temperatures most of the time. Since Christmas the high season is on and we have tours every day – except the resting days for the dogs of course. The dogs are doing a great job, always motivated and happy. One week ago our puppies had their first birthday, so officially they are no puppies anymore. And indeed, they are neither looking like puppies nor can you see a difference in the work. But they stay our „puppies“ until we have the next ones 😂

    With the new year also the snow found its way to us. With snow and wind the trails were gone several times the last days. So, Raffi got up early in the morning to prepare the trails to make it a little easier for the dogs and me on tour. But I can just repeat: the dogs are so motivated that they also jump through deep snow like it’s nothing to search for the trail and pull a sled at the same time. 

    Today they have a resting day and beside taking care and cuddle dogs we have time to shovel some more snow out of the dog yards, from the roofs, etc. 😅 then we have some more busy days before it gets a bit less next week and we hopefully can prepare more trails and maybe do another private tour for us. 

    For all who are waiting for pictures… they follow now 😉 and if you want to join a tour, just take contact and we arrange it. 

  • 29.01.2021

    Winterwonderland

    Today some impressions from yesterday‘s run in our winterwonderland. 

    After the last snow storm the trail is very deep but the dogs (and musher 😉) enjoy it so much. You can read in their faces, they love to be out together. 

    And one picture from today, finally we did the frozen water picture 🙂

  • 21.12.2020

    Winter solstice

    Today was the day many people are waiting for: winter solstice. That means the shortest day of the year. Wait! Is it not 24h? Yes, of course, also the 21st of December has 24 hours, but it is the day with the shortest time of daylight on the Northern hemisphere. From now on days are getting longer and nights shorter. Many people in the north are missing the sun and are happy to have passed this day.

    I don’t really care about how long days and nights are, especially now since we are – unfortunately – not longer living above the Arctic Circle. So, to be correct, we don’t have polar night and also no midnight sun in summer. But we are so close that it is almost as if. Anyway, for me it’s not important if in theory we get more daylight from now on. I am more waiting for nice winter weather, cold and sunny with snow diamonds all around. But it is still much too warm, +2°, not much snow and what we have is very soft now, lakes are not frozen, etc. 

    So, we can only live from memories of great colors also during the darkest time of the year. And hope we will see it again soon. 

  • 06.12.2020

    Where is the winter?

    Today is the 6th December… not only „Nikolaus“ in Germany but also WINTER ❄️❄️❄️ but it seems that the one who is responsible for the weather is on holiday 🏝🌊☀️

    +1° is much too warm for December 😬 The snow is wet and heavy and the swamps still not frozen… where is the real winter? 🥶❄️☃️

    Anyway, Raffi was searching for new trails, first with ski 🎿 then with dogs 🐕 and you can be sure he liked the second alternative more 😉

    In the meantime Luna and Stella were allowed to stay inside with Joël and me so that they are not too sad about staying home. Even if they are doing great in front of the sled we need to keep in mind that they are not grown up yet and deep trails are not good for their bones and joints. But as soon as the trail is harder they can join again 😊

  • 28.11.2020

    Do what makes you happy

    Winter has finally arrived 😃 The last days we had temperatures down to minus 20 degrees 🥶 and also some more snow ❄️ Actually, we had the biggest snow depth of whole Sweden yesterday 🤩

    It’s still not so much but enough for short runs with the sled 🐕-🐕-🐕—🛷 

    When our puppies joined the first time last weekend we realized that the harnesses we had planned for them were still a bit too big… or puppies too small 😉 so, we wrote an email to Axaeco and right in time the new harnesses were in our post box yesterday. Thank you, Henry, for the super fast service. The new harnesses are looking great and it seems also Luna and Stella are proud to wear them…

    We are anyway really proud of our puppies. They are definitely born to be a sled dog. You put them on the line, they stand „line out“ (means holding the line straight) waiting for the command to start and then they just go. The first video is right after the start from our yard, crossing our neighbours yard. Next pictures are from the trail, enjoying our winterwonderland. 

    After coming home they get a little snack and as you see the whole team including the puppies is waiting patiently until the snacks are cut 😋

    And last but not least some nice pictures from Arvidsjaur and Akkanålke mountain.

  • 19.11.2020

    When dogs trick their human

    A bit late but I need to post it, even if it was already some days ago…

    Since the snow was still not here Raffi decided to start building the next cozy element of our free run. A tower for the dogs to look around and of course a place to sit and cuddle. 

    So, he took some trees to start with the basic poles and added the roof base. While working up there Barolo wanted to play and Raffi was throwing a piece of wood for him. After a few seconds Barolo was back and – of course – wanted to continue playing. When realizing that Raffi is up there and will not throw something the next minutes he invented a new game: trick your human 😅🐕🙈 not difficult for him to let the ladder fall down and watch Raffi sitting up there 🤣🤣🤣

    Now we need some more construction wood to go on with the tower but eventually we postpone it to after the winter because today the snow was coming back and we hope for more to go out with the sled soon ❄️🐕🛷

  • 24.10.2020

    Season has started

    Yeah, winter is here and the season has started in a double sense… Aurora and sled season! What could be better?

    A lot is happening now. Yesterday the work on the roof started. And they are so quick, almost all old material was taken away and one half was already protected against new rain or snow. We will add pictures of the results later on. But we promised our guests that they will see Northern Lights and indeed we got a really nice show in the evening. The pictures are still on the camera and will be added as soon as we have them on the computer.

    Meanwhile we want to show you some pictures and videos from the very first sled ride of the season, including meeting eleven moose. If you zoom in one of the photos you may see one of them 😉

  • 18.10.2020

    Winter is here

    Always a bit sceptical about the weather forecast we were really happy to see this… today in the morning when we woke up… and it’s still snowing (and stormy as well) 🙂