Today my walking season started and I have decided to resume blogging about some of the walks that I take. I’m not really a writer, but I enjoy taking pictures and sharing them with my readers. Sometimes I take pictures while walking uphill as that gives me a reason to stop on the hill and catch my breath. Other times I see things that I think are very Norwegian, meaning that I did not come across the custom until I moved to Norway, though that doesn’t mean that the custom doesn’t exist elsewhere. I will try to explain why I am including the pictures that I include. I usually take a lot more pictures than end up in the blog. For example, today I took about 40 pictures, using my smart phone and I am sharing 12 of them.
The weather today was grey, meaning that it was cloudy the whole time, but there was no precipitation while I was walking. I had worn a bright yellow rain jacket as it keeps me visible, as well as protecting me from the wind and the rain. The temperature was about 4 degrees Celsius during my walk, so I had several layers on. On this particular walk, there is a 20-25 minute climb uphill at the start, so I warmed up quickly and soon had my sweater off, but I left the jacket on. In the woods, I didn’t notice the wind, but towards the end of the walk when I was out in the open, it was good to have the jacket on to protect me from the wind.
The purpose of the walk was primarily to fill in about an hour and a half while my husband had some things to do in Straumen. We both had appointments at shortly after 1 pm for our Covid-19 vaccine, so I had a deadline as to when to arrive. I got dropped off about 3.5 km from Straumen, then I walked up the hill, perpendicular to the car road, then eventually headed off in the same direction as the car road, then went down the hill just before Straumen. I spent time in the woods, well away from car traffic and other noises. I enjoy walks like that.
A lot of the trail that I was following is part of the Kvistadbakkan Culture Path. It is labelled as blue difficulty, which means that it is uneven terrain and can be steep in some parts. I would consider it a walk that would give me some serious exercise, but not a difficult trail to follow.
A lot of the trail that I was following was either tractor road or well-used footpath. Last weekend we had received a 20 cm snowfall, so I was prepared for snow on the trail. I have done this route before and was confident in my usage of time as well as knowing where to turn. This is an area with a lot of trails. Many people go for walks here and many will take their dogs for walks here too.
This is what much of the trail looked like today. The recent snowfall has not melted completely in higher areas, but is melting quickly when it is warm enough. Sunshine hastens the melting process, but in the woods, many areas may not get much sunshine. Today there was no sunshine while I was walking.
There was a stream along part of the trail and it was busy taking away the melt water.
The path got quite muddy in parts and I came across all these trees lying across the tractor road. These had been placed there very deliberately. Underneath is a particularly muddy section where a small stream crosses the road. Putting down trees in this fashion will allow people to cross the muddy area and will also prevent wheeled vehicles, such as tractors or ATVs from sinking into the mud. You can see from the trail on the snow how muddy everyone’s feet had become on this section of the trail.
It was also obvious that someone had been at work clearing up along the trail, cutting back the trees that were growing close to the trail. By letting in more light, the trail will dry up more quickly after rain and it also lets the users get a better view.
Eventually, I came out into the open again and could see out over Trondheim Fjord. The small islands (Kvamsholmen) are accessible at very low tides, but today the tide was coming in and about three-quarters of the way to high tide. The large island in the background is Ytterøy and in the far distance are the hills of Levanger. The field is mostly bare of snow, but snow is still lying around the edges where not much sun reaches.
I came along the tractor road at the higher end of the field in this picture and saw this small construction and made my way to it. It was called a Grill Cabin. I do not remember seeing it before, so I presume it was constructed last summer.
Inside there was seating around five of the six sides of the little cabin, and in the center there was a place to light a fire and grill food. I took the chance to sit down for a few minutes and eat the sandwich that I had brought with me.
The ceiling has been built so that the smoke from the fire can get out.
Outside the little cabin, was a stump of wood that is used to boil coffee. A fire is lighted in the center of the stump and the coffee pot (you can see one in the previous picture, hanging on the wall) fits snuggly over the fire. The four slots in the stump allow air to get to the fire, which slowly consumes the stump.
Translation of the sign: ” Do not walk on the field. The growing season has started and sprouting is important and sensitive. Greetings, the Farmer”. The fields are not green yet, but the early spring days are important for the growth of the grass on the fields. In Inderøy, many farmers will have cattle grazing the fields in the summer, or the grass will be cut to provide feed during the winter season.
Now it was just to walk down the hill and get to the store (to buy a few small food items) and city hall (where we would get vaccinated). There wasn’t much snow left at lower elevations.
This was a one-way walk, requiring that I got dropped off at one place and picked up at another. I used about one and a half hours between being dropped off and getting to the store. By road it is probably about 3.5 km, but I will have walked at least 6-7 km by going through the forest. It is a walk I will do again, when it is suitable.
Just as there is a sunrise and a sunset every day of the year (unless you live in polar regions), there will also be a moonrise and a moonset most days. The moon is different than the sun in that it doesn’t produce its own light as the sun does, but rather reflects the sun’s light. Half of the moon is illuminated at anytime, but how we see the moon is affected by its position in relationship to the sun and the earth.
