More vacation to come...

This week-end there was a blues festival in Longyearbyen. It was the 10th time up here in the "cold" North. Many tourists came from the mainland along with 15 bands from all over the world. The music was very good, although we only attended one night.

On Thursday Anna will travel to Copenhagen for some vacation and to meet friends. She really likes Copenhagen, while I am very reluctant to go there, as I have lived there for several years ;0) Any way I have to work, and Anna is without work so she has time ;0)

On November 9th we will meet in Oslo and from there we will fly to Edinburgh in Scotland and travel around in Northern England and Scotland. We are still debating where and how many places to see...
November 17th we fly back to Oslo and the finally to Svalbard on the 18th. It will be good with some more vacation and to other parts of the world...

Weather wise on Svalbard, it is still fairly cold, with temperatures between minus 8 and minus 18 degrees. The darkness is growing stronger and stronger and in 2 weeks time we will be at full dark-time here on Svalbard!

The cold is biting...

This morning the temperature had dropped to -11 degrees when I walked to work.
I gave a couple of lectures to the ANG students (Arctic Nature Guide) about coal mining on Svalbard and being a guide on cruise ships here and in Greenland, Iceland and Antarctica.
During the day the temperature continued dropping, so at the time I was walking home it was -18.

Anna made a lovely dinner with fried salmon, while I was half asleep in the sofa for some reason. The dinner made me wake up and then we found out that there was a lot of northern light (Svalbard standard which means less than Greenland and Iceland). We drove out in to the Adventdalen where temperature had dropped as low as -27. No wonder I was freezing cold trying to make northern light photographs while Anna was in the car keeping warm and listening to music ;0)

All in all a good day on Svalbard...

more snow...

During the night it snowed a bit more and during the day it just continued.
The snow cover is getting thicker and today I saw the first snow-scooters driving on the road, this might not be the smartest idea but probably good fun ;0)
Now it is also getting darker and darker. Going to and from work is during the twilight...
After work I walked over and finished the paper work for the car and drove home to Anna to show her our "new" transportation...

Anna and the car in the snow

Is winter coming?

During the last week or so the weather here in Longyearbyen has been quite changing. It has been days with a bit of sun on the summits of the mountains, but also overcast and snowy days. The temperature has been around 0 degrees with occasional changes  to -4 and  +5. Now king winter seems to have taken over again, covering the longyearbyen area in a thin blanket of snow. Daylight is getting shorter by 40 min every day, so it is necessary to enjoy the little light we have left, before entering into almost 4 months of darkness...
When the weather is not too good we spend time going to the gym, the shooting range or stay at home putting up curtains and watching movies and making BBQ with friends ;0)
Last week we also bought a car. WHY? might you wonder, as there is only 45 km of roads in this town!
The answer is easy, "WHY NOT"! Well it is always good to be free to do what ever when ever, visiting friends in the other end of the valley without being worried about the weather, driving groceries home etc.
It is not a NEED to have but NICE to have a car ;0)

Back on Svalbard

Again I have not been using my time posting on my blogg. Shame on me.

After spending a wonderful vacation in Iceland, which lasted only to short, I went to Hannover, Germany to attend a conference. In the mean time Anna stayed in Iceland, getting another week with family and friends.
We met again in Oslo on the way back to Svalbard.
Since then I have been busy at work while Anna has been mostly at home as she is now without a job. She is only a substitute for a few hours now and then...but she is looking for jobs here in town, so we hope for the best ;0)

continued vacation

After arriving in Reykjavik, Iceland I had 9 more days of vacation with Anna and my parents.
Most of the time we spent in Reykjavik, but Anna and I also drove North to Stykkisholmur to visit one of our friends where we stayed over-night. The town of Stykkisholmur was full of hollywood people, sealing of the town and making the movie " The secret life of Walter Mitty".

One day we drove up to my uncles house at Hamarsheiði, close to Hekla to help him build his house. He wants to move to the country side to enjoy his otium. It is a very beautiful place.
Most of the days in Iceland we had good weather and we ALWAYS went to the swimming-pool and had fantastic dinners.