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Friday Photo #485 – April Twilight

Photo: The northern sky glowing at midnight in the white nights of spring, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. April 20, 2022. 00:35

Only a month after the spring equinox in March the nights of mid april are no longer fully dark. Though it can be somewhat deceptive just looking at the sunrise and sunset numbers themselves, which at the moment are about 04:50 and 21:15, which seem to afford plenty of time for darkness. But the arctic sun rotates on a much flatter orbit than lower latitudes, so even though it is below the horizon for 6-7 hours, it is not actually that far below. And with each passing week the sky will continue to brighten until the midnight sun arrives in just over a month. The sun moves fast here in the north!

Just after midnight I wandered down to the beach. Partly to have something to write about this week, but really hoping for a last aurora image of the season – which this year, is April 10th for me. Kind of an anticlimactic end this year compared to last year (friday Photo #433 ), when the sky was dancing every night until the very end. The weather and sun were not so cooperative this year it seems.

Now to look forward for the landscape to turn green over the next month and a summer in the mountains!

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 14-30mm f/4
14mm
ISO 1600
f 4.5
3 seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #484 – Spring Ptarmigan

Photo: Male Ptarmigan in mix of winter and summer moulting sitting on fence post, Myrland, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. April 11, 2022. 15:11

With the long and (hopefully) sunny days of April comes the ever increasing activity among Lofoten’s birdlife. With the oystercatchers some of the first arrivals in mid March, many of the other migratory bird species have arrived over the last few weeks. Bridging with them a near round the clock flurry of activity in the skies over Lofoten as they fight for mates and territory for the summer breeding season.

The Ptarmigans, while year round residents of Lofoten, also join in with the activity and become much more active an visible than during the winter as their mating calls ring out through the air. One benefit of living in a rural setting such as mine, is that much of the area surrounding my house is filled with frequent activity, making for somewhat easy photography from my yard. Although in a few more weeks, the noise level on some nights will reach an irritatingly high volume, that I have to wear earplugs some nights to get a full sleep!

The Ptarmigan are also some of the easiest of the birds to photograph, and usually allow one to slowly approach without flying off – though a 500mm lens also helps in this process! If I’m lucky, I can catch them in my backyard and sneak around my house before they notice me. Maybe I should build a hide one of these days, but truthfully, I’m not that into bird photography. Only when an easy opportunity presents itself, such as these April days around the neighbourhood.

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 200-500 F/5.6
500mm
ISO 1000
f 6.3
1/2000 second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #483 – Aurora Season Ending

Photo: April northern light shine over glowing northern horizon in final days of aurora season, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. April 10, 2021. 01:06

With the ever lightening nighttime sky of April comes the inevitable end of Lofoten’s aurora season. Last year (Friday Photo #433) brought a fantastic finale to the season with 5 consecutive nights of dancing northern lights, including the latest aurora I’ve seen, occurring on the night of April 19/20.

What this year will bring, I don’t know yet. There is still time for a little more, but once April arrives, the sun seems to go into hyperdrive and the night time sky quickly fades away. But the last aurora is kinda like the last sunlight before the polar night in December; you never quite know when it will be until its already gone.

The last weeks have brought several major solar storms, some of which where even too far south to be visible on Lofoten – one reason why bigger is not always better in regards to northern lights and KP index. But for these late season auroras, there generally needs to be a good level of activity, pushing the aurora into the darker overhead sky and further towards the south.

For this image from 01:00 on April 10th, even a fairly moderate aurora is able to shine though the glowing northern horizon. However, a week later, this would probably barely be visible as the horizon would already be glowing significantly brighter.

I’ve written previously, but I personally think the last week of March and first weeks of April is one of the best times for northern lights as I find the white nights to add nice contrast to the images. Of course, it is also a bit more risky at this time of year as the nighttime hours are greatly reduced compared with earlier in the winter. But even so, I think my favourite aurora images of the season generally occur in April.

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Nikon 14mm f/1.8
14mm
ISO 2500
f 1.8
8 seconds
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #482 – Slippery Roads

Photo: Snowy traffic jam as rental car is pulled from ditch after sliding off the road near Vareid, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. March 29, 2022. 15:47

After an unusually warm and mild first half of March which saw Lofoten looking more like spring than winter, the snow finally returned in a series of passing storms. Along with the snow, an unusually high amount of road chaos also occurred, mainly in the form of cars in ditches and semi-trucks stuck on inclines. It must be the combination of sun shining on the snowy roads, as even to me, they seemed to be slipperier than normal winter roads.