This is not my own picture, but taken from the timeanddate.com website (user: m.wood).
The moon has eight different phases, based on how much illumination we get from it. A new moon is almost completely without reflected light and will look dark. It is then waxing, or increasing in light and becomes a crescent moon. Then comes the first quarter when half of the moon is illuminated. Then the moon is waxing gibbous. Then comes the full moon when the moon is a big round lighted circle in the sky as in the picture above. Then the moon is waning, or becoming smaller. Then comes the third quarter where again half of the moon is illuminated. The final phase is the waning crescent.
The eight phases of the moon.
So, for example, where I live, the moonset was at 11:59 today (2021.01.06) and it will rise again tomorrow at 01:36, (https://www.timeanddate.com/moon/@3132743) and there will be 52% illumination. It is in the phase of the third quarter.
Let’s look at how the sun, the moon and the earth are aligned at four of these different phases.
The new moon is directly between the sun and the earth so that people on the earth do not see any reflected light from the moon.When the moon is in the first quarter, it is beside the earth in relationship to the sun and we see half of the moon.When the moon is full, the earth is between the sun and the moon, so we see the whole of one side of the moon illuminated.When the moon is in the third quarter, it is again beside the earth, but on the other side and we see only one half of the moon illuminated.
In the past, before electrical lighting was common, and today in places with little outdoor lighting, knowing the phases of the moon and when there would be extra light during the dark hours was important. Many people in cities today may find that they rarely see the moon, but I live in an area which is relatively dark at night, so I very much notice the full moon and how much light it gives.
Where the moon rises on a location’s horizon and where it sets varies throughout the lunar month. One thing I notice about where I live is that when the moon is full, it is usually shining into my bedroom and living room windows most of the night and setting after I get up in the morning. However, as we have only twilight instead of darkness during the months of May, June and July, I rarely notice the moon nearly so much during these months.
One of the reasons I was looking up this information about the moon and its phases was because I know it affects the tides. I will come back to this in a later blog.
The moon’s orbit around the earth is elliptical, meaning that it is not the same distance from the earth at all times. When the moon is closer to the earth, we get a supermoon, where the full moon looks bigger. When the moon is farther away from the earth, we get a micromoon, where the full moon looks smaller.
Other phenomena involving the moon are solar eclipses and lunar eclipses. These will only be visible from certain parts of the earth.
A solar eclipse happens when the new moon is between the earth and the sun and hides part of the sun. It may be partial, when the moon only covers part of the sun; it may be annular, when the moon is not large enough to cover all of the sun; it may be total, when the moon covers all of the sun. (See more information here)
A lunar eclipse happens when the earth gets between the sun and the moon and the earth’s shadow covers the moon. This will happen at the time of the full moon. The moon can turn red causing it to be called the Blood Moon.
A lunar eclipse
During a total lunar eclipse, no sunlight reaches the surface of the moon directly. However, sunlight is being bent by the earth’s atmosphere. (For more information click here). The moon looks red because only the longer wavelengths, like orange and red, pass through the atmosphere and end up on the moon.
On 2019.01.21, about two years ago, we had a total lunar eclipse that was visible from our house. Here are some pictures that I took myself.
Here is the blood moon, taken at 6:01.The lunar eclipse is starting to be over and white light is again showing on the moon’s surface. The picture was taken at 06:44.By 07:08, the sun is again shining on the moon and the eclipse is over.The sun has now risen but the moon has not set yet. The picture was taken at 08:57.
As I write this on the last day of 2020, I am thinking of all that has happened during this year, both to myself, my family and the world. Some things have been constant in my life and other things have changed quite a bit.
Throughout the year I have used Duolingo to help keep my brain in shape. My old standby language is French, which I first learned when I was 14 years old. I grew up in an officially bilingual country, so French has been with me most of my life. Even in kindergarten I remember learning to count, in French, the number of elephants on the inside cover of a Babar book. Over the six years that I have been using Duolingo to learn languages, French has been my constant language that I have worked on almost daily. If I have finished what was on Duolingo in French, it didn’t take long for them to add more lessons and I have experienced at least two upgrades in the French course during 2020.
In addition to French, I was studying Italian at the beginning of the year and now I am studying Swedish, which is perhaps a more practical language for me that lives in Norway and shops at many Swedish chain stores. Swedish is easy as it is so close to Norwegian, but there are things to learn which helps my brain keep in shape and learning new things.
Also during 2020 I have tried to get out walking several times a week. Those who read my blogs will have seen descriptions and pictures of quite a few of the walks I have taken.
Looking westward from Brekkefallet, Mosvik. Picture taken on 2020.09.02
January 2020 was, in retrospect, a normal month. We were working on plans for an extended holiday of several weeks to San Francisco, Detroit and Bergen. Reservations were made and plans agreed on. News from China that there was a virus on the loose that was causing a lot of deaths had started to filter through, but though I hoped that we wouldn’t come across it in the Chinese part of San Francisco, I didn’t know how that virus was going to affect the rest of 2020.
