An idiot on a snowmobile.
It snowed a lot during our first couple of winters in Skellefteå. We’re fairly keen walkers, but those early winters up north were not really designed for strolls through meadows. If we’d attempted a short hike to the shore of the lake at the end of our garden, I’m pretty sure we’d have drowned in snow before we’d gone 10 metres.
Even our cats, all giant Maine Coon monsters, built for harsh winters, rarely ventured outside other than for their obvious necessities. And even then, they came back looking like abominable snowcats.
Our first winter proved especially frustrating. We couldn’t get out and walk down to the lake. There was no way to explore our beautiful plot of land: not without a snorkel, anyway.
So, early next winter, in 2014, after some encouragement from our Swedish friends, we decided to buy a snowmobile, or snöskoter.
Our skoter-crazy friend, Låge, found us an ideal machine. It had a wide track, which offered stability and traction and was big enough to allow two people to ride on it comfortably.
After I passed my snowmobile driving test, (it took around 11 hours over four weeks) my girlfriend, Donna and I tried the relatively shallow pre-Christmas snow in our vast garden – it was a breeze. The sense of freedom it gave us was thrilling. We could venture out to places that had been hitherto inaccessible.
The fact that the snowmobile was very stable and responsive on a marked and maintained trail where snow depth was more predictable, totally escaped me. It was an oversight that I would later regret.
In early January, we had a huge dump of snow. On a sunny Sunday morning, a visiting friend of mine, Joe, and I got togged up and hopped on the sköter to make a track in the deep snow down to the lake, so our girlfriends could enjoy the day, too (a skoter is a fine tool to make walkable paths over deep snow).
But after about 50 metres I could sense that the terrain had changed. The skoter wobbled around in the powder snow at low speeds and was proving difficult to turn. After 150 metres, I was starting to panic – I was heading towards the trees at the lake’s edge and the bloody thing just would not turn.
Then I made the first major error of the day – instead of accelerating out of the spot of trouble (in the heat of the moment I’d forgotten my skoter instructor’s counter-intuitive advice), I slowed down.
The skoter, stripped of its momentum, dipped its left side into the deep, fresh snow and threw me off. I was flipped into two metres of snow. I was like a turtle stranded on its back – I could not move. Eventually, with Joe’s help, I righted myself. But we couldn’t shift the skoter.
We were only 200 metres from the house, so Joe trekked/swam back to fetch a shovel. Thirty minutes later we were free and Joe jumped on the back and off we went again.
We found ourselves stuck (in our garden!) a further three times – on the last occasion, to free the skoter, we dug up enough snow and ice to build a competitor to the Ice Hotel.
This was not my idea of fun. If I’d been out on my own, or worse still, become stuck much further away from home, I’m not sure how I would’ve coped.
I’d learned my lesson. It was lovely out there, but it was a beauty tinged with glacial danger, and it had really scared me.
I sold the skoter a few weeks later.
This article is a column and the opinions are the writer's own.