Sitting at an outside table at Jokkmokk station and pondering over the last week. Have quite been able to write until now, needed time to process the experience.
Arrived in Gällivare Thursday midday after a quite enjoyable but incredibly long train ride from Helsingborg. 22.5 hours all in all. Checked out the office at the station and tried to figure out what to do next. The day past fairly quickly, although the place is surprisingly quiet. Met Ulrika at the station when the train got in, she had plenty of stories to tell but I could feel the nervousness building about the following day.
Slept for a few hours and got dressed for work. I do really like the uniform, casual but still official looking. Slightly nervous still but less so than expected. Just a few passengers from Gällivare, but in Porjus we picked up 12 musicians taking part in Inlandsbane festival. A colorful bunch they made sure the trip got more interesting. The guiding part went quite well, no Germans on the train so could focus on getting the Swedish and English version working. Can’t do it without the manual but that should hopefully change soon. The day went well, slightly chaotic when changing train in Sorsele to head back up north, lots of passengers (well not really but more than on the trip down) and managed to mess up the food order for Vaikijaur but Maggan sorted it out when we arrived. Exhausted after the first day but feeling quite good about the experience, it was fun!
Second day was mostly good although I messed with seat reservations when we changed direction of the train in Arvidsjaur. Got a call from the office about a complaint on that, but I think that it will be better next time when the routing starts to work properly.
Got a proper place to sleep on Sunday, so nice with a real bed! Spent most of monday in bed relaxing. On Tuesday Lena lent me her car so I got a good look at the area and got some shopping done.
And yeah, we also had a train derailment on Monday, nothing serious and no one was hurt, trains running again the next day. But Lena had to work on bus for her two shifts. Let’s hope that’s the only time this season!
Today was the start of my other project that I’m doing in my spare time. The plan is to write a new guidebook for Inlandsbanan that’s interesting to read and available in English and German. So headed down south to Porjus with the train. Arrived very early and everything was closed, but after a few hours of walking around the small town I got a guided tour of the old hydro electric power plant. It was the first day for the guide and I were the only customer, she was very nervous but all in all managed quite well. I do know how the first day feels like! There is not much to do in Porjus so walked up to the viewing spot and got a lovely view of the area. It is really beautiful up here, in particularly at the top of a mountain. Could see snow on the mountains at the horizon.
But Porjus is not fun enough for a full day so catched a bus to Jokkmokk where I am now. Been walking around town and checking the place out. Probably need to structure myself more if the guidebook is actually going to happen. But it is a start. Luckily since I started writing it hasn’t begun to rain, a wet laptop is not much fun. The train back to Gällivare is arriving in about half an hour. Life is good.
I will be great to get back to civilisation again. 
