I was in Sweden over Christmas this year and spent part of the big day out in Färnebofjäden National Park. With Christmas celebrated on the 24th in Sweden, like much of the rest of Europe, this freed up Christmas Day for something else. When I’m in Sweden, there’s little I like more than to grill sausages on an open fire out in wilderness. So my brother, nephew and I headed out into the cold and wintry outdoors for a bit of alfresco cooking.

Färnebofjäden is the closest national park to where my brother lives and is less than an hour’s drive away. The ground was covered in snow but not the nice, deep, fresh powdery stuff but old, hard and icy snow that would have brought the UK to a standstill. Many of the roads were sheet ice but with studded tyres, the journey to the national park  wasn’t too troublesome.

Just near Gysinge, we stopped by the River Dalälven and set ourselves up in a wind shelter on the river bank. Wind shelters, small open-fronted ‘log-cabiny’ huts, are dotted around the Swedish countryside, usually by rivers or lakes. With fireplaces in front and a good supply of wood topped up by the park rangers, the shelters are a brilliant facility used by many.

With the fire started very quickly, we waited for the ash-bed to grow until it was hot enough to cook the sausages. We had a wander around the spot while the fire got going. The weather was cold enough for the river to start freezing with plates of ice growing from the banks outwards, joining together to form a larger sheets. With low cloud and mist, the scene was one of a dark and harsh winter’s day.

There was little wildlife around in the gloom, few birds could been seen or heard, although we were joined by a treecreeper by the shelter. On the way back, however, we saw a large group of roe deer eating out in the middle of the snow fields.