Two images from the lake
Sundown splash
Storberget
Storberget – “The big mountain!” A bit more than 90 meters high, which sounds completely ridiculous, if you live in Norway, near the alps or another place that has real, big mountains. But Storberget is a mountain, too, with a lot of rocks, a small ravine and a view on the near Baltic Sea and some islands. And it’s near, just fifteen minutes by car and a walk through the forest.
Midsommer colours
Finally it’s summery and warm in Västerbotten! Yesterday the car thermometer showed 20 °C for the first time this year, if only for two seconds. All people were out yesterday to celebrate midsommar. All mosquitos were out as well; there are a lot of them this year because of the wet May. Today I didn’t drive the direct way home but took some detours. It’s like loading the batteries with fresh colours and save them for the winter to come. The photos below are all taken in Kvarnbyn, a nice village near Burträsk.
Just beautiful!
Almost like summer
For me it’s not the warmth, that makes a Swedish summer, it’s the colours! Blue sky, green birch trees and meadows with yellow flowers – dry ones with dandelions or very wet ones with marsh-marigold – both are just beautiful.
Translations:
| English | German |
|---|---|
| Dandelion | Löwenzahn |
| Marsh-marigold | Sumpfdotterblume |
Submarine flower
I love the golden yellow blossoms of the marsh-marigold. They bloom and gleam all along the shallow shores of ponds, lakes and rivers. They love water.
Me too, I love water as well! But I like it less when it comes as rain. And this year’s May has been extremely wet, it rained many days. Beside of this the snow in the mountains is still melting and fills the rivers and streams with water. The result? High waters. And submarine marsh-marigold that I discovered at some places round the Innerviksfjärden.
Translation:
| English | German |
|---|---|
| marsh-marigold | Sumpfdotterblume |
Sundown at Långhällan
A short trip to Umeå
I have to admit, that it felt a bit strange to travel to Umeå. For one thing it’s a big town and for another thing it’s south from Skellefteå and that’s not my usual travel direction.
You may laugh at me calling Umeå a big town. Umeå has 80000 inhabitants and that may not sound very much, but the whole city with its many big buildings and streets feels much bigger, especially if you compare it to Skellefteå – the next town nearby – which is less than half as big and appears only a tenth as busy as Umeå.
I stayed over night in a hotel in the 12th floor with a nice view over the town and the river Umeälven. What a pity that it rained almost the whole time.
Today it still rained a lot and I didn’t have any interest in city sightseeing. So I fled the town and took a long walk in nature. That’s much more my cup of tea.
Travelling back in time
Believe it or not, it is possible to travel back in time, at least some weeks.
Here in Skelleftehamn near the coast the ice on the Baltic Sea, the river Skellefteälven and all lakes is gone and all birch trees are bedecked with green leaves.
Yesterday I had a gig in the Skidstugan Stenabäck – a small ski hut between Norsjö and Lycksele. On the way there I could see the birch trees being less and less green until they were leafless again. As I said – like travelling back in time. But I was even more fascinated by the fact, that parts of the lake Stor kvammarn were still covered with ice.
Just at the driveway to the ski hut some reindeers were hanging around. I saw them again several times this weekend. The group was easy to recognise because of the white reindeer with the pale pink horns.
I stayed over night and so I got the opportunity to make a picture of the incredible evening sky. It looked like clouds burning in slow motion.
Today I took a short tour by car with R. who drove along some forest roads nearby. We saw a young moose standing in the forest and just beside the road a Western capercaillie probably looking for a hen.
Then I took my own car and drove home, not the fast and boring main roads but the smaller ones. I saw four more moose on three different places. Five moose total – a new record, but there all were quite camera-shy, trotted away and hid in the dense forest – one even crossed a small river and even if I couldn’t see her anymore I could still hear her feet splashing through the water.
One photo through the windscreen – just for the records.
Translation:
| English | German | Swedish |
|---|---|---|
| western capercaillie, wood grouse, heather cock | Auerhuhn/Auerhahn | tjäder |
Paddling round Storgrundet
Two weeks ago the sea between the island Storgrundet and the mainland was still partly ice covered. Today I paddled round Storgrundet and couldn’t discover any ice left. The view of the blue sea almost looked like spring, but it didn’t felt like spring at all, it was very windy and chilly. When I left the protected bay I tried to make some photos but soon gave up since I was blown back ashore faster than I could take my camera out of its pocket. I only made a selfie on which it’s quite visible that – measured by temperature – spring hasn’t come far yet.
At the outside of the island I didn’t had a chance to release the paddle for a photo, too high were the waves. I regretted soon that I paddled without spray deck, because some of the bigger waves made it into my kayak. The next photo I made in a sheltered bay, where the water finally was calm enough and I could empty my kayak with a sponge (it wasn’t so much water, that came in).
Some hours later …
I had a look at “kanotudden” (literally: the canoe bay), a bay of the river Skellefteälven, where the ice is finally gone, too. Almost. There is some leftover ice, mostly crushed to small bits that were jingling and clanging with each arriving wave. But even the small bits were still solid enough to bear a wandering wagtail looking for food.
The canoe club, which is located at kanotudden still seems to be in hibernation, I’ll have to check later …