Towards the end of February, my husband and I left on our planned trip, meeting up with my son in Oslo and then flying to San Francisco where my daughter lives. We also met up with my sister there for some of our stay, with her staying in the same hotel as us three visitors from Norway.
I enjoyed our trip to San Francisco, having time to relax with family and spending time with my sister and daughter who I don’t see very often, but do keep in touch with on a regular basis. The weather cooperated with only one day of rain and temperatures were much warmer than they would have been at home. San Francisco has lots of things to do, but as we were staying at a hotel in the downtown area, I noticed in particular the number of homeless people that were just living on the streets. It was a stark contrast to where I live, where the local community gives those not able to look after themselves a place to live.
Many of the streets in San Francisco are quite steep, though it is good exercise walking up them,
After two weeks in San Francisco, my son, my husband and I flew to Detroit. At this point in the trip, the corona-virus is becoming news, but it is not affecting what people are doing with their days. Traffic in the airports was normal. The reason for Detroit as a destination was to visit my husband’s half-brother and his family in their home environment.
Now we were staying in someone’s home and the television was on most of the time. But there only seem to be two main items of news – the up-coming presidential election in the USA and the corona-virus problem. The latter was becoming a great problem in both Europe and the USA. We were in Detroit for a little over one week, but suddenly things were not normal. A trip to a museum indicated that though there were still some people around, the place was not as packed as one would have expected. A trip to downtown Detroit was even more revealing, as there was almost nobody walking around and nobody on the light rail through the city center. The pandemic as it would be called was creating changes in the way people spent their waking hours.
Downtown Detroit, photo taken on 2020.03.13. Notice how few people are walking on the streets in the middle of the day.
During this week, we had to reschedule the rest of our trip. The week in Bergen was cancelled. The hotel we had booked was closing down and they would relocate us to a different hotel. My son who was working in Bergen at the time was given home-office so he decided to move his home-office to our place in Vangshylla. Plane tickets were rebooked, still going through Amsterdam but now our destination was Trondheim airport, rather than Bergen. Already, the airlines were reducing their numbers of flights and flights between the USA and Europe were becoming less and less frequent.
The trip home from Detroit was very different than the trip out. The airports had almost nobody in them. However we met one of my daughter’s friends in the Detroit airport and also in Amsterdam, so we spent a bit of time talking to her and her family. I have never seen large airports with so few people in them. People were starting to wear face masks. The planes were only half full. On arrival in Trondheim airport we were met by people fully covered in protective clothing. Though foreign citizens, we were official residents so there was no real problem, but it was a stressing situation. Taking the train back to where our car was parked was also different, with almost nobody on the train.
We had to spend 14 days in quarantine as we had been out of the country. I didn’t mind the rule as we had no idea if we had picked up any bad viruses on our trip. We arranged with people who lived near the food stores, to pick up groceries for us so that we had at least some fresh food in the house and I was hoping we had enough dried food so that we could eat varied meals. We picked up our bags of groceries outside their homes and avoided contact with them.
Home again, the news was getting more disturbing and the corona-virus spread around the world. Those who got sick, got really sick and many died, particularly those who had previous health problems. My husband and I were suddenly in a high-risk group, those over 65 years old. Thankfully, we live in the country, with lots of nature right outside the house, so we could go for walks and keep a reasonable physical health even while in quarantine.
The two weeks of quarantine passed and we didn’t get sick, but the world around us had changed. For us, the most noticeable difference was that my son was living at home again, not able to get back to Bergen until the beginning of August. He also ended up coming to stay with us again in November when Bergen had a lot of contagion. Then he got a new job, in Oslo, where there was also home office and so he moved out of Bergen and is currently living with us until the contagion in Oslo is reduced and allows easier access to the city.
My husband and I have a life-style that is not very much affected by the pandemic on a daily basis. Neither of us likes crowds of people. We have lots to do around the house and garden. My husband is busy fixing up the house in stages. The spring and summer went to finishing the terrace. Unfortunately the nice summer weather had come and gone before it was usable, but we have it for next year. Then there was new windows and siding on the next side of the house. This outside work was done as the days were getting very short on daylight and not very warm either. But every bit done, makes the house better than before.
The new terrace deck before the glass railing has been installed.
I spent a lot of my time knitting and sewing, sweaters, toques, kid’s clothing, shirts for my husband and tops for myself. I also spent time in the garden, trying to keep it in order. A lot of the summer months were spent painting, both things for the terrace, the wall, and furniture for inside. When you have a house, there is always something that can be improved.
Sweater knitted for my husband.
My son also contributed to improving the garden. His window looks out on some of the lawn and he started by removing moss from it. Then he got several loads of dirt to even out bits of the lawn. Then he planted grass seed. The improved lawn made a great improvement to the garden.
My son and I took two different day-trips to visit nearby islands, Ytterøy and Jøa. We were not in much contact with people, and during the summer there was much less contagion, but people were mostly still aware that there was a pandemic and that foreign travel was discouraged.
