Seasons change for boards

Its now the big seasons change in Stockholm for my boards.

Summertime is longboarding, wintertime its snowboarding and in between its monsterboard or some call it dirtboard.

Its now too many wet leefs on the ground for longboarding and that is soooooo sad.

So time to put the wonderful longboards away and bring up the snowboards, witch is not half as fun as longboards.

My favorite longboard is the Swedish brand Kahalani, with the board made of chestnut tree and extra big wheels for smoth cruising in city traffic.

Sometimes I have my 8 year old son sitting on the front of the board and Im standing on the back, he have his own

longboard but is too lazy and want to sit on mine like a taxi... hmmmm

My husband and daughter also have a longboard each and its wonderful cruising around and go for picnics or just transport yourself around the city.

Last week I took my son to the park for a lesson in dirtboarding.

The most amazing advantage in riding the dirtboard for a 42 year old mother is the HANDBREAK... I love the handbreak...!!!

It can be scary sometimes when it gets to very high speed with longboards, snowboards and dirtboards, but the handbreak... wow am I happy...

He of course was flying down without using the handbreak

Bye bye longboards until spring

Leaving Cape Town

Sitting in the Lounge in Johannesburg on my way back to Stockholm again sipping my last holiday GT.

What a positive surprise this country and town was! First experience the Political heart of Johannesburg with the history of apartheid and then the complex history of South Africa, however for the fun part of South Africa is Cape Town, Jo-Burg as great shops, Restaurants and Jazz music but also very much the Commercial heart and soul of SA not the adrenaline fun side which I came for.

Cape Town is the place to get the ultimate holiday for an adrenaline person like me, they have great skydiving even if I passed it this weekend, diving, shopping, trekking, all kind of sports and activities and amazing nature.

this is the Water Front

It’s cheaper than Europe and much cheaper than Stockholm (apart from skydiving where Sweden is still one of the cheapest place to skydive)

The party life was great with lots of bars, discos, and live music, mostly on Longstreet but also at Camp Bay

Negative bits were the beggars, I always get annoyed with beggars, and tourists give them money and therefore it’s very beneficial for them, so they are everywhere, and they can spot foreigners from a distant.

The ocean is not warm, not even in peek summer, I hate cold water… Bring a wetsuit!

Taxi through town 10 min was 6€
Pooch dinner with first class meat and wine was 30€
Normal lunch 4,2€
Coffee was 1,2€
Sharkdiving was 53€ in the Aquarium tank
Sharkdiving in a cage in the ocean full day was 140€
Hotels its good for all kinds of wallets, we had a five star designers hotel Villa Zest with only 7 rooms and fantastic service and cost 135€ including breakfast per night.

A weekend was far to short in Cape, I have to go back

Diving with sharks at last

Oh dear, I’m still so full of adrenaline.

I manage to get to dive in Two Oceans Aquarium by the Water Front in Cape

Town. They have a 2 million liter seawater tank full of Sharks, mantas, fishes and turtles

I met with the dive master at 10.45 for short instructions and to put on the diving gears. You have to have an open water diving license to be able to dive there. I was very nervous and of course my diving gear was broken, first the regulator, then the o-ring and the buckle to my weight belt broke and almost fell of on a turtle. After a lot of frustration I finally sat on the bottom of the tank and tried to relax with a shark bumping my head with her tailfin, relax… relax… breath slowly, I knew it was a she, because the dive master pointed her out before we went in and she had a big scratch on the side

– Don’t get close to her, she will not bite, she has been fed, but she’s a bit bitchy, he said. I notice…! That bump got my mask full of saltwater.

