Upplandsleden/ Gästrikeleden stage 16 Långhäll - Hemlingeby (Gävle) 19 km

Sunny, windless and 16-17 degrees but still the clear air and beautiful colors of autumn. Maybe the forest is at its best in October! We were back at the nice rest area on the border between Uppland and Gästrikland. Upplandsleden is over so we continue on Gästrikeleden. In addition to the fact that the forest feels more northern in its character, the hiking trail is marked with the signs for a snowmobile trail.

The stage is easy to walk and has almost no difference in altitude. It offers varied hiking in several different habitats. The initial hike passes through Långhällsskogen nature reserve and then goes through an agricultural landscape with scattered farms. During one section we walk next to the remarkable Korsnäs chute. A three mile long wooden aqueduct built in the late 1800s when Korsnäs moved its production from Falun to the port of Gävle. The last part goes through the area belonging to the Hemlingeby outdoor area. The well-visited area has many paths and trails and we pass several beautifully located and well-maintained rest areas.

We as well as an elderly couple we meet when we pass the farmhouse in Kubbo are dismayed that the trail has been completely destroyed by ATVs and motorcycles. In our many hikes on the trails around Stockholm, this is the first time we have encountered this problem and we can guess that it is because this area is sometimes very inaccessible and it is therefore difficult to catch the offenders.

In order to complete this stage, you need to park a car at the snowmobile parking lot just under a kilometer east of the wind shelter on the border between Uppland and Gästrikland. The site is accessed via an increasingly narrow gravel and forest road from the southern part of Skutskär. The second car is parked at the slalom slope in Hemlingeby outdoor area south of Gävle. Whatever the signs and brochures say, this stage is 19 kilometers.