On our last day in Falun, Hanna took me up to Lugnet (which literally means “Calmness” in Swedish).

Lugnet is a large sport complex located in Falun, Sweden. 58 of the Swedish Sports Confederation’s 67 special sports can be practiced there. There are 6 full sized indoor pitches in the area where everything from dance to association football can be played or performed. There is an ice arena including an indoor hockey rink, an outdoor hockey rink, a bandy field and a curling hall. Lugnet is also Sweden’s national cross-country skiing centre and often hosts one part of the cross-country skiing World Cup.

Source: Wikipedia

Although it’s a sports complex, we didn’t go there to watch any desperate skiers practice in summertime (there were none!), but rather to watch the fabulous view.

The view was nice despite the rain. I guess the lesson to be learned is that there is beauty in all things, sunshine or not!

My Falun hostess!

Hanna & I

Looking into the camera and trying to avoid the rain…

Having posed so well out in the rain, we rewarded ourselves with a cup of coffee and an ice cream!

The coffee

and the ice cream!

Not to forget the people who enjoyed it!

With a recharged level of energy, we then headed out for a long nice walk through Falu city.

And having heard so much about the Falu legend “Fet Mats” (a man who actually existed and lived more exiting life dead than alive)during our excursion to the Falu Mine, we went to visit his grave, since it was on our way.

Fet-Mats Israelsson (? - 1677)

In 1719 miners in the Falun copper mine found apparently intact dead body from a tunnel that had been long unused. When they took the body up, they found out that it was Fet-Mats Israelsson who had disappeared 42 years earlier. His former fiancée, Margaret Olsdotter, recognized him.

In the open air the body dried up and turned hard as a rock. People gave it a nickname “petrified miner”. Fet-Mats Israelsson was put on display on Stora Kopparberget.

When the naturalist Carolus Linnaeus visited, he noticed that Fet-Mats was not petrified but just covered with vitriol. He stated that as soon as the vitriol would evaporate, the body would begin to decay.

That proved to be correct. Fet-Mats Israelsson was finally buried December 21, 1749.

Source: Wikipedia

Here is the evidence! The tombstone reads: “In memory of Mats Israelsson who died while working in the Falu Mine 1677″.