With the GoPro camera on my hand wrist I got some nice films, not brilliant since its my first time using it under water. I was filled with a humble love for the beautiful creatures swimming around me. I big joy apart from diving in this amazing aquarium was to see my husband and more than a hundred visitors behind the glass waving at me, I got so exited that I didn’t see a huge manta approaching me, it took me by surprise that I lost control and fell on my back onto the ground, I started to laugh my ass off, it was so funny and once again I got my mask filled with saltwater

I can go on and on about this 30 minutes dive, every little detail was absolutely amazing
- all of you that have dive license please go there, it’s a memory for life! Sweetling David and all sharkscared people, this is a fantastic way to learn to get to know them, we are on the bottom list their menu

I left the aquarium 13.30 with a huge smile, a shark tooth I picked from the bottom of the tank, and ordered fish for lunch, how bizarre!!!!………

Finally in Cape Town!

WOW what a place, they got everything!

Adventure, beauty, nature, good food, a wild mix of people and cultures, buzz and chill.

Yesterday I left Johannesburg after a very emotional journey though the history of the blacks of South Africa and their hard struggle. Coming from a safe and secure country of Sweden, its quite heartbreaking to visit Soweto, even if it’s been modernized, it’s still a disaster in some areas.

Visiting three museums of apartheid, a few tears fell but I feel so hopeful for a more just future.

Today we had a nice long walk and bus ride through the city of Cape Town and up to the top of Table Mountain, its 1 km, aprox 3 Eifel towers high and a stunning view!

Not to hard to trek compare to my Kilimanjaro trek… even for a sick husband.

When finally got to the sea level again we decided to visit

Campus Bay, really trendy surfers beach with Celeb wine bars and restaurants, the houses and apartments

surrounding the beach were to die for

The Shark-dive tour tomorrow got cancelled due to rough seas, but… I managed to find a last minute solution which is really cool…

More tomorrow

Johannesburg trauma

After two days in Johannesburg and two visits to the emergency hospital I’m starting to relax and will look around this cool city.
They got my husband in an ambulance from the airplane after a bad infection in his stomach, and when we checked in to SAS Radisson blue, they upgraded us to an executive suite.
5 in the morning we had to visit the hospital again and at 9 the hotel drove my poor husband 300m to his meeting in a limo! We LOVE VIP treatments…

Tonight we will have an African dinner with a few of my judge colleagues who live here. I work extra as a skydivejudge for artistic skydiving and formation skydiving. I met them first time in Russia during the world cup, it was a hard competition with 40 degrees heat and lots of forest fires.

Tomorrow I will visit Soweto and apartheid museum and some other interesting stuff while sick husband go to work

See you soon

South Africa adventure

Hi there

So nice to be here on Sweetliving blog.
I’m a guest blogger from Stockholm Sweden and will share some of my adventure with
I am 42 years married to my soul mate a British bloke.
I have two children 18 and 8 years.
I am an adventurer, mother, wife, career woman and time optimist trying to mix my life in harmony. My motto is to do the utmost of my life and not to be afraid of crossing my comfort zone (or that of my husbands, which is fun to see when he feels a little nervous)

I just recently returned from a fantastic trek to the top of Kilimanjaro with Fair Travel.
Maybe I share that crazy week with you later, but this time I’m writing from the airport on my way to South Africa.
I have the big fortune to follow my amazing husband on his business trip, he always regrets taking me...

- wow lets stay a few extra days and go shark diving and climbing Table Mountain!!
- Shit! he thinks and regret badly even mentioning the trip... but she is doing it again...

It also happens that Sweetliving David is extremely phobic to sharks, so this trip I will dedicate to him and my poor husband and all of you people who are scared of WHITE SHARKS.

I prepared my GoPro camera and let you follow me under water to meet the mean killing machines and other fun stuff I come across.

Anyway, time to leave the comfort of the lounge and start this little adventure, our hand luggage is bursting at the seems, I hate putting it in the hold, soooo slow at the other end when you want to run out the airport and start the fun. I always travel only hand luggage wherever I go.

I also send my love to Sweetliving Hella on an other part of the planet, China, and her wingwalking adventures. Fly safe!

