Friday Photo #628 – Stormy Sea

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Photo: Lofoten Sjark – fishing boat heading to sea in stormy winter weather, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. January 28, 2022. 11:34

A thousand years before the oil was discovered, tørrfisk – air-dried cod from Lofoten was already one of Norway’s most important exports, and that importance continues to this day in keeping the livelihood of Lofoten. But now day, its not men in wool suits and row boats braving the cold winter waters, but modern boats, able to do the work of a hundred men. But the winter weather is still the same and on days like this photo, it is not an easy task to be at sea.

It is mostly coincidence that cod migrate from the far north to spawn in the waters around Lofoten during winter, which happens to be the best conditions for air-drying the fish in the cold and windy Lofoten climate. Too cold and the fish will freeze before drying. Too warm or not enough wind and the fish will spoil. Lofoten is the balance of all the elements.

January is still early in the fishing season most years, so many of the wooden drying racks – hjell – you will see around are probably still empty. And many of the racks, particularly around rorbuer cabins are no longer in use today: partly due to the smell annoying tourists staying in the cabins, but mostly do to moving to larger, more industrial sized areas where tractors can be driven underneath to hoist up the buckets of fish – which are then still hung by hand.

Weather can also have a big effect on each year’s catch. Many days like this photo and it will probably be a long and difficult winter for many fishermen. On clear and calm nights, you can see the lights of the boats filling the horizon as they pull in their catch below the dancing northern lights. I hope this winter brings good fishing for those at sea and good aurora to my guests over the next two months.

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6
500mm
ISO 1250
f 5.6
1/640 Seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #627 – Northern Lights

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Photo: Northern lights and moonlit mountains over Vik beach, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. January 24, 2019. 00:13

The media hype around this year’s solar maximum and, ‘OMG!!! Best time in 10 years to see northern lights!’ No doubt means Lofoten will be busier than ever this coming winter season. But I’ll tell you a little secret – there are always northern lights on Lofoten, and most anywhere in the aurora oval. Some periods may be more quiet that other, such as January 2024, which otherwise should have been very active, but that has as much to do with the earth’s magnetic field, as it does with the activity from the sun. And of course the biggest factor for Lofoten, the weather!

If you had been to Lofoten during the previous months, then you’ll mostly have been disappointed with your northern lights chasing, as there has been a near continuous cloudy sky and stormy weather over most of northern Norway. No matter how active the sun is, if you can’t see the sky, then you cant see the northern lights. On my own, I usually only go out under ideal conditions the days, as so far that has only been a handful of nights this season.

But the good news is! There is no on-off switch for the northern lights. They will be here next year, the year after, and many years to come.

Here is an old photo from January 2019, during the solar minimum when the sun was supposed to relatively inactive. And yet here is an aurora filled sky over moonlit mountain peaks. And I have dozens of similar nights each year for the last decade. So don’t worry, the northern lights aren’t going to be ‘over’ if you don’t visit the north this year. Next year will be fine as well, and all the years into the future…

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Sigma 14mm f/1.8
14mm
ISO 2000
f 1.8
1.3 Seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #626 – Twilight Moon

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Photo: Moon in twilight sky over Skolmen, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. January 3, 2023. 11:19

Welcome to 2025! When I first registered 68north.com in 2010 as a small portfolio for my growing collection of travel images from Lofoten, I never imagined what the journey over the next 15 years would have been. Nor did I image when I first started writing these Friday Photo posts over 10 years ago that I would still be here writing one every week. The world is a lot different today than it was then, especially the world of travel, photography, and information.

In some ways I still have one foot in that old world. I still don’t use a gps when hiking, I’m not that into video and social media, I’ve never put any advertising or sponsored content (other than my own products) on this website, and I’m still writing blog posts. With the growing presence of AI in both imagery and words, perhaps a hand written site like this is more important than ever. Even if no one reads blogs anymore amongst the increasing supply of fantasy depicted as reality. At least the information is here should anyone come searching for it.

And a new year means the days are getting brighter as the Polar Night is quickly coming to an end. Weather permitting, it might be possible to see the first half of the sun tomorrow as it floats across the southern horizon. That said, these first days are the year as still quite short. Here, a waxing gibbous moon is just about to pass over Skolmen mountain in the distance.

Opposite of the midnight sun, there is the midday moon during winter here in Lofoten. Whereas in ’normal’ latitudes, a full moon will rise opposite of sunset. When sunset doesn’t occur, and the sun is below the horizon in the south, the moon can be above the horizon at noon towards the north – 180˚ opposite the sun.

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6
330mm
ISO 200
f 5.3
1/40 Second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #625 – Dark Mornings

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Photo: Dark morning on Hamnøy bridge, Moskenesøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. December 31, 2020. 09:21

The darkest day of the year has now passed and the sun once gain begins its journey north and in only 5 months the midnight sun will shine all day long over Lofoten. But before that happens there is still 4 more months of northern lights filling the evening sky and hopefully many days of good skiing in March and April – once my photo workshop season finishes.

