Aurora Borealis - The Northern Lights

This is why I came here in the first place. A dream. My dream. Because I'm living my story and I'm happy doing this, despite the critics.

Bogdan arrived in Norway one day before me, on Wednesday morning, and he was lucky enough to catch the sun and the light in that sleepless day and night. He didn't sleep until I came, on Thursday morning, this is what I call LOVE. 

Love for photography. And for me.

I really don't know what to post first, The pictures he took during the day or the ones taken by night? I will reverse the time a little bit, and I'll post the night first, because it's so spectacular I can't stop myself. 

May I introduce… the Northern Lights, Aurora Borealis. It's a natural phenomenon, a natural light display in the sky, particularly in the high latitude regions, like this one where we are now. The aurora is caused by the collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude atmosphere. The charged particles originate in the magnetosphere and solar wind and, on Earth, are directed by the Earth's magnetic field into the atmosphere.

Aurora Borealis is named after the Roman goddess of dawn, Aurora, and the Greek name for the North wind, Boreas. The aurora borealis most often occurs near the equinoxes, so this is why we are here exactly on my brother's birthday. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BRO! 

I LOVE YOU, even if I'm not there to celebrate today!

Bogdan went two nights ago on Skanksanden beach, somewhere North from where we are now, and he was lucky enough to catch this beautiful aurora.

In this area, Lofoten Islands, you can see the aurora, if the night is clear, from late September until the beginning of May. 

We came with the astro-photographer Alex Conu, on an organised tour, he knows well the places and the light. Actually, he came here for good, together with his wife, Anca, so if you have in mind a visit in the area, you can contact him at www.doipeglob.ro, and I'm sure you'll get the best of those views, in any season.

There is a website where you can keep up with what is happening in the sky: www.spaceweather.com, you can find some aurora borealis prognosis and alerts.

Unfortunately, when we woke up, the weather was really bad, the sky was dark and it started to snow all of a sudden. Today we found a snowman in front of our cabin's door.

Hello, Olaf!

I hope I'll see it one of those nights, the weather changes every hour, so chances are good. If you're wondering about the points on the sky, that is not photographic noise, those are STARS!

Wish me luck!

Short Break in Oslo

It was a very busy time of the year for me, the end of February and the beginning of March. I finnished it around a week ago, and I was day dreaming about the northern lights since. But, Saturday evening, Runa had an accident while she played with her brother, so we spent the evening in the hospital, and also last Monday and Tuesday, with a little surgery on her knee.

I missed the departure on Tuesday, but she was doing fine, so I decided to follow my husband the next day. Three planes, a ferry and 22 hours later I arrived in Lofoten Islands, Norway.

In Oslo I spent around 10 hours, so I went downtown to visit the city. There is a train a little bit expensive (170 Nok = 21 Euro for one way), but it takes only 20 minutes to arrive.

The light was dull and it was very cold, so please excuse the quality of my pictures. 

The view from the train was really interesting, pretty red houses in the snowy fields...

In the Central Station, the first shop I saw it was this gorgeous flower shop. I spent minutes staring at it, counting the well-assorted flowers.

The University of Oslo is quite impressive, isn't it?

Also the Royal Palace...