Blue skys and Blue clear water!

Lova

First airshow day

Late evening, right before bedtime.

Today has been very…. I do no. Different in a bad way.

The airshow started good. Really cool opening with fireworks, continuing  with Skip and Jurgis showing a great aerobatic display with pyro effects!

A couple of more displays later we stood ready on Catwalk. Engine was running, we where standing next to the runway, ready and waiting for our turn. Looking at a fighter doing his show. Something gave a bad feeling inside watching it. And when he was leaving display area, it happened. 

Suddenly the airplane turn over and went straight toward the ground. I couldn't believe what I saw. The fighter kept going straight down and disappeared in the ground with a cloud of fire and black smoke. Next to it, one parachute hang in the sky.

Still cant believe its for real. I've been thinking so many times this might happen, and now it did. Luckily it landed on an empty field. I can say no more about the accident, cause no facts been released about what happened.

As the accident was taken care of, the show continued with great performances and all safe flights. But it was weird, so weird.

Todays was friday, as you can se from the carpet in the …………. :) They change every day! 

The airshow finished early afternoon, and we went back to the hotel. A shower then hit downtown for shopping! Well, shopping buckets, soap and more towels to clean the airplanes ;)

To light up the finnish of the post, here's some funny spellings!

All for today.

Stay safe and take care of each other out there :)

Good night! xxx Hella

Some team airplanes nicely in a row with our Wasp in front here. More cloudy today. Whats cloud and whats smog? Sometimes hard to say ;)

Fwd: At airshow in China :)

Hey! 

Her comes a loooong post!

Last post didn't even contained all text I wrote so I must add some extra ;)

Well, those bags I posted i pic of, I told u  little whats in'em. Since I will continue travel after the airshow I brought everything needed for surviving some backpacking and hiking. Got everything in those bags between fancy dresses and high heels to hiking boots, first aid kit and a trangria…

Flights to China went well, except that my computer didn't start, taking the battery off  and on a couple of times help. Then the internet is very on an off. 

We don't spent many hours at the hotel, only for dinner and sleeping.

I like the hotel, its ok. Xifei Hotel, in Xi'an. 5 star, I got 2 (!!) big beds, and more space than home almost ;) Beds in China are rock hard, but I solved it moving one madras to the other, so its double up! Cousy :)

First day here we spent at the hangar… well, as all days on airshows! Third time here and all feels as before, some new teams, some met-before-teams and friends. Think this show will be a great one! :) CATWALK (the wingwalking airplane I stand on) will perform twice a day, as the only display doing that! We have a tiny camera attached and will send live TV for 600 millions chinese!! Thats unrealistic…. Today we where interviewed by CCTV three times. Hope something good came out of it ;)

Benny making some adjustments on Python :)

Ever seen as tiny babanas?

Briefing in chinese/english.

First day here (Tuesday) was a bit rainy, yesterday (wednesday) was better and today (thursday) was warm and sunny, lovely!! And forecast for airshowsdays fri-sat-sun looks very good. The rain killed most of the smog for some days, much fresher air…

Food here is mostly great! But some is also bit more exiting than others. 

For breakfast:

To end....

This dude bit me! I still have a swollen mark on my thigh! 

Ok, not only his fault, I sat down him....

First showday today!

Speak later :)

xxx Hella

Time to travel again!

Summer has been really nice, I've spent most of my time at dz Skydive Stockholm. Not jumping like crazy, mostly packing parachutes.
Season is about to end, and now I will go with Scandinavian Airshow to China for airshow, third year in a row! :)

As always I try to see something extra, this time I will meet up with Linda after the airshow to see zhiangjiajie and walk on the great wall! Hopefully pass by Shanghai too.

