Icedogs

Cinder road. Dirt road. Gravel road. And most of all holes-in-the-road. Countless kilometers of humping and bumping bring us to far off places, from where we can start our walks with the dogs. However the many dirt roads also make sure Daisy creaks and squeaks like an old wagon (oh well, she actually is an old wagon!).

We ourselves start creaking and squeaking as well. The ongoing moist cold has penetrated deep into our joints and our muscles are begging for a hot tub. Well, that ‘s not gonna happen any time soon. Come on, old body, do not protest, go on! We do have to check out the condensation problem inside Daisy when we get back home. Her nightly dampiness doesn’t improve our muscle problem.

Luckily we don’t keep track of our route on a map, cause it would look like a rather remarkable, weird maze. The traject of a headless chicken, a deranged rabbit on a plain… North to south, east to west and then backwards… Ha! Nothing wrong with a little whimsicality in your life. Nothing has to, anything goes 🙂

When at the end of september a short late summer arrives, we head ‘south’ to the island of Senja. South is a relative term, cause we ‘re still far above the arctic circle, for about a month and a half already. The island is a discovery. Temperatures are mild, and for a moment we are back in automn, with its insanely warm colours (no, no photoshop!).

But alas, the Indian Summer is short and rain is coming. So back to the north, where cold hopefully also means dry 🙂

At 70° north, close to the Russian border, temperatures drop below zero. And yes, gone is the rain!

And look, with a bit of luck, in the afternoon, in a corner out of the wind and into the sun, temperatures reach a tropical 8°C! Perfect conditions to dry a bunch of wet doggy towels.

The doggies love it here and are having a great time.

Wild animals all over the place, and for the girls there is always something to score. The date of expiration clearly is non of their concern. Fortunately their stomach is way more tougher than ours. Bah, dirty doggies!

October, so far north, the world bathes in different sort of light. It seems that dawn lasts a whole day. A fragile, soft, yellow pinkish glow, as if the day never really becomes day but suspends in a golden glow.

The nights are not so soft and fragile, but abundant and excentric. The Northern Lights overwhelm us with their whimsicality and brightness. It’s a phenomenon that is difficult to discribe, because on the one hand it creeps along the sky in complete silence and on the other hand it explodes in colour and light. It takes on all kinds of shapes, than fast, than slow. Threedimensionally it waves over your head, or it tightens in a beam that flies away from you. The Northern Lights is the exuberant stripling, the generous artist, the unpredictable, fierce eruption and the rolling softness, all in one.

The Northern Lights are never boring.