Godt Nytt År!

Happy New Year!!!

Celebrating the new year was no Times Square event here. Just a little over dozen folks celebrated New Year's Eve quietly yet beautifully here at Jøssåsen.

We had our own little fireworks and even sparklers, but what I will remember most fondly is sending off balloons and paper lanterns into the dark Norwegian night sky.

Hello 2009!!!

Project for a Recovering-Insomiac

The view of the sky from our cottage was amazing, especially during sunset, and I loved the colorful sky that never quite went dark. So I decided it would be a great idea to take pictures of the sky every half hour. No one thought I was really serious about the "project" although they agreed that it was a cool idea. Maybe I'm a little nuts to have stayed up all night to take pictures of starless sky, but it was amazing to observe the shifting shades of blue, orange, pink, and silver of the sky as the night went on. Here are some of the pictures from that evening.

8:00pm

8:30pm

9:00pm

9:30pm

10:00pm

The sun slowly started to make its way down shortly after 10pm.

10:12pm

10:20pm

Going, going, going....

10:21pm

And...

Gone!!!

The sun finally said good-bye at 10:23pm.

10:30pm

11:00pm

11:30pm

midnight

12:30am

1:00am

1:30am

2:00am

2:30am

Between 2:30am and 3:00am was the darkest it ever got, which wasn't that dark at all.

3:00am

3:30am

4:00am

4:30am:

MISSING

I must have dozed off and missed taking a photo. Oops!

5:00am

5:30am

6:00am

6:30am

It actually looks a bit darker at 6:30 than it did at 6:00.

That's only because it started to get quite foggy.

I decided this was a sign--for me to go to bed.

The End

Sunrise at 3:55 AM; Sunset at 10:52 PM & Moonrise at 10:59 PM; Moonset at 6:39 AM

Since I get up at 6am to milk the cows at 6:30am, I've been going to bed at around 10:30pm, which by Chicago (or most anywhere) standards would be pretty dark. But the sun sets around 11pm in Trondheim these days so when I do go to bed, the sun is still in the sky shining brightly. And so because of my early sleeping and waking schedule, I had not yet seen the moon. Well, that is just until the other night....

There was a little party held for Tobias, one of the co-workers (a volunteer like myself), who is leaving Jøssåsen after working for a year. All the co-workers, new and old, gathered in one of the many huts that Jøssåsen owns to thank Tobias for all his hard work and also to socialize and drink. And because the party was held late in the evening, I had the rare opportunity to see the moon, a full moon, no less, on my way back from the hut to my house, Nergården.

Words can't even begin to describe what I saw. The big, round, silvery full moon was peeking just above the hills, and the mist from the lake was wrapping around the tall green pine trees. As I stared at the moon and the misty surroundings, I understood why there are so many mystical creatures or trolls in Norwegian folklore. Something very magical was going on, and I bet if I had stood out there long enough, I bet I could have met a troll, just like this one that I saw in Wisconsin, earlier this summer (right).

Eager to share this magical beauty with everyone, I tried taking as many pictures as possible. But alas, as I took the photo to the left, my camera ran out of batteries! Sad. Although the rare beauty I witnessed will never be forgotten, I am sorry that I couldn't capture it to share with everyone even though I realize that no picture could ever do it justice.

The daylight is fantastically long here. I have heard of "white nights" and experienced a bit of the phenomenon while working in Alaska and visiting Iceland, but it feels quite different here. I'm not sure exactly why. But I do know that the long daylight fills me with awe. Additionally, it gives me more time and opportunity to explore around Jøssåsen. Last "night, "Eva, Anne, and I went for a walk in the forest at around 8pm. Did it feel like "night?" No, it certainly did not.

When the three of us returned to Jøssåsen, and I managed to persuade Anne, my new partner in crime, to go rowing. It was well past 9 o'clock when we started rowing on the lake, but again, it seemed like it was midday.

We rowed to the middle of the lake and enjoyed the surrounding hills and the clear blue sky. It was so picturesque and so surreal....

The days are getting shorter as each day goes by. Just yesterday, Saturday, 19 July 2008, the duration of day in Trondheim was 19 hours and 2 minutes (5 minutes and 39 seconds shorter than Friday). Today the duration is 18 hours and 57 minutes (another 5 minutes and 43 seconds shorter than yesterday). As the days slowly shorten, I wonder what winter days will be like in Jøssåsen....