THIS WEEKEND, 19th - 21st of August, WE OFFER ALL OUR CUSTOMERS A 13 % DISCOUNT ON THE GO-PRO HD HELMET CAMERA! ALSO OUR OTHER CAMERAS WILL BE ON SALE WITH GREAT PRICES! CHECK OUT THE WEBSHOP AND ORDER NOW! ONLY THIS WEEKEND, LIMITED STOCK SO HURRY UP. A SWEETLIVING VOUCHER WILL BE INCLUDED IN ALL PURCHASES, THIS WILL GRANT YOU UP TO A 10 % DISCOUNT ON ANY FUTURE BOOKED SWEETLIVING EVENT!

DON´T MISS THIS OPPERTUNITY, SHOP IS OPEN!

Good morning!

What could be a better start of the day, if not fly along the mountain in åre? :)

Now Im off for downhill!

Life is sweet!

Sent from my iPhone
Hella Stening

Life is to enjoy!
Sweetliving.se
Airshow.se

Windsufing & SUP @ Varberg, Sweden

On tuesday I went down o Varberg in the south of Sweden to attend the 4H national camp for youths.

It´s the organisations biggest event in Sweden and since I´ve been a member of 4H since I was 6 years old and been to 15 of these camps before I felt like I had to participate on this years camp aswell.

And on the same day I arrrived they had different activities that you could participate in. This is a great oppertunity to try and learn things you never done before. In my case windsurfing and SUP (Stand Up Paddleboard) was two of these things.

Windsurfing was awsome and funny as hell. It took a few tries but eventually I got up on the board and even learned to turn a few times, very proud of myself I must say. I also tried SUP. Not as fun as windsurfing but a fun sport to compete in I can imagine. I learned that SUP in the US is a bigger sport than Windsurfing, Kitesurfing and Surfing together, hard to believe but true. We only had a few hours so I didn´t get as much time as I wanted on the board but I´m definitely doing this again!

Thanks to Tobias Andersson @ Fahlen Surf for the lessons !

Roll out Västerås, Sweden

Wingwalking display today!

4 tandem skydives!

On saturday Sweetliving had four happy girls jumping of an airplane on an altitude of 4000 meters!

Our twin otter is back!

On Friday evening our beloved Erik-Erik landed at stockholm skydive DZ! In brand new colors and wings :)

Our Mongol Rally Vehicle!

A Mercedes ambulance!!
We picked it up today at Mantorp Rally Park and drove some laps on the race course! great fun and got some fun videos :)

Ice climbing on the schedule today :)

After a really early morning fixing my horses and two (good!) meetings in town re sweetliving I drove to Stockholm to meet up with a friend of mine to join him ice climbing!

I havent done it since the course in 2006! LONG time ago. And it was as great fun as I remembered it! Hope it wont be another 5 yrs till next time ;) Of course the GoPro cams where mounted here and there :) 

Some video editing is on the go, just need some time to finnish it, and then the problem with good free music. Any recommendations anyone?

Tomorrow is pick up day for the Mongol Rally Vehicle!! I will send you a photo when we arrive there!

Wish you all a great weekend :)

Door to hell...

.... is one of our goals to see along the road, during the Mongol Rally drive. Looking at photos you will understand the name. This is a gas-leaking enormous hole in Karakum desert in Turkmenistan. In 1971 biologists where drilling for gas, the ground collapsed and left this 80 meter wide gap. And leaking natural gas is still burning!

Click here to see photos!
(I did it the lazy way....) ;P

We also bought our vehicle! But we don't have any photos yet, so we wont tell you now. But is cool. So cool. Hopefully pick up will be this weekend. And test-driving of course ;)

Getting there!
Otherwise, its just work work work! Finally I've started to editing some videos. Hope I get time enough to finnish them and upload them here for you :)
Got some of our first tandem skydive for the year book! Cant wait to meet you at the dropzone! Well they actually booked months ago, but now its getting close :)

Good night everybody :)
Myself, I got two more illustrations to do. Sleep might be for next life?
x Hella

Planning the route

So many countries! We will probably pass trough 20 countries... And visas?! Now we're researching which ones needs visa, and which ones thats even possible to enter. And not in war... Trough hole europe will be pretty easy but from Turkey trough i.e. Iran, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, gobi desert and to Mongolia will be a long rough hell of a ride! This roadtrip might become uptil 2000 miles... Not bad ey!

