Saturday February 4th

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JOKKMOKK!

So I was still recovering from my sickness but I had already purchased the ticket for Jokkmokk's Winter Market. So bright and early we all loaded onto a bus at 6am and headed to the small town north of the arctic circle. On the way we actually stopped AT the actic circle! It was extremely cold today and seriously I stepped out of the bus into -40 weather and it was instant frozen! Back in Lulea it was -30 but seriously that ten degrees changes many things!

By the way the Arctic circle is about an hour away from Lulea to give you an idea of distance.

So after a brief stop and some very cold pictures we got back on the bus and went the last 45min to Jokkmokk. Upon arrival we parked the bus and walked about 10 min to the city center. We all rushed into a tent teepee like thing. They gave us warm lemonade and those instant hand warmer things. Everyone was quite cold...i however was doing pretty well! Applause here for AMY! I wore a pair of thermal socks, my ultra warm UGG boots, thick polarteck pants, jeans, snow pants, a polartec long sleeve, columbia long sleeve, tank top, full sweater, LL Bean fleece jacket, and my new goose down jacket, a scarf, and two hats, along with mittens. Go see the pictures lol.

So the winter market is a 400 year old tradition. Sellers come out and set up stands -- food, skins, jackets, coats, clothing, leather goods, art, all sorts of things. Think of it kind of like a state fair? Anyways because it was -41 you had to watch your time spent outside. So the game plan was to go walking for about 40 min, then find your way into a building and warm up. Seriously go look at my photobucket pictures....it was so cold that my eyelashes froze!

It was very cool however I didnt really buy anything....everything was very expensive! What I really wanted was this real mushers hat and I would have bought it but literally it was so cold out the credit machines wouldnt work! So oh well...i guess i wasnt meant to have one 😊 The day was long and cold! We arrived around 10am and left around 2pm. As we walked back to the busses thinking OH YES WARMTH (because we were all frozen to the point of pain) we soon discovered our hopes were in vain....turns out the bus had no heat 😞 Thats right the heat on the bus was broken! So that was a loooooooong 2 hour ride back. That was when i actually got cold. Trust me after a bus has been sitting in the cold at -40 it stays cold! We were all freezing!

Upon arriving back home we all rushed into the building and took warm showers. When we met for dinner two hours later we were all still feeling very cold! Not surprisingly we all went to bed quite early that night because we were all worn out! Sunday was spent in pajamas and under blankets while still warming up! haha!

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