Bird restaurant

We have a very busy restaurant outside our house. It has a self-service buffet and about a dozen trees for outdoor seating. The majority of the visitors behave well, they get their food at the buffet and find a seat in the trees where they can eat it. However, some of the guests prefer to dine at the buffet itself, and sometimes even fall asleep here. This occasionally causes problems for other visitors, because they are blocking the access to the food. 

The great tits are the most common visitors, there are about a dozen of them. They are well-behaved, select their preferred seed and fly to a tree to eat it. 

The willow and blue tits are also regular visitors, but they are in the minority: there is only one willow tit and 2 blue tits. They are also very shy and don't like getting their picture taken. 

Sparrows are some of the less behaved visitors. They are not as agile as the tits and prefer therefore to sit at the buffet and stay there. In the middle of the polar night, the sparrows often sit here for hours during the night. The green finch is a more recent visitor. 

And last but not least, the magpies, of course. They come to clean the floor. 

Austeråsfjellet

We haven't done any bigger trips lately, but here are some photos from some short trips around Tromsø. The first couple of photos were taken on a short Sunday trip up Austeråsfjellet a week ago