Mongol Rally 2011!

This is insane! I will participate in the Mongol Rally this summer! Me and Gustav (Teamleader) will drive from London to Ulaan Baator, its about 2000 swe miles....

It will take about 4-6 weeks and you are not allowed a fancy car or gps. Most of the roads lacks of condition and its not the safest countries to travel trough...

But what an adventure! Craaaazy!

On thursday we will have bigger meeting to plan the route, calculate money and start to search for more sponsors. So from now on you can follow our preparations here :)

Read more at:

mongolrally.theadventurists.com

and on our website:

Mongolrally-TeamSweden

and like us on Facebook:

http://www.facebook.com/mongolrally-teamsweden

Now I can barely go to sleep....!

Hoegaarden with swe skydivers :)

We spontanious gathered tonight for beer and smiles :) Life is good at home too ;)

More snow!

Yesterday was grey and rainy and melting snow. When I woke up this morning a few centimeters of new white snow covered the yard at it's really beautiful :)

Me and my beloved fellow Robbie Williams is reunited, now we´re of to the stables. Im riding and he might go and chase a rabbit or something...... haha :)

 Back to daily routines. I still miss Al Ain and all cool guys! Memory for life, thats for sure. To read more about the airshows, check out WWW.AIRSHOW.SE to reas more about Scandinavian Airshow. Jacob Holländer is the owner, manager and pilot. 

Have a great day! Hella

Planning new trips...

We landed in Arlanda, stockholm at 8.30, delayed by an extra stop fot refuil. Me and Lisa is still here planning and dreaming of more travelling! ;) Rest of the team left the airport and Jacob, Benny and Magnus will stay 2 more days to finnish packing.
Here in Sweden its snow, cold and grey. Longing for more sunshine and adventures, life on the road is the best...

Riding quarterbike in the sanddunes!

Todays highlight and maybe even the trips funniest time was when me and Lisa joined Shawn, Cody, Jessica and some locals out to the desert.  They brought their bikes and we got to ride on the back of quarterbikes! See this photos..... more will come later on :)

Gotta continue packing! Feels boring its all over and everybody is leaving.... :(

Bye for now!

Day after.....

Last days was really good except that there was a hold for a couple of hours when some VIP landed on the airport next to display area. Pretty strange...... so Python did not fly. Catwalk is halfway disassembled.

It was a great party lat night and now we just had breakfast so we gotta run for the bus!

Speak later! :)

What a great day AGAIN!

I just had  fab day of flying and hanging out with cool dudes! been flying and met more cool teams, love'em! Wish too see u soon! Gnite verevybody! <3 <3

What a great day!

This morning we flew 9 airplanes and 1 helicopter over the desert for photos and video shooting. We had PYTHON and CATWALK in the air. And 3 wingwalkers! It was so cool and pretty hard, because we had to fly faster than we usually do to keep speed with the faster airplanes. The funny thing is that they flew slowy.... 

Look at these photos, do I have to tell you I love to fly?!

Later on the show started and everything went well, we ran around playing cats as always after the flight and got interviewed by tv's n stuff :)

Billy the Badger followed me on the top wing :) He fly for charity! Good guy ;)

I cant explain to you what a good time Im having... and all these sweet people I learnt to know, how I will miss them! Hopefully I will meet you all again on airshows in the future :) And... facebook is good shit! Just had a beer with my team and some other favorites, now we all have to get some rest for tomorrows show. It was a rough flight this morning, 40 minutes on the wing is not a game :P

On the photos you can see our new suits! Better or not? :)

Gnite! xxx