My husband and I had several trips to our local IKEA store, which is about an hour and half drive from home. This actually makes it into a day trip. But on one occasion, we found that the store was so crowded that we didn’t really find it comfortable to be so close to so many other people. We then made sure we planned the next trip at a time when there would not be nearly as many people in the store.
Just recently I have read a book in Norwegian, called the Corona Spring, a day-by-day summary of what people were experiencing during the spring of 2020 in Trondheim. It made me think about my experiences in this pandemic and how it has changed things for me. So what are the effects really for me?
Better hand hygiene, especially when having been out in stores or other public places.
No hugging of friends that I meet, either casually or otherwise.
Less contact with other people than those in my household. I have two girlfriends that I meet regularly, but otherwise there is little contact with people.
Trying to keep a safe distance between myself and others, primarily when in stores, but also when meeting people when out on walks and stopping to chat. With a hearing disability, this isn’t always easy.
Almost no restaurant or cafe visits. I’ve never been a big one for this anyway, but there have been almost none this year once we were home again from our trip to the USA.
No planning of major trips, either within Norway or outside of Norway. Staying at home is safest.
As 2020 ends in just a few hours, and I look ahead to activities in 2021, I expect my daily life will be much the same. Meals will be made and eaten. Projects started and hopefully finished. The dark days of winter will become the bright days of summer, then the darker days of autumn and winter again. The years go by faster and faster as I age. I hope you will have a good year in 2021.
If I think of the meaning of the word, twilight, I think of the time when it is getting light, just before sunrise, or the time after sunset when there is still light in the sky.
2020.12.22, 09:15 Civil twilight in the morning
If you look at what astronomers calculate, there are three definitions of twilight. I’m going to give the times for today, 22 December 2020, and my location at Vangshylla, Norway as well as definitions and where possible a photo.
According to my source at www.timeanddate.com, twilight is the time between day and night when there is light outside, but the sun is below the horizon. The morning twilight is often called dawn and the evening twilight is called dusk.
The astronomical definitions of the three stages of twilight are based on the Sun’s elevation, see the diagram below. Sunrise is when the sun comes over the horizon. For calculation purposes, it is the geometric center of the sun that is used.
If we think of what is happening in the morning, civil twilight starts when the sun reaches 6 degrees below the horizon and lasts until sunrise. The actual point in time when the sun reaches 6 degrees below the horizon is called civil dawn. Nautical twilight is when the sun is between 6 and 12 degrees below the horizon and astronomical twilight is when the sun is between 12 and 18 degrees below the horizon. In the morning, astronomical twilight comes first, then nautical twilight, then civil twilight. In the evening, civil twilight comes first, then nautical twilight, then astronomical twilight.
1 Astronomical Twilight
At Vangshylla today, astronomical twilight was between 6:41 – 7:40 and 16:48 – 17:47. This is about an hour in the morning and an hour in the evening. Before 6:41 and after 17:47, the sky is completely dark and celestial bodies that can be seen with the naked eye will be visible (in a cloudless sky). Lights in houses and city streets will be quite visible even at a distance. I have no photos during these times as it is too dark for me to get a picture. When I looked out a window during this period this morning, I could just see the outline of the hill in the direction where the sun would eventually come up.
2 Nautical Twilight
2020.12.22, 07:45 at the beginning of nautical twilight. It is still pretty dark and only artificial lights are visible in the photo. I live out in the country, so there aren’t many lights at this time of day.
At Vangshylla today, nautical twilight was between 7:40 – 8:48 and 15:40 – 16:48. Again, this is approximately an hour for each period. In general, artificial light will be required to do activities outdoors. In times past, when sailors navigated using the stars, most stars would still be visible to the naked eye. I feel that it is still quite dark. Today was a cloudy day, but perhaps on a clear day, there could be a bit of light just coming in the sky.
3 Civil Twilight
At Vangshylla today, civil twilight was between 8:48 – 10:05 and 14:23 – 15:40. This is about an hour and a quarter for each period.
2020.12.22, 9:14, taken looking towards where the sun will rise, during civil twilight. Today it was cloudy all day. If there had been a clear sky, there would have been more light. It still feels dark and lights are needed indoors to function. Outdoors one can do things without additional light.
This is the brightest form of twilight. In the morning, civil twilight begins when the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon and ends at sunrise. In the evening, civil twilight begins at sunset and ends when the sun is 6 degrees below the horizon. During these two periods there may be enough natural sunlight that it is not necessary with artificial light to do things outdoors. Some countries use this definition to make laws regulating the use of headlamps and street lamps and can also be used in rules affecting aviation and hunting.
