Monthly Archives: March 2016

Langfjordbotn to Ivalo

Posted on by

After the geomagnetic storm I dont expect much. Surprisingly the Auroras are still amazingly beautiful to me in the nights to come. The ride to Ivalo is much relaxter than the one the other direction and I enjoy driving through the beautiful scenery a lot! Unfortunately I dont find any of my hosts when leaving so I hide the money in the cabin and write an email – what else to do. I get an Email from Tore later that he is in Oslo that day….

Arriving in Ivalo I meet Miro again and get invited to some of his incredibly amazing indian food. I miss india! After food I spend the night in the car again watching amazing Displays between Ivalo and Inari. Next day I get an amazing cabin in the woods including kitchen, sauna and loneliness. 3 more nights but weather forecast seems to be bad. Maybe one last chance to watch the Aurora in the last night but also possible these will be the last pictures now…. Enjoy!

Geomagnetic storm over Oksfjord! (KP7 at 70˚N)

Posted on by

I will make it short – you want to see the pictures. I had an extremely exhausting journey from vienna via ivalo to Alta. A little later I found the only place to get coffee since 45km after spending a night in the car. A charming young lady not only makes the best coffee since I left home but also is very hospitable and offers me a place to sleep. Far away from everywhere directly at the fjord in Langfjordbotn. Love it!

First night provides some Aurora in the evening but most of the night I keep watching the clear sky without any display. Next night a geomagnetic storm is predicted as well as dense cloud coverage. Clouds stay until the evening but when I go out to check around 19:30 the sky is almost clear and KP Level at 6 (rising up to 7 during the evening)!!!

Enjoy the pictures!

Lapland – Baltikum – Vienna (on the road again)

Posted on by

And what can I say, even though I am pretty far south already I witness an amazing display in purple again! I watch for maybe half an hour and then I hurry to meet Miro who is an amazing guy. We have a coffee and food at his place and when we go out to smoke a cigarette the Aurora is still dancing – even in the light polluted city of Rovaniemi! We jump into the car and leave the town. Miro has not seen it that often yet to so we enjoy a lot until late night. I have to drive to Helsinki tomorrow so it should not be too late for me either!

Sun rises at 8:20, I leave later than planned at 10. Little after Rovaniemi most of the snow disappears from the road and at 64˚N I see the first liquid water in rivers. Sun sets at 17:17 a few hundred km north of Helsinki.

I get a cheap ticket for the ferry 24 hours later and spend an unexciting day resting at friends in Helsinki. Has been exhausting 850km yesterday with partly very bad road conditions (that area where it is not cold enough to freeze permanently but melts and then freezes over again). Today the sun rises at 7:53 and sets at 17:17 – already a plus of 2:30 daylight since I left Sommaroy!

In Estonia I visit another very nice friend. Its an amazing country with lots of wild jungle, flat like a pancake and swampy frozen at the moment. I stay another day and try to get an offer to fix the car – but its not worth the afford. Sun rises at 6:30 and sets at 18:39 – more than ten hours in between for the first time. When I leave snow is falling and turns all white again – no sun (still rising at 6:27). Estonia is snowy, Latvia is extremely beautiful, a cheaper finland with forests lakes and incredible beaches and Lithuania is an agricultural desert. Sun sets in Poland at 16:47. I drive most of the night and take a nap around 150km before the border to Czech Republic. When the sun rises at 6:45 I am still asleep, but when it sets at 17:25 I sit at my mothers place, drink coffee and book the next flight. Only 13:25 until sunrise! 16:42 a few days ago!

Roadmap