The Wild Hunt (https://wildhunt.org/tag/nordic)
This is the first time I cross path with what Finns call a hiidenkivi (“cult stone”) and the Swedes a jättekast (“giant’s throw”), and for a little while longer my mind meanders, thinking about the ancient stories that were more than likely told about this place in ages past.
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.