Sarek National Park(Sweden)

Sarek National Park(Sweden)

Sarek National Park (Swedish: Sareks nationalpark) is a national park in Jokkmokk Municipality, in the province Lapland in northern Sweden. Sarek borders the national parks Stora Sjöfallet and Padjelanta. The national park is popular with hikers and mountaineers, but not suitable for beginners.

The national park is roughly circular with an average diameter of about 50 kilometres (31 mi). The park has no marked trails, no accommodations, and only two bridges. Furthermore, the area is among the most rainy in Sweden, which makes hiking dependent on weather conditions. It is also not uncommon to encounter streams that are hard and dangerous to wade across without proper experience.

The Rapa River delta is considered one of Europe's prettiest, and the summit of mount Skierffe offers an overlook of this ice covered trough valley.

Most notably, the national park houses a number of high mountains of over 2,000 metres (6,600 ft). In fact, 6 of Sweden's 13 peaks over 2,000 meters are located inside the boundaries of the national park. Among these is the second highest mountain in Sweden, Sarektjåkkå. Sometimes the massif of Mt. Ahkka, located just north from Sarek National Park, is also included to the geographical Sarek, which makes the number of 2,000 meter peaks inside the park 8 instead of 6. The park also houses around 200 peaks that reach 1,800 metres (5,900 ft) or higher. Due to the long walk up, the mountains are seldom climbed.

At 1,800 meters meters above sea-level lies the Pårte observatory, built in the early 1900s, because of the efforts of Axel Hamberg. The construction material had to be carried up on back.

There are around 100 glaciers in Sarek National Park. Together with a few other national parks in Sweden, Sarek National Park is the oldest national park in Europe (1909–1910)