For a short while longer though, night will remain a strong presence over Lofoten. Here at 09:21 in the morning in late December it is darker than it will ever be in May. But once that first sun arrives a week into the new year, it feels like the days accelerate at an amazing speed. It is a swift transition from lazy mornings to having to set the alarm quite early to head out for sunrise – and sunsets changing from late afternoon to dinner time. Each week I wake up 30 minutes earlier to match the pace of the northward moving sun. Which by late March the decision then becomes: Get up incredibly early, or just simply stay up until sunrise and then sleep. Needless to say, though of us working as photo guides here in the far north have terrible sleep patterns!

On this New Year’s eve morning I was actually hoping to photography the full moon between the mountains in the background. But what was forecast for clear sky over Reine – looking directly up, ended up with a cloudy horizon, and thus no moon to see on this morning. I spend dozens of hours each winter standing on this bridge, but not often when it’s empty. And even though the iconic shot is too my right, I liked the contrast of the yellow lights and street against the deep blue morning sky of the Polar Night.

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8
24mm
ISO 100
f 9
8 Seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #624 – The Longest Night

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Photo: Himmeltindan rising over Storsandnes beach during the polar night, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. December 20, 2019. 11:38

The brightest hour on the darkest day, or there about. With a clear sky it is only a soft twilight which shines over Lofoten during the winter solstice. Tomorrow, the sun will reach its lowest point in the sky before the circle north begins again in the never ending ebb and flow of days and nights north of the arctic circle.

I don’t do well during the Polar Night – I am much more a summer person! The endless darkness feels like a smothering blanket at times. And this year’s consistently bad weather hasn’t helped – there is nothing fun about doing mechanical work on your vehicle in gale force winds and sideways rain. Fingers frozen, plastic brittle, and working by headlamp even at noon. In summer, I could work at any time of day whenever the weather improved, in winter, the moments are short and fleeting, and can be weeks in between. I actually had to drive to a friend’s house in Leknes to do some mechanical work the other week because the weather at my house and been endlessly stormy.

But when the sky does finally clear and the wind stops blowing the world can feel quite silent, almost like it is asleep. These soft, muted blue tones are all the fill the world on the northern side of the islands, with snow covered mountains rising towards the sky. These mountains that will be the first ones to greet the sun on its return to Lofoten next month. The seaside elevations will have to wait a few days longer, but eventually shadows will fall across the beaches again as well.

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Nikon 24-70mm f/2.8
32mm
ISO 64
f 11
30 Seconds
WB Daylight
6 stop ND filter

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Friday Photo #623 – Almost Night

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Photo: Clouds blow across the twilight sky from Vareid’s rocky coastline, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. December 14, 2021. 13:04

Lofoten is now a week into the Polar Night. But this year it might as well have started in mid November, such as the stormy weather has been. Again this week rain and wind have been shaking my house a majority of the time and many parking lots around Leknes would be better used as ice hockey rinks than something to try and walk across. And although the weather feels quite bad this year, it is still within normal – normally unpredictable and stormy.

Clouds and snow cover are the biggest determining factor for how bright the few hours of midday twilight will be. Heavy clouds and even noon will feel quite dark. Fresh snow and a clear sky and it might feel like you are in a candy coloured dream world as the land around you glows. So it is hard to describe in words what the polar night is, and perhaps it really isn’t anything beyond a time to slow down for a while. To not feel lazy that I’m not on top of a mountain at midnight waiting for sunset. A time to be content to sit in front of the computer and not constantly look what is happening in the world outside.

On this afternoon I ventured around the corner to the coastline at Vareid. In the full winter season this is a popular stretch of road and rental vans will fill every pullout each sunrise and sunset. But in December, the road is empty. I usually shoot closer to the sea, but it was a bit rough this day, so I stayed up along the road. The clouds were moving swiftly across the sky, so only a minute exposure was needed to give them a nice soft look, and to contrast with the distant mountains – and the soft sea with the rocks.

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 14-30mm f/4
20mm
ISO 100
f 7.1
61 Seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #622 – The Night Is Coming

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Photo: Early afternoon darkness as Mørketiden – The Polar Night begins, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. December 8, 2020. 14:20

This weekend Lofoten will see its last sunlight of the year as the Mørketid – Polar Night begins. For me, it has already been many days since I last saw the sun, as this years grey and dreary weather has maintained a strong presence over the islands: stably unstable is the current forecast for the weekend.

Stably unstable. It kind of has a nice sound to it, despite meaning that you’ll probably don’t want to spent too much time outside. This autumn and start of winter has perhaps been the longest period of consistently poor weather since I moved to Lofoten in 2016. I guess this is the payback for nice summer. I’ve been needing to do some housework which requires me to be outside in relatively calm conditions – so stuff doesn’t go flying all over my yard, and lately it is only one afternoon every couple weeks where this is possible. And despite all the hype over the coming solar maximum, I have read many reports of frustrated northern lights chasers, even up in Tromsø, which is largely suffering the same weather as Lofoten.

