The Wild Hunt (https://wildhunt.org/tag/nordic)
The woods around my home in Arctic Norway were few and far between, mostly small birches barely taller than your average adult. Here in Åland, I met with real woods: tall bone-white birches, spruce, thick pines, bushy walnut groves. This vibrant life was everywhere, and all the while I was searching for graves.
Exhausted, sweaty, and painfully hungry, I take my back into the gravel road of what must be Sōdra Ugglarp. On the horizon a long earthen-colored brick building stands against the deep blue sky, like a wall. In front of it, I notice a concrete-pit filled with horse manure. Closest to me, nearly as long as the barn, lies the stone ship, shaped by dozens of massive standing stones, like teeth of a giant rising from the green earth.
With just two days to go, I made use of one of my few free days to go downtown and get a few supplies: gift wrapping paper, thick craft rope, glue, and a big burlap bag. I had found out what to do: instead of having someone dressed as Santa delivering gifts, I would have someone don a homemade Yule Goat costume.
As my wife takes our daughter to bed for a well-deserved nap, Hanne takes her bicycle out of the shed, hands me the map, a helmet, and a bottle of water. In less time than it takes to recite the runes of the elder futhark, I am out adventuring.
Lyonel Perabo reviews “The Traveller’s Guide to Modern Heathenry,” an introductory book published by the group Asatru UK.