First day of spring Mar 20 2016

Today it’s the first day of spring. In the forest you could see the first snowless patches of soil covered with blueberry plants and the first birds sang their spring songs. But if you continued your walk through the woods until you reached the shore and had a look over the Baltic Sea, it looked like winter would be endless and continue forever:

But if you went on the ice and looked closer you could see, that the frozen surface only covered parts of the Baltic Sea. There was open water ahead. Blue open water. Blue open water with tiny little waves.

Oh, what I longed for my kayak – I would have loved to paddle on the crystal clear sea to the icebergs that you could see near the horizon.

The first day of spring in Skelleftehamn – still wintry but with a promise of spring coming soon.

Magnitude 4.3 Mar 20 2016

Things you can experience in Skelleftehamn:

Ice fishing · heavy snowfall · northern lights · moose · frozen Baltic Sea · earthquakes · cold …

“Wait a moment, did you say “earthquakes”?”

“Yes.”

“In Skelleftehamn?!”

“Yup.”

Yesterday evening, when I stood in the bathroom, I heard a noise and felt a shaking like the biggest truck ever would speed through the streets. But it was a short event, I forgot it quite soon and lay down to sleep.

Today, when I browsed through my Facebook timeline, I realised that so many people from different places wondered, if this could have been an earthquake, that it really had to be one. And it was!:

GEOFON Program

According to GEOFON, Potsdam, the earthquake had the magnitude 4.3 and the epicentre was in the Baltic Sea, 19 km deep, round 60 kilometres from where I live.

Fortunately 4.3 is a quite weak earthquake and I don’t believe, that it had any impact at all.

By the way, this was not the first earthquake I experienced in Skelleftehamn, there was another one in June 2010, two months after I arrived here.

Serenity Mar 18 2016

Thaw Mar 16 2016

When it’s more than 10 °C in mars for two days a lot of snow thaws and transforms normal streets into a proving ground for jeeps. Soft slush, sheer ice, deep tracks and huge puddles cover the streets and crossings and I wait for the day where I’ll get stuck twenty metres from home.

On the other side the scenery can look almost nice, at least when you lower your camera as much as possible:

Vårvinter Mar 13 2016

Where are we – Annika and I? In the Arctic on our way to the North Pole? Looking for polar bears?

Well, not really! We’re on the frozen Baltic Sea on our way to the island Gåsören, enjoying the blue sky and the warm sun.

But we didn’t only enjoy the warmth of the sun, but the warmth of the sauna, too – even if we didn’t fire it as hot as it should be for a real sauna experience.

We were not the only ones on the ice of the Baltic Sea yesterday.

There were ski tracks and skiers.

There were snowmobile tracks and snowmobile drivers.

There were moose tracks …

… and there were moose on the ice, too. Far, far away, but clearly visible.

“vårvinter” means “spring winter” and describes this season, where the land is still covered with snow and ice, but the temperatures aren’t longer as cold as in January or February.

Just a photo through the window Feb 17 2016

Today it was just a fine winter day. Last week was warm and cloudy, with wet snow showers and drizzle. Parts of the little amount of snow, that we got this year melted away. But last weekend it snowed. As a matter of fact it snowed so much, that some of the planes to Skellefteå were cancelled and round 30 of the participants of the Winter Swimming Championship couldn’t join.

On the other side it’s always nice with fresh, white snow, at least in my opinion. From Friday to Sunday we got round 25 – 30 cm and it needs only 20 other centimetres to hide the fence in my backyard.

But I won’t witness it, if more snow came the next week. Tomorrow (more precise: in tome hours, it gotta be a short night!) I will take the bus to Skellefteå, another bus to Luleå, the train to Kiruna and probably a lift to Nikkaluokta, where I’ll start a ski tour on the Kungsleden:

Nikkaluokta – Kebnekaise – Singi – Sälka – Tjäktja – Alesjaure – Abiskojaure – Abisko

I’ll be offline for some weeks. Now I just hope for good weather, because I want to make many photos. Wish me luck!

Snow covered boat Feb 16 2016

Snow covered boat at the beach of Storgrundet

Winter Swimming World Cup and Scandinavian Championship 2016 Feb 15 2016

Last Saturday the 5th winter swimming competition in Skellefteå took place, this time not only as a Scandinavian Championship but even part of the world cup. The Happy Friends of Cold and Darkness (or in Swedish: Mörkrets och kylans glada vänner, which I’m a member of, was the organiser of this event.

I wasn’t part of the organisation team this year, but I was on the ice round the swimming pool and took many photos, both for me and the media.

The first winter swimming in 2012 was the coldest with temperatures round -32 °C. This year it was much warmer with only -1 °C, but the wind and the snow showers made the event to a chilly experience, too.

Here are some impressions:

Links to blog articles about the other winter swim championships in Skellefteå:

2012 (German)
2013 (German)
2014 (German)

The snow returns Feb 12 2016

I dislike thaw. When it’s winter I want to see white snow, not brownish slush and drizzle falling from low-hanging clouds.

The latter was the weather that we got for four days. The snow slid from the roofs and melted away and under many water puddles sheer ice covered the roads. But alas, yesterday the weather changed and it started to snow. Today it has been quite windy and it has been constantly snowing. The strong winds glue the wet snow to the houses, the cars, and the windows.

I guess, we got round 20 cm of snow the last 24 hours and it continues snowing. The thick brown half-frozen chunks of wet snow, that framed all streets start to get a fresh white snow blanket and small snow drifts cover the roadways.

Yes snow – that’s more my cup of tea. I hope however, that the wind gusts will stop soon, since tomorrow the Winter Swimming World Cup and Scandinavian
Championship 2016 will take place in Skellefteå and I guess it won’t be much fun for the swimmers standing in some kind of “snow storm” dressed only with a swimsuit and a warm cap. And neither for me, who is going to take pictures of this event.

No sun today Feb 6 2016

As you can see in the blog posts before, we had really nice winter weather with a lot of sun the last weeks. Even last night was clear. When I stood up at 7 o’clock we had -15 °C outside, but it was cloudy. Three hours later the temperature has climbed to -5 °C and it started to snow.

Annika and I went outside to go for a walk. It became a bit longer and chillier than planned: We went to the shore and rounded the island Norrskär on the thick ice layer that covers the Baltic Sea. When we returned to the mainland, wind and snowfall had intensified. It’s still snowing, but not very much, just some centimetres, I guess.

This photo shows a nameless stony island between Norrskär and the mainland. What a contrast to the photos of the sunrise some days ago.

It’s not the photo, it’s the whole landscape that looks monochrome and the island Gåsören – 2 kilometres away – was even completely hidden behind the falling snow.