Photo: Twilight glow of winter’s polar night, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. December 11, 2016. 10:49

As December arrives the Lofoten is soon about to enter the mørketid, otherwise known as the polar night – the time in which the sun does not rise above the horizon here in the north.

It has already been dark for a while, and so the sun a little above, or a little below the horizon doesn’t make too much of a difference to the day during the last weeks. But as the sun finally drops into the sea, even that weak bit of direct light will be missed as we enter a month of twilight and darkness.

Last year, living in Skjelfjord, I think I noticed the change to the mørketid much more as the sun was visible over the southern horizon until it finally vanished into the sea. Where I live now, with mountains closing in my valley to the south, the sun hasn’t been visible from my house since mid October. And so if I don’t leave home, as when I was stuck for 5 days due to a rockslide, I can only see the sun shining on the distant mountains.

I took this image on my way home from Leknes one morning. After what had seemed like endless weeks of storms and wind, the Islands suddenly fell silent. With an hour to go till noon, the day would become a bit brighter, but not much.

For the time being, I still enjoy the experience of the darkness. But next year I’ll probably find myself in Spain or Portugal for a week or two to refill on the vitamin D!

Camera Info:
Nikon D800
Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8
32mm
ISO 100
f 10
1/4 second
WB Daylight

Photo: Large rock-slide blocks the road to Myrland, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. November 17, 2017. 12:14

Thursday evening sometime between 20:00 and 22:00 nature send a reminder of who is in charge. A friend and come over for a short visit to checkup on a project we are working on, leaving after a couple hours. But soon I heard a knock on my door and she had come back, saying there were some rocks in the road. There had been a large rock in the road earlier in the day, but it had been cleared, so maybe she though it was just the darkness that made it look like more. So we hopped in my van to check things out.

Approaching the scene in the darkness, my headlamps lit up the first initially small boulders – which hadn’t been there when I passed by in the late afternoon, before illuminating large blocks in the distance, completely covering the road. Hmm, no one is getting by that this night…

In the morning I returned to checkout the scene again. It was indeed the largest rockslide I’ve seen since moving here. As information spread, I was interviewed by the news agency NRK, and we began to find out that my little village, of merely a dozen residents, would be cut off for a while – The original estimate of a Saturday opening being extended to Monday.

And so I sit at home, with unexpected guests and glad I generally keep enough food on the shelves for just this type of situation. Saturday I will miss an event I was hoping to attend, but that is life up here…

As a bit of a side note. Despite the fact that there are clearly posted ‘no stopping’ (not just the ‘no parking’) and rockfall signs for this section of the road, many people car/van/motorhome camp along there all summer long. If it is not too late in the evening and I see people out and about, I will often stop and give them a bit of a warning that they might not be in the best place. On any given night it is not likely that something will happen, and it makes me feel like an asshole, possibly interrupting some romantic moment or ruining their perfect camping spot with the midnight sun shining in the north. But I drive this road on an almost daily basis and see what falls from above. It would be nice if people listened the signs, but they don’t. So I’ll probably have to be an asshole next summer as well, telling people that they should move along…

And in fact, along with some friends, I remember telling a van to move which was parked in this exact spot of the avalanche sometime in July. The amount of fresh small rockfall and debris present there should have already indicated that it was a poor camping location. Had they been there this Thursday evening, they would now be buried under tons of rubble.

Camera Info:
Nikon D800
Nikon 70-200mm f/4
200mm
ISO 320
f 5
1/125 second
WB Daylight

Photo: Northern Lights over Skjelfjord, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. January 31, 2017. 22:56

Today is the last day of March, and with that, soon it will be the end of the aurora season here on Lofoten. Though there are still a couple weeks left, so don’t fear, if you just arrived!

Each day, the sun continues its journey to the north, the days growing by around 1 hour per week. And with the clocks having changed last weekend, I found myself driving home at dusk last night, only to look at my watch as see that it was almost 9:00 pm! And I hadn’t had dinner yet…

For photography, the days are getting long if you want sunrise, sunset, and northern lights all in the same day. However for life here in the north, it is perfect! The mountains are covered in snow and there is enough time to get up some pretty decent peaks during the week for those with normal working hours.

Back to the photo. I saw the aurora out my window, which from my house in Skjelfjord, doesn’t happen all that often due to the high mountains surrounding me. I headed out to drive around a little, but the aurora was glowing in a way that it filled almost the entire sky, and almost looked fake really – like I had just turned some clouds green in Photoshop! So I wasn’t really happy with anything I captured, until I drove home and parked in my driveway.

The aurora was beginning to increase a bit again, and with the fjord perfectly calm, the reflections were nice. So I walked over to a small jetty near my house and shot for a while. The lack of moonlight meant light pollution was something of an issue. But luckily the aurora was strong enough to overpower most of it, keeping the mountains greenish instead of mercury-lamp orange.

And the same as the aurora season is soon ending, so will my view of these mountains. I have exciting news that I will write about late.

Camera Info:
Nikon D800
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
14mm
ISO 1600
f 3.2
8 seconds
WB Daylight