At Double wars I swim

And walk in the forest.

Double Wars is the perfect holiday for me: I have been on the brink of exhaustion for at least four years, working much more than my arthritic body can handle - being in ciosntant pain is not only tiring for the body, but for your brain too. And in my case it has led to other severe illnesses, including me nearly dying from a hole in my duodenum. Unfortunately the agency which handles sick benefits in Sweden ("Försäkringskassan) doesn't give a rat's ass if I die, or if I get more and more complication from working more than I can handle. So, as you might now, I got so exhausted in the end of November last year that I am now on 100% sick leave. Something that could have been avoided. But, I digress. Double Wars means that I can't work, I can't do stuff on my computer, and people can't reach me. So it is a wonderful time to just get away from everything.

However, I also have much more need for solitude than most people who attend, so I spend a considerable time walking in the woods, and to the lake, where I usually swim, and then just sit and meditate in the sun.
No matter how cold it is there is usually at least one day with good enough weather for me to swim when we're at Double wars.

And since that is such an important part of my Double Wars experience I didn't want to be without it in this my Double Wars-at-home-experience.

Unlike Double Wars, where there's five minutes walk through a mostly flat forest, at home this means a rise of  95 metres and about an hours walk. But it was lovely, both the walk and the dip in the rather cold lake. Werll,actually I bathed in two different lakes, it was after all a c. 20 kilometres walk all in all.

On my way there

It was lovely in the sun after the cold water.
Of course I have a linen bath towel. I made it (as in hemmed it, I didn't weave it) for Visby medieval week in 1998 and I use it a lot!

I had walked to the lake in modern clothes, but after the dip it felt SO good to get into my linen shift and wool gown. There's nothing quite like that feeling, after a bath.

So: shift on, braids up, and Birgitta cap on.

And then gown, belt and shoes.

And then I walked some four kilometres until I got into the next lake, after which I switched back to mundanes, it works better when you walk through residential and industrial areas. Especially the shoes, at least when you have arthritis.

I also snapped a photo of some beeches, because that is what you find at the Double Wars site.