Tuesday afternoon, on my way to Reine for a conference I didn’t get far from Leknes before I encountered the first car off the road. The weather was pretty terrible, and I even though of turning around myself, but there was a large amount of traffic on the roads, about 1/2 of which being rental cars. It wasn’t fun driving conditions, even for a local, so I don’t understand why so many people were out…

A short while later, I passed another car in the ditch just after the Fredvang bridges. Just before departing the conference in the evening, I saw that the E10 at Nappskaret was closed, as 3 semi-trucks had gotten stuck. And finally just before getting home there was a van sitting deep in the ditch at Kilan – where 2 semi-trucks found themselves partially off the road on Thursday, closing the E10 for several hours. Busy days for the tow truck drivers…

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6
460mm
ISO 640
f 5.6
1/1250 second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #481 – Spring Oystercatchers

Photo: Oystercatcher pair on coastal rock with snowy Justadtind in the background on the first day of spring, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. March 20, 2022. 17:25

Last Sunday was the vernal/spring equinox, marking the astronomical start of Spring here in the north. Though even after an unusually mild March, snow is once again falling today – so ‘green spring’ is still a ways a way up here. Yet there’s always one sign every year that winter will be ending eventually and that is the arrival of the Oystercatchers along Lofoten’s coastline.

This year, my first sighting was on Sunday the 13th, as I was driving towards Reine. I tried to get near some at Yttesand beach, but as I was slowly approaching, someone flew a drone overhead and scared them off… Though I’m not overly interested in bird photography, its more so that I have a record of when certain events occur each year. But I’d still like a nice photo is possible.

For this image, was on my second attempt I just took a walk down to the coastline from my house, from where I can hear them chirping away all day. At this time of year, before they have nested and laid eggs in the coastal grasses and fields, they are quite skittish and move off quickly. So giving up on the plan of getting very close, I tried to use a bit more of the landscape in the scene. In this case, the distant (and stilly snowy) mountain of Justadtind.

These two were well placed on the top of the rock, allowing me to slowly move around and change up the background a bit. Soon though, a 3rd oystercatcher arrived, to the annoyance of these two, and sent them off to defend their rock from the newcomer.

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Nikon 200-500mm f/5.6
500mm
ISO 640
f 5.6
1/1600 second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #480 – A Rock On The Road

Photo: A (very large) rock on the road near Storsandnes beach, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. March 16, 2022. 09:39

The unusually warm temperatures since the beginning of March have begun to thaw out the frozen mountains of winter. But as the sun comes out and the temperatures go up, ice and rocks come down. This particularly large one fell on my road on Wednesday morning – also cutting the internet cable to my village in the process. It’s big enough that they’re going to have to get out the heavy machinery to move it, or perhaps even blast it apart.

As of Thursday, the 815 was also closed near Valberg, on the southern side of Vestvågøy, due to another rock fall. And with heavy rain and wind due all weekend, more rocks will likely be falling from the mountains of Lofoten. To paraphrase one of the guys from the Norwegian road agency about the rockfall on Lofoten: the roads (of Lofoten) won’t be safe until Lofoten is as flat as Denmark…

With that in mind, the road signage on Lofoten, and Norway in general, is quite understated. You can see in this picture that quite appropriately placed rockfall sign just beyond the boulder. While this rock is on the bigger side, rocks large enough to smash through the roof of a car fall along this road on a monthly basis, more or less all year long.

Yet, it is just a few of these tiny signs to warn you of the quite substantial rockfall danger of Myrlandsviein. And these tiny road signs do little to stop the dozen or so tourists in vans and motorhomes camping on the the road each night throughout the summer. Perhaps if they knew the reality of what waits in the mountains above them, they would choose a safer spot to sleep for the night?

Considering how much emphasis Norway puts on road safety, it seems strange that consistent rockfall in a highly touristed area only receives a small notice.

Which brings me to my next point. From a Norwegian perspective, small signs like these do mean something! And yet, I think this translation is lost among the continental European visitors whose countries are often covered in an endless amount of signs that they become subconsciously ignored. If the road was dangerous, it should surely have more than a small sign, right? Not in Norway…

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 24-200 f4/6.3
24mm
ISO 100
f 10
1/1000 second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #479 – Frozen Sand

Photo: Winter storm waves flow over frozen sand at Unstad beach, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. February 23, 2022. 15:52

During winter cold spells or after heavy snow of the beaches the sand often freezes into a hard, sandy ice. During calm periods, this mostly just stays as a frozen layer on the beach, with the waves gently washing over the beach. But when the waves pick up during winter storms, they often ‘chip’ away at the frozen layer of sand, sometimes forming interesting shapes and lines along the tideline.

