Store Blåmann

The good weather continues.... Beautiful evening trip with Andreia and Kåre up Store Blåmann, one of the most spectacular mountain walks close to Tromsø. Steep, very rocky with stunning views from the top. Store Blåmann featured on my blog before when I sampled its vertical profile for apatite fission track dating in 2009. Here a few more photos.

Het mooie weer zet door.... Hier een prachtige avondwandeling samen met Andreia en Kåre naar de top van Store Blåmann, één van de meest spectaculaire bergwandelingen vlakbij Tromsø. Steil, rotsachtig, met schitterend uitzicht van de top. Store Blåmann is al eerder op mijn blog beschreven toen ik op verschillende hoogtes monsters heb genomen voor apatiet fission track datering in 2009. Hier een paar nieuwe foto's.

We are heading to the top of the shadow... Shadow of Store Blåmann in Kaldfjorden.

View to the west, over the rugged mountains of Kvaløya.

View north towards Vengsøya.

Looking back up. Sun light on the north face of Store Blåmann.

Gråtinden

We finally got some summer weather again. Nice evening walk/cycle up Kvitbergfjellet and Gråtinden. The first 4 km and 500 m elevation up to the mast on Kvitbergfjellet are along a gravel road, so I decided to try to cycle it. But I have to admit that the consistent climb was too tough for me and I had to alternate cycling and walking. The down hill ride was fast though. Fantastic views from the top, particularly of the fog coming in along the fjords from the ocean.

Good gravel road.

Good view of Bentsjordtinden across the fjord.

The last few hundred meters to the top are a bit steeper, but there is a marked track.

Looking back to Tromsø from the top of Gråtinden.

Fog covered fjords, with the mountains of the island Senja in the distance.

Clear view to the south.

My bike was patiently waiting for me.

Large nearly full moon caught my attention when driving back. It is nearly midnight.

Botanical garden in Tromsø

July has been rather wet and grey with only the occasional sunny day. The dry spells have been too short to be able to paint the outside of the house, so I painted some walls inside instead (the stairs). The weather hasn't stopped me hiking, it is quite nice with some rain and wind as they keep the mosquitos away. The wind did make a good effort trying to blow me off the mountain Kjølen last week. I had planned to continue to the other side of the top plateau, but it was so difficult walking into the wind that I just turned around. Surprisingly, I didn't meet anyone else on this normally very popular hike that day.

July is tot nu toe nogal nat en grijs met maar een paar zonnige dagen. De droge periodes zijn te kort om het huis buiten te verven, dus ik heb maar een paar muren binnen geverfd (bij de trap), die hadden het ook nodig. Ook met wind en regen is het goed wandelen in de bergen, dan heb je in ieder geval geen last van muggen. De wind deed vorige week z'n best om me van de lokale berg Kjølen af te blazen. Ik was eigenlijk van plan om door te lopen naar de andere kant van het top plateau, maar het was zo moeilijk om tegen de wind in te lopen dat ik bij de top maar omgekeerd ben. 

Kjølen. I had to hide behind the cairn to take this photo.

Last Friday was a warm and sunny day and I made a beautiful walk up Buren. Buren is one of the 10-på-topp mountains this year and it was good to see that quite a few people were enjoying this nice hike.

Afgelopen vrijdag was het warm en zonnig, een mooie dag voor een wandeling naar Buren. Buren is dit jaar een van de ti-på-topp bergen en en is daardoor dit jaar redelijk druk bezocht.

View back to Tromsø from halfway up Buren.

Top of Buren.

My mother visited yesterday afternoon and we walked around the arctic botanic garden of the University of Tromsø. It is peak season in the garden at the moment with lots of interesting flowers out. Very colourful.

Gistermiddag kwam mijn moeder op bezoek en hebben we door de arctische botanische tuin van de universiteit van Tromsø gewandeld. Het is hoogseizoen in de tuin en er staan veel planten in bloei. Prachtig en kleurrijk.

Meconopsis, 'blue poppy', from the Himalayas.

Gentiana 'silken skies'