I’ve only photographed on 1 day in the last 3 weeks, so this photo is from a couple years back. Only 14:20 in the afternoon, you can already feel the last moments of twilight before the darkness of night arrives.

Despite the overwhelming presence of darkness in the polar night, there are some brighter moments as well. I’ve put together a new article and gallery with images from Mørketiden.

POLAR NIGHT GALLERY

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Nikon 70-200 f/4
119mm
ISO 100
f 6.3
1.6 Second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #621 – Getting Wintry

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Photo: Snow covered Stornappstind mountain peak rises over Nappstraumen, Lofoten Islands, Norway. November 27, 2024. 13:04

The temperature has slowly dropped over the last week in what otherwise has been a mild and wet November. In fact, every month since May this year has been above average in temperature after a hot summer and stormy autumn. Compared to November 2023 which was very cold, calm, and dry – 4.4˚c below average (-1.6˚c vs. normal 2.8˚c ), this November will follow October’s trend of above average precipitation and temperatures. It seems like the whole north Atlantic is quite grumpy this year as storm after storm sweeps over Lofoten and northern Norway. Hopefully this pattern breaks before my photo workshop season begins in January!

If you wanna checkout what the weather has been up to yourself, you can see the historic weather statistics on yr.no: Leknes Last 13 Months

I’ve written a lot about the weather lately, but that is because it’s one of the most important elements of any Lofoten trip. Sometimes you’ll get lucky and everything is nice and you don’t even need to think about the weather, but unfortunately, this is far from the majority of the time. So it’s generally a good idea to know a little bit about reading the weather up here – although this year, that might have been somewhat depressing if you’ve visited from late September until now.

I was actually going to post a different photo today, also from Wednesday, but a much more colorful image of what will likely have been my last sighting of the sun for the year. But it was really just a snapshot and nothing very interesting. That image was actually take from below the mountain you see here, looking south, towards the left side of the frame. In this image, just 20 minutes later and looking west, the landscape is dark and almost completely void of color. Colorful sunset vs. grey winter, just a few kilometres and minutes apart.

Camera Info:
Nikon Z8
Nikon 24-120mm f/4
62mm
ISO 100
f 8
1/13 Seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #620 – Long Shadows

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Photo: Long shadows over snowy November mountain landscape, Lofoten Islands, Norway. November 19, 2023. 12:12

Having spent the last month in sunny Spain, returning to a November version of Lofoten is like hitting a wall of darkness. The change of scenery was made even more apparent after flight delays didn’t see me back in Leknes until 23:15, at which point I had a 2km walk to where my van was parked at a friend’s house. Nervously watching the weather radar as I arrived, I lucky made it to my van between the frequent passing sleet showers. As I neared home 20 minutes later I was greeted with a full arctic blizzard. Perhaps I should have stayed in Spain…

By all accounts, this year was a good November to have missed. Looking at the weather history, it has rained or snowed 28 of the last 30 days, with no shortage of severe wind and storms included. As I write now, my house is once again rumbling in gale force winds.

With the polar night still two weeks away, the sun is already quite low on the horizon, with all day golden hour – should the sun actually emerge from the clouds. By now, many locations across the northern side of Lofoten will have long since seen the last direct sunlight of the year, even before the start of the polar night.

From my house, I can look from the shadows across to the distant mountains of Himmeltindan, Veggen, Mannen, and Ristind as they rise into the mid November sun. Sun that won’t reach me again until late February. But soon enough, even these mountains won’t be high enough to reach the winter sun and the whole world will be twilight and darkness.

Camera Info:
Nikon Z8
Nikon 24-120mm f/4
83mm
ISO 50
f 8
20 Seconds
WB Daylight
10 Stop ND filter

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Friday Photo #619 – November Sun

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Photo: November afternoon sunset from Ballstadheia, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. November 25, 2022. 13:09

November is that middle ground between no longer autumn and still not winter. Although as far as the sun is concerned, the daylight hours are similar to January and early February. So if you’re heading to the mountain for a sunset hike like I was on this afternoon up on Ballstadheia – you probably need to start hiking before lunch! Quite a difference from my after dinner hikes of summer, which was not that long ago.

In the last couple Friday photo posts, I’ve showed images of 2023’s cold November, with a -1.6˚c average temperature, was the coldest month of the whole winter – 28 out of 30 days dropped below 0˚c. November 2022, when this photo was taken, was quite a bit milder, having an average of 3.8˚c and only dropping below 0˚c on 12 days.

What both 2023 and 2022 have in common is that they were both relatively dry, with less that 50% of average rainfall for the month. Now compare this with November 2021 in which there was above average rainfall and precipitation on 29 out of 30 days – I remember it as a grey and misty month when I was struggling to get some final images for my Northern Light ebook. I would have much preferred the weather of 2022 or 2023!

So where am I going with all this? Nowhere really. Just an example of how there’s no predicting much of anything outside of general trends when it comes to Lofoten’s weather.

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 14-30mm f/4
20mm
ISO 100
f 14
1/25 Second
WB Daylight

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