Sunrise in Straumen, Inderøy at 10:05. Heavy cloud means that the morning is quite dull.2020.12.22, 14:10, 13 minutes before sunset. The ball of the sun is just going behind the hill in the distance. There is still a lot of cloud, and it was raining where I was taking the pictures, but the sun’s rays shine under the clouds.2020.12.22, 14:58, 35 minutes after sunset, so civil twilight. There is still a bright glow in the sky in the direction the sun has set. There is still enough light to do things outdoors.2020.12.22, 15:46, so at the beginning of nautical twilight. There is still enough light to get a picture, though I had to put my cellphone on night mode. There is still a bit of a glow in the direction that the sun set over an hour ago. The lights in houses in the distance are showing up in the picture.
Twilight in the summer
The length of twilight is affected by a location’s latitude, so that places closer to the equator have shorter periods of twilight than those places that are at higher latitudes. During the summer months at higher latitudes, such as northern Norway or northern Canada, there may not be any difference between astronomical twilight after sunset and astronomical twilight before sunrise.
So let’s look at my location. From 2021 April 11 until 2021 September 2, there is no official “night”. There is only twilight. From 2021 April 28 until 2021 May 20, there is no astronomical twilight, only nautical and civil twilight. From 2021 May 21 until 2021 July 22, there is only civil twilight. From 2021 July 23 until 2021 August 14, there is both nautical and civil twilight. From 2021 August 15 there will again be astronomical twilight and from 2021 September 2 there will be night as well.
I like the period between the end of April and the middle of August as it never really gets dark at night. Knowing that there will be lots of light in this period, helps me get through the short, dark days in November, December and January. At the summer solstice, on June 21, we get 20 hours and 53 minutes of daylight and the rest is civil twilight. This is quite a contrast with the winter solstice on December 21 (see the blog I wrote yesterday) when there is only 4 hours and 17 minutes between sunrise and sunset.
The winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere is the summer solstice in the Southern Hemisphere. One should more accurately call this the December Solstice as there is also a solstice in June, which in the Northern Hemisphere indicates the longest day of the year, i.e. the day with the most daylight hours. The December solstice is a particular time on a particular day, when the sun is exactly over the Tropic of Capricorn. In 2020 this happens on the 21st of December at 10:02 UTC, or at 11:02 local time where I live.
The sun was just clearing the hills in the distance at 11:02 local time. The picture was taken from sea level, at the high water mark on the beach. Note how orangey the colour are just after sunrise when the sun is still very, very low in the sky.
For those of us living in the Northern Hemisphere, this is the shortest day of the year, i.e. the day with the least amount of daylight.
Because of latitude and the way we keep time, the latest sunrise and the earliest sunset will not occur on exactly the solstice. The earliest sunset will occur before the winter solstice and the latest sunrise will occur after the winter solstice. (See explanation here)
How much of a coincidence is it that Christians celebrate the birth of Christ (Christmas) a few days after the winter solstice in the Northern Hemisphere? Here in Norway, Christmas becomes a festival of lights as the number of daylight hours is at a minimum and people like light.
So let’s look at some of the numbers for my location in Vangshylla, Inderøy, Norway
Date
Sunrise
Sunset
Hours of daylight
Solar Noon
Dec 18
10:03
14:21
4 hours, 18 minutes, 37 seconds
12:12
Dec 19
10:03
14:21
4:17:56
12:12
Dec 20
10:04
14:22
4:17:31
12:13
Dec 21
10:05
14:22
4:17:24
12:13
Dec 22
10:05
14:23
4:17.33
12:14
Dec 23
10:05
14:23
4:17:59
12:14
Dec 24
10:06
14:24
4:18:43
12:15
Notice that I have given the sunrise and sunset to the nearest minute, but one actually needs to include the seconds to show the exact number of minutes of daylight and to see the changes from day to day. There isn’t much difference between Dec 19 and Dec 21, only 32 seconds .
The latest sunrise is on December 24th and 25th at 10:06. The earliest sunset in on December 16th, 17th, 18th and 19th and 14:21. There are very small changes each day around the solstice. However, with exact astronomical calculations, the day with the shortest number of daylight hours is December 21st with 4 hours, 17 minutes and 24 seconds.
I have also included in the table when the solar noon is, that is, when the sun is at its highest position in the sky. This varies slightly from day to day, because the day is not really 24 hours long. Around the December solstice, solar noons are a little bit farther apart each day.
This photo was taken at 12:13, showing its highest position in the sky on the December solstice. Note how there is less orange in the photo and more blue, partly because the sun is higher in the sky, but also it is partly covered by cloud.
Today I found another spring flower blooming, spring phlox. In my garden, this plant is often eaten by deer in the winter, so it often blooms later than it should. This year it is still growing well, even in December and has put out two flower buds. Is it hoping to bloom before the deer come to eat?
Today’s walk started from home at about 11:30. We have a very short period of daylight at this time of year and as today was sunny, it was important to get out in the sunshine. My husband and son were my walking companions today and our goal was a small beach on the east side of Skarnsund.
As we walked down our driveway, I saw the first “spring” flowers blooming. I normally buy primroses in January in a store, so these plants are used to blooming in the middle of winter. This plant got moved last summer to a new location and it seems to have done very well to be blooming in December. They often will continue to bloom under the snow.
