The sun is back. Long live the sun!

Toilet with a cold seat

New Years Eve in a cold place

A trip to Rostadalen, Dividalen National Park boundary.

A cold and beautiful place.

God jul - Christmas, Norway-style

Pre-Christmas in England, to celebrate Mum's birthday, then Christmas in Norway. Brilliant (utterly!) to have time at home, and yet nice to be back in Norway, also.

Reflecting, I have had the good fortune to spend Christmas in different places before. I've shared other people's Christmas days in New Zealand, Canada and Iceland. To be abroad is never the same as Christmas 'back in Blighty', but it is very wonderful nonetheless. You really don't know what to expect, so the experience of Christmas is a fresh and exciting surprise. And, Ah!The traditions of others... I'll never forget my mixture of fear (terror?) and delight at the live candles on the tree, when dancing and singing around the tree in Iceland (...great, but totally insane, insurance-wise, no?). Then there was joining into the snow golf tradition of playing golf with the neighbours and friends of my kind and generous friends the Ripley's, in Fort Macleod town, Alberta. Ha! That was one tradition that has not only survived but also enriched the years for that family, it appears: playing golf in the street The Day After The Day After Boxing Day with a club that is anything but a golf club (dangerous? Yes). And Boy! did we all get tipsy on cocktails at my friend Jo's, on her family's sheep farm in Otago, New Zealand! (the response to my question, "what shall I bring" was, "...a bottle of liquor" ;)).. Then, after learning how to make various delightful combinations of drinks with Callum and Matt, it suddenly poured rained from the heavens - right on cue, as the lamb was being roasted out on the grill on the lawn, and we were just settling down into a classic Southern hemisphere Christmas of winter sunshine and high temperatures....

So, to Norway (and to less talk of high temperatures)

Well, it started off with a stroke of Christmas luck - with me winning the almond in the rice-pudding dinner/dessert that you traditionally scoff on the eve before Christmas Eve. I'm proud I won, so you get to hear the whole story!

It's called risgrøt and is cream, rice, some tasty spices and... a hidden almond, buried deep (and blanched, for detectability-reduction...)... He he! - and I won the marzipan pig prize for finding the nut treat. Er, small problem: didn't know the rules. How was I to possibly know you are not supposed to EAT the almond evidence....? and if you eat the bloody evidence you don't get the massive marzipan pig prize. Hmm. Problem. Yep.

(Hmmm. I did show the evidence, but it was not so pretty - a half consumed almond is never much to look at!)

And then, to Lyngen, to see the family, exchange gifts, relax and... eat. Home-cooking, Norway-style, at its best. Pork chops, a broad range of home-made picked herring... and lots and lots of coffee and cake!

.. Add a trip in the snow-flurried darkness up to a mountain hut one afternoon and a massive fire in the woods up the valley (yes, those ARE Ferrero Rocher chocs you see there, melting beside the flames).... it all was pretty magical.

Cold. Dark. Warm. Christmas in Norway :)

Goodbye Sunshine, 2011

...it went from this, when it was impossible to escape the suns rays

To this moment, when we celebrate its departure, for two months...

(Pollfjellet summit, 1213m, the town of Skibotn seen in distance, below)

Sun Season Over

Oh! Those bare, stoney grey hills of Kvaløya, towering over their mountain lakes and marshes... All is now decked with snow. (Now, IF you were a small plant up there, you would be no doubt be reflecting: "oh, here we go again"... ). Rivers and streams are iceing up, and physically slowing down.

In Tromsø, the streets are also becoming rather less busy. I think that is a real sign of summer: people strolling casually about, in town. Time to waste, and Vitamin D to absorb - you can't spend enough time engaged in this activity, up here. And no one thinks on it as a waste of time either - everyone agrees with the importance of Summer Sun Worship.

On Sunday, the sun left us for its - shall we say - winter holiday for two months. The town almost sighs audibly with relief - the memory of the manic pressure of the midnight sun fades right away. Tourists are fewer, and locals are less inclined to crowd the streets, loitering and recalling the time of day whilst they soak up the suns rays. (It suddenly got too cold and wet to do this). As the street buskers start to look a bit chilly, it's indoor party time now ;)

So...it's the pre-snow ICEY season starting. At this time of the year, I think about how difficult it must be to be an eldery person, up here. You have to be very, very careful how you walk, and very, very determined to get outside! But you manage.

Summer was like a tonic to us. And those seemingly endless hours of sunlight have set us up, and prepared our systems to manage the next two months. And, oh! for the beautiful, blue-light of winter. The quietness of new snow, and the palette of dawn and dusk colours....

(...ah!...once the ICEY season is over ;))

(can you spot the Norwegian troll climbing up the mountainside in this picture ;) ???)

Snow is in the air...

Yes! Many kilometres and many hours of geese-counting now behind me, autumn now here, and winter approaching. The days are drawing in - fast. You see the difference in the the light daily. But it's great to have cooler weather, (the dog appreciates it, at any rate...) and I am really looking forward to winter now (compared to 'sort-of-not' a few weeks back).

We have had fresh snow at 800m recently. I was in the National Park, hiking with Dovre, the other weekend. Ah! Nothing quite a magical as fresh snow on the peaks, striking autumn sunlight, blueberries for breakfast, and snow flurries in the air....

Empty roads and geese on my mind

After months of 'not very much work at all' since Christmas, I have - finally - recently been working around the clock (or so it felt at times!) - surveying greylag geese in Finnmark and Troms counties. The round trip from Tromsø is about 2000 km. So, this means hour of driving on near-empty roads (I swear one day I saw only 2 cars in 2 hours of driving...) with an agitated dog in the back of the vehicule.

It also means outstanding northern landscape to admire, and very nice places to camp out. It's been work the time and effort.

.... and surveying on empty roads is just as well, considering I have only just now found out the all-important road regulation to "give way to the right" here in Norway. Ah well! Not bad to learn the highway code here after a mere three years of driving here....

(crikey)

The secret to a long and happy life?

It's maintained by some that the true secret of health, happiness, and hence a long life is, above all, the beneficial value of good sleep. (Other properties such as personal financial wealth and which country you are from are probably less important than we place value on). In the sleep department, huskies have an unrivaled sleeping ability, I really think... There must be great benefits to being able to snooze soundly for hours at a time - after all, noise and disturbance is to a minimum, once you stop fidgeting and the drifting snow is firmly in place. Warm, comfortable and quiet. That must be beneficial to your immune system and health...

Enjoy the photos! And remember what's important :)

Introducing the Alaska husky - an adaptable breed: able to sleep whenever and wherever...

...forest understory is pretty darn comfy, but decked under snow shouldn't be underrated either! ;)

A good way to live, don't you think?

My Easter

Easter in the UK is etched in my memory as camping on the Devonshire coast, cold mornings and sunny afternoons, (oh, and pub lunches, in between sandwiches gritty with sand, consumed on the beach). Flowers. Grass. Lambs in the fields. You know - that sort of thing.

On Easter Sunday this year it was quite different. Mostly alpine. Not a lot of beach around.

Mind you, it was still undeniably 't-shirt weather' and not without sunburn! (...and believe it or not, the sea is only a few kilometres down the valley)