This was one of those days at Unstad beach. The waves were big, 4m+, and washing high up the beach. The incoming tide would slowly break away the frozen layer of sand, eventually creating a sharp line across the beach. The bigger waves would break off large chunks of the frozen ice-sand and wash them higher up the beach – and often crashing into my tripod legs, making that series of out of focus from the movement. But as the water flowed back out, there were moments when the tripod remained still and the images sharp.

Even with boot on, it was a wet foot afternoon, as it was better to stay as close to the action as possible. There were a few other compositions I made some attempts at, but those were even closer to the waves, and I spent most my time running back up the beach before I could make a decent composition.

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 14-30mm f/4
14mm
ISO 100
f 11
0.6 second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #478 – Storm Chaos

Photo: Traffic jam and car stuck in snowdrift on E10 near Eggum in snow blizzard conditions, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. February 26, 2022. 15:10

In last week’s post I wrote about the coming warm weather due on the weekend. The rain eventually did arrive Saturday night, but not before enveloping Lofoten in a heavy blizzard throughout the afternoon causing chaos along the roadways throughout the islands. By Sunday morning, Lofoten was split in two, with several avalanches closing the E10 on Flakstadøy, and avalanche in Reine, and several of the side roads closed as well. This left tourists and other locals stuck in various locations across the islands.

I myself, ended up stuck in Leknes for Saturday and Sunday nights, with my road closed already since Thursday due to avalanches. I thought about walking home of Friday, but decided against it due to weather and the high avalanche risk. When I finally made it home, I could see several areas where my road had been covered.

But the real chaos of Saturday was on the E10 between Leknes and Solvær, which, when the storm hit in early afternoon caused traffic to come to a halt. I heard stories of people taking 6+ hours to make the normally 1-ish hour drive between the two cities. I was heading towards Svolvær from Leknes when I got stuck in traffic near Eggum, with several cars in the opposite direction stuck in heavy snow drifts on the road, or off the road completely.

Shortly after, I turned around to head back to Leknes as I could the weather was obviously too severe for driving. And even on the way back towards Leknes, the car ahead of me got stuck in a drift, but I was able to help push them out, so we could continue on.

The storm was forecast to be warm and rain, so I think a lot of people were caught out, not expecting the blizzard that hit. It was the worst driving conditions I can remember for years, perhaps even back to the hurricane in winter 2015.

In one of the times I was at a standstill, I managed to get a couple Iphone shots out the window of the chaos around me. But it doesn’t come anywhere near close to showing how bad conditions were and how poor the visibility was…

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Iphone

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Friday Photo #477 – White Winter

Photo: Deep winter freeze at Nedre Heimredalsvatnet, Eggum, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. February 9, 2022. 11:42

Lofoten has been full of snow for the last weeks and even the often windswept outer coastlines and mountains have remained in a deep freeze – the landscape often looking like a black and white painting. But unfortunately, this will soon be coming to and end for the time being as the weather forecasts are warning of up to 50cm of rain arriving Saturday night.

It will actually be a very quick transition from white winter to brown winter. The forecast for Saturday at 08:00 is -5 degrees c, while by 20:00 in the evening the temperatures will have risen to 5 degrees c. A 10 degree temperature difference in only a few short hours. And with it, heavy, snow melting rain, which looks like it will last throughout most of next week as well, unfortunately. Even Tromsø further north doesn’t look like it will be spared of warm temperatures and rain.

So tomorrow will be the last morning to enjoy the winter wonderland for now. How much will be left? Who knows. But hopefully the snow soon returns and there are plenty more weeks of skiing here…

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 14-30 f/4
14mm
ISO 100
f 9
1/40 second
WB Daylight

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Friday Photo #476 – Clear Sky Quiet Sky

Photo: Clear sky – quiet sky: barely visible aurora on clear winter night, Flakstadøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. February 15, 2022. 20:12

After weeks of high aurora activity but mostly cloudy and stormy conditions on Lofoten, a perfectly clear night finally arrived! But unfortunately, the aurora did not…

Clear sky, full moon, and fresh snow. Everything that would make a perfect night of northern lights. Except, other than a barely visible glow low on the horizon, the northern lights never arrived. Which was expected, as after a moderately active month with lots of high KP auroras dancing behind the clouds, the sun has grown in the last days.

But it can be a bit frustrating sometimes. If the clear sky had been just 2 days earlier, it would have been an epic night! But that is part of the aurora photography game. And even living in the arctic, a fair amount of luck and good timing is still needed.

Luckily, there are 2 months left in this winter’s aurora season – so 60 more nights to go out looking for the tricky lady dancing across the northern sky…

Head over to my Instagram account for (almost) daily postings of the local conditions here on Lofoten: @distant.north

Camera Info:
Nikon Z7 II
Nikon 20mm f/1.8
20mm
ISO 1000
f 2.0
1.6 second
WB Daylight

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