Our walk continued across farm fields, around the neighbouring farm and across another field. We have no snow on the ground and the temperature today was about 7 degrees Celsius.
Here we are following a tractor road along the hillside. There were icy bits and it was very rough as the farmer’s cows have been out grazing in this direction. Skarnsund is just visible to our left and in the distance.When one sees the viewing platform in the woods, it is time to look for an opening in the fence as the trail goes down past the viewing platform The hill in the background is on the other side of Skarnsund. You would need to cross the bridge to get to it.The hole in the fence which can be blocked off in the summer when there are animals out grazing. In the winter the gap is usually left open.
The slope down to the water is quite steep and one needs to walk carefully. I prefer to do it now when I am with others, in case of mishap. There are other trails in the woods here, most of them would be made by the deer. This area has not been logged recently, so it is nice old forest.
Here is the trail we are following which will take us down to two cabins and a beach. Note the green rope on the right which is a guide line down the slope. It is mostly just laying on the ground, sometimes covered in vegetation and not necessarily safe to grab, but it does show that you are on the right trail.
At this time of year, there are a lot of dead leaves on the path, which can make it slippery. However, there was no ice on the path as we are under the trees. It is hard to take pictures that show how steep the slopes are here, but one does not want to wander off the trail.
A deer trail taking off from the main trail we are following. We live in a temperate rain forest with primarily spruce trees. Where the trees stand tight together, little light gets to the floor of the forest so very little else grows. Here there are mosses and lichens under the trees.
Eventually we came to the stream that drains this hillside. There is even a little bridge to help cross it and a sturdy handrail.
A small stream tumbles downhill. There are also two waterlines that will take water from the stream to the cabins below.We continued to follow the trail that now also had a waterline on it. This is a very common sight in the cabin areas around here. The lines may freeze in the winter, but people mostly use their cabins in the summer half of the year.Skarnsund Bridge from the north east. This photo was taken at 12:14, so approximately when the sun is at its highest in the sky for today.
It was lovely to just be on the beach for a while. The sun was shining and there was no wind. The water was calm. There was snow on distant hills, but nothing close by. We were also far enough away from the bridge that the noise of the traffic was almost not heard. There were no fishermen out today. Everyone here is busy getting ready for Christmas celebrations.
Looking north. One’s location in relation to hillsides will decide if you get sunshine or not at this time of year. We live on the right side to get sunshine. The housing area on the other side of Skarnsund is Framverran.
The beach is not sandy at all, but in relation to many places along Skarnsund, there is a place to walk for a couple of hundred meters before the next impassable section of rock comes. At high tide, most of this beach would disappear under water. We were there when the tide was about halfway between low tide (at 9:17 and 122 cm) and high tide (at 15:36 and 290 cm), so an incoming tide.
A view of the bridge on our way back home, from the part of the trail that is possibly at the highest elevation. A check on the map on my cellphone tells me that we are at about 140 meters above sea level. It’s been a glorious sunny day.
I don’t take this walk very often, but today was a good day to do it. Sunshine, no wind, plus degrees in the air and two good companions. We used a little more than an hour and a half on our walk.
Today’s walk took about 2 hours and one of my goals was to get some sunshine. In December, sunshine is a precious commodity and though our house gets some in the afternoon, the days are short. By heading outside, I was hoping to get fresh air, exercise and some sunshine on my face. All goals were achieved and as I walked, I thought about how important light is in December.
The first photo was taken at 11:40 and the last one at 13:17. Today, the 6th of December, sunrise was at 9:42 and sunset at 14:30.
This picture was taken at 11:43 from Skarnsund Bridge. At this point the clouds are obscuring the sun so that I’m not actually in the sunshine. Note how low the sun is in the sky and though it was moving from east to west, it didn’t get any higher in the sky. Sunshine in December gives very yellow and orange tones to what it shines on, whether it is cloud or nature.The mountains to the north of us are now covered in snow and the sun shining on them made me think about how location is so important to how much sunshine a place gets, though cloud cover also plays a role.
In Norway, it is interesting to see how the coastline has been settled. The north side of a fjord will get more sunshine than the south side and therefore will have more farms and villages. As you look at the picture above, the peninsula sticking out into the water gets a lot less sunshine than the mountain tops in the background at this time of year. Height above sea level will also affect how much sunshine a place gets, especially in winter. Getting higher up, there will be less land between the sun and where you are. As I crossed Skarnsund Bridge and climbed up a side road on the other side, it was noticeable that houses higher up got more sunshine than those lower down.
Walking today had its challenges. A few days ago, it rained on frozen ground and since then, there has been a thin layer of ice on road surfaces that are not often driven on. The side of the road can be even icier, so I had to be careful where I walked. This side road was sanded and doesn’t have much traffic, so I was able to walk in the middle of the road where it was sanded and had no problems walking, either up the hill or down again.There was a lot less ice on the road as I climbed up the hill, especially where the road was mostly under the trees. With much less ice, the walking was easier.This farm is getting a dose of sunshine. An open field between the house, farm buildings and the direction of the sun, allows the buildings to get some sunshine when the sun is not obscured by clouds.This solitary birch tree was bathed in sunshine.Yes, I got a dose of sunshine too, as my shadow proves.
I notice how the sunshine changes the colours of the things around us. Without sunshine, December tends to be a month of grey and white, with just a few dabs of blue and green. But when the sun shines on something, the colours turn more vibrant. Coniferous trees become very green and the sky was very blue where there weren’t any clouds. The brown grass and trees without leaves turn yellow and orange.
The coniferous trees are still green, but the deciduous trees show up as very yellow now that they have lost their leaves. The forest where I am walking is a mixture of both coniferous and deciduous trees.Finally, I came to the pathway I was aiming for. This path, though labelled with a red man, meaning that it was a difficult path, was much easier walking than on the roadway. Under the trees there was almost no ice or frost.I love this sort of a walk, into the forest and along a well-trodden pathway. At this time of year, it is quite quiet. I didn’t meet anyone else. Car traffic cannot be heard. There were no birds twittering in the trees. But patches of sunshine filtered through the trees.In an open patch along the trail, the puddle in the swampy part of the path has frozen. There was ice in only one small section of the pathway.The goal of my walk has been reached, Furufjellet (Pine Mountain), which was reflecting the sunshine as I had suspected it would.I turned around and started walking home again and now Vangshylla was bathed in sunshine.Skarnsund Bridge was also being bathed in sunlight. The concrete towers and the wires glowed in the sunshine.The wires of the bridge are painted red, so they showed up very well against the blue sky.Home again, and still an hour until sunset.
Quilting is the process of sewing several layers of fabric together. Finishing includes making the edges and corners neat.
Layers
Having now sewn the top layer of my place mat, the layer that shows, I need to make my place mats thick enough for their purpose. My place mats will be used a lot and need to soak up spills, deaden sounds on a wooden table, and tolerate a lot of washing. Making them with several layers, help them deaden sounds.
Before the backing material is attached, it is important to trim the edges of the place mat and make sure it is the size you want it.
I cut an old flannel sheet into the right size rectangles and used two layers of the sheeting to make a thicker place mat. This filling layer will not be visible in the finished place mat. The backing is made of a solid blue that goes well with the top. The edges will be folded over to the front to make good edges.
Here you can see the three layers for the place mats. The top layer is the patchwork that I have designed and sewn. On the bottom is the backing in a solid colour. In between is white flannel sheeting which adds thickness to the place mat. The white sheeting will not show in the finished place mat.
(Note: I am doing my sewing in November when there is very little daylight. I am mostly doing my sewing while it is dark outside. This means that most of the pictures were taken inside under various inadequate lighting conditions. Please excuse the poor quality of the colour in the photos. A few were taken outdoors and they will reflect the real colours much better.)
Quilting
Quilting is the process of sewing all the layers together so that they tolerate washing. There are many ways of doing the quilting, but with a geometric pattern like I have, I like best to follow the lines of the pattern. In this case I decided to sew only in one direction, and in the trough between two strips. I have chosen a contrasting colour so that it shows. When sewing in the trough, the stitching may not show up, if you use a colour of thread that easily disappears into the fabric’s own colour.
The quilting is done by sewing with a contrasting colour in the troughs created by the strips.
When doing the sewing, start in the middle of the place mat and work your way to the outside edges. As you sew the different layers may stretch a bit and by starting in the middle you can reduce unwanted tucks as you sew.
Looking at the back side of the place mat, you can see that I have quilted with parallel lines in one direction only.
Many of the old-fashioned quilts were quilted with various flowery patterns in the sewing. This, of course, is a personal preference. With other place mats where I have appliquéd patterns, there is often more pattern on the back. This place mat has a very plain pattern. It is adequate to hold all the four layers together solidly enough to tolerate a lot of washing.
Finishing
Once I had finished the quilting, I worked on making neat edges. The backing was folded twice and pinned in place. I always have difficulties with the corners and I spent quite a bit of time trying to get them all the same and easy to sew so that they didn’t come apart.
Here the backing has been turned twice to make a neat edgeHere is a close up of how I had pinned the edges and corners.I also did some extra zigzag stitching in the corners so that the place mat tolerates a lot of washing.Three of the place mats in use, with the new blue plates that they were designed to match.
Once the design has been decided on and the calculations made, it is time to get down to the practical work of cutting and sewing pieces together. My design at the moment is geometrical, using squares and rectangles in three colours of fabric.
Tools
Self-healing cutting mat, roller knife and cutting ruler.
If you are going to do much of this type of creative work, it is important to invest in the tools that are needed. Cutting a lot of small pieces with scissors is both time consuming and inaccurate. A roller knife along a flat edge will give a much straighter cut and cut down on the wear and tear on your fingers. Use a self-healing cutting mat. The one I have has metric measurements on one side, and inches on the other side. You can choose the measurement system that suits you best. I have been metric since before I moved to Norway in 1980.
Using a roller knife, you can cut through several thicknesses of fabric at the same time. Make sure you have extra blades for the roller knife as they can get dull quickly if you are cutting a lot.
Cutting
I was using leftover pieces of material that were often odd shaped, but I was able to use up quite a few of these pieces. The challenge can be to get the squares and rectangles matched up with the grain of the fabric.
First I cut long strips 4 cm wide, then I cut the strips into the correct lengths.
The dark blue pieces were to be of three different lengths, 4 cm, 6 cm and 8 cm. All pieces are 4 cm wide.
I ended up with over a thousand pieces. I made a few extra of each colour and size in case any turned out uneven or unusable. It was a bit of a challenge to count how many were cut, but I did them in groups of 10 and that helped. With persistence the job gets done.
Remember that accuracy when cutting is very critical to the look of the final piece of work. I use a 1 cm sewing allowance on all sides. So if a finished block is to be 2 cm by 2 cm, I cut it 4 cm by 4 cm. This is all done when doing your calculations during the design of the project. Using a roller knife and a long ruler helps make the edges very straight. By using the lines on the cutting mat, you can make sure that corners are at 90 degrees and that lengths are as accurate as humanly possible.
Sewing
The best procedure when making geometrical patterns is first to sew the small pieces into strips, then to sew the strips together to make a larger piece. You want to think carefully how you do your sewing so that you don’t get a lot of material bunched up to the right of the sewing needle.
Feeding the small pieces into the sewing machine. Here I am sewing two small pieces, 4 x 4 cm, together.
To reduce the amount of cutting of thread that you do, I suggest that you feed the small pieces into the sewing machine with a couple of millimeters between them. This saves both thread and time. I cut the pieces apart when I ironed each piece. I worked on making 30 strips at a time. I find it easiest to work with the strips if I press the seam allowance to one side before I add the next piece. It means a lot of moving from the sewing machine to the ironing board, but I find the moving around is good for me.
Five pairs of small pieces sewn together. They are easy to cut apart once they are out of the sewing machine. At this point I ironed the seam allowance to one side.Here I have four pieces sewn together and the fifth one is laid on top. They were lined up more exactly as I fed them into the sewing machine.
Accuracy is very important when both cutting and sewing pieces together. When making a strip with 8 pieces, if each piece is out just 1 mm, you can be out 8 mm by the end of the strip. I had one strip that ended up being much too short and I had to pull it out and replace it.
Here are some of the finished strips waiting for assembly.
Once I made all the strips that I needed, I arranged them in the correct order for the place mats. This can be a good time to check that the lengths have all come out close enough to use.
Here I have lined up the strips in the correct order to make the pattern I wanted. I then make them into a pile so that I just take the next one from the pile while sewing them together.Strips sewn together.
In the next blog I will explain how I have made the backing and done the quilting.
Wednesday is my usual day to go for a walk with a girlfriend. The weather forecast was for sunshine so I was looking forward to today’s walk. As I went out to the car, I noticed fog rolling across the water, coming out of Skarnsund. As I stood watching for a few minutes, the fog rapidly moved out over Trondheim Fjord.
Picture taken at 9:38 looking towards Skarnsund Bridge.
I had agreed to meet my friend at her house in Straumen and I was anxious to see where there was fog and where there wasn’t fog. As I had hoped, the fog was mostly on the water and if we walked uphill, we would be in the sunshine.
We choose to walk up to Øyna, a hotel and restaurant located near the top of a hill in Straumen. (See their website for more information about them. You can also get information about them in English here.)
Øyna, a commercial enterprise having hotel accommodation and a restaurant serving locally produced food. It lies at the top of a hill and lies low in the terrain.The newest hotel units also lie low in the landscape but each room has a beautiful view over Straumen, Trondheim Fjord and the surrounding area.
Even on a foggy day, the views from here were good though, of course, not as good as on a sunny day. In the picture below you can just see the top of the spire of Sakshaug Church, sticking up from the fog. This picture is taken looking between two of the new units of the hotel, so this is the sort of view there would be from the hotel rooms themselves.
Looking down the hill from Øyna towards Straumen, most of which is hidden in the fog. In the background are the hills of Levanger.Looking westwards towards Trondheim. We are now high enough above the fog to get an interesting picture of how the fog covers the fjord. Where you see white, it should be mostly fjord underneath the fog.I always find it interesting how patchy fog can be, especially when looking at it from above. Here I am looking eastwards towards two of the housing areas of Straumen. Not everybody has sunshine.Back home and this picture was taken at 12:00. There is more fog on Skarnsund, but it is still lying low over the water.The fog is wispy over the water, but not rising particularly high above the water, so I am still in the sunshine.Looking towards Ytterøy with the small boat harbour at Vangshylla in the center. The sun is low in the sky, even at noon.
I had a most enjoyable walk, including a good climb up the hill in Straumen, an exploration of an area I hadn’t seen for several years, and lots of sunshine. We used about 75 minutes on our walk today.
