- Travel on the Rail -

Part 6

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Today, I will be on the train all day. I went to the station through the slippery road with the other two guys. I am parting from one of them here, who had traveled with me for a few days. We are getting on the train "Bottenviken" for Goteborg in Sweden that is leaving Narvik station at 9:10. The other one says that he is going to get on the train in the afternoon.

No.28 on the car No.80?

Now, let's get on the train. I saw my ticket to find my seat. It is No.28 on the car No.80. No.80? It is not with this train! We got on the train for the moment as the leaving time was coming, and went through all the cars of the train with a big backpack, but we could not find. Him, too. We could not get as asking the conductor. We took the vacant seats for the moment and would move if somebody spoke to us.

"Bottenviken" at Narvik station

This train is arranged with an electric locomotive of SJ as the top, 2nd class seats, 2nd class compartments, 1st/2nd class seats/1st class compartments in the same floor, and a cargo car. We took the seats of the 2nd class. But we regret sitting there because the seats are on the right side that we can only see the wall of the snow. On the contrary out of the left side, there seems to be a magnificent view of the fiord. We saw it with the twisting necks, not to meet the eyes of the people there.

We are going through the snow field after the fiord. We went into Sweden over the boder before I knew, and arrived at Kiruna at 12:07 after passing with a few freight trains with heavy-looking ironstones each other. Oh, this is that Kiruna that I studied at the geography class in high school. I will check it by the Check Pen. Mistook! I will erase it by the Eraser Pen. And at home, will review it by the Check Sheet.

We met another Japanese from Kiruna. He told us that he stayed at the person's house last night that he had first met in the train because his train had been canceled at Kiruna by the heavy snow although he would have gone to Narvik within yesterday. I envy his English speaking ability!

Several cars were added to the last cars with our train. We moved to the back car, which was not so crowded, and also went to the buffet. I ordered somthing like a pizza with salami, letttuce, and more. I hoped it would be warmed, but it was served as it was cold. It was 34 Swedish Krona (SEK, about 680 yen).

We will stay in a town of Boden (not an icecream-producing district) tonight, and arrived there at 16:30. It is getting dark. We parted from the guy who got on the train at Kiruna as he was going to the further station.

We decided to stay at the hotel just in front of the station. It is 50 SEK only for staying at the room with bunk beds. I went to the bed being suprised at the so cheap price.

For Haparanda, at Boden station

We are going into Finland today. We started from Boden by the train leaving at 7:55 for Haparanda. It is with a casual style with two diesel cars though going for the border, but it is much more comfortable than KIHA 58 type that is one of the typical diesel cars in Japan.

After going through the snow field in the country that was not so special to write here, we arived at Haparanda at 10:10. It is just near the border with Finland, but we have to go by bus from here because the width of the VR's (Finnish National Railways) tracks is 1,524mm the same as in the Soviet Union (at that time) althugh SJ, NSB, and DSB have all 1,435mm, so the tracks are not connected.

Haparanda station is so strange, as I do not know where is the first floor and where is the second. Also it has something like a church.

Haparanda station

We got on the bus for Kemi station where is at the border with Finland at 11:55. After about 5 minutes, we got to the place where just looks like the border, and an officer in uniform got onto the bus. He came to us directly instead of the other passengers and ordered us to show our passports, and went back to the office with them. A few minutes later, we could get back the passports from him and go over the border, but we were feeling that the others around us were looking at us during the bus's stopping there. Yes, we are now just foreigners.

Anyway, we could arrive at Kemi station without any troubles. It is 13:40 in Finnish time. The reason I wrote it is that there is a one-hour difference between Finland and other European countries, so it is 12:40 in European time. The currency is Markka (FIM, 1 FIM = about 30 yen).

Left Kemi at 15:35. It is the frist time I use VR. The light blue cars pulled by 3 diesel locomotives look very fresh for my eyes that had ever seen only red cars. Also in the passenger's car, it is very comfortable with the seats for only 4 people in a row in spite of such a wide car.

By the way, the car with us has a TV set, which we can see animated cartoons made in USA. We watched it during all our way, saying "it's not fun", and arrived at the terminal Rovaniemi at 17:00 on time. It caused us seeing no any views out of the window. Also it got dark around the train just after the departure.

It took us about 10 minutes to get to Rovaniemi Youth hostel from the station. Asking to the reception about Santa Claus Village where we would go tomorrow, she kindly wrote down a map to get to the bus stop for us.

As leafing through a note for travelers' scribbling at the reception, we could find lots of Japanese on it. Then, he with me pointed one of them,
"Hey, this one!"
It was a girl's name.
"Last year, we were on the same flight from Europe back to Japan."
He went out to buy a picture postcard to send her. I, left alone in the room, somehow felt a sense of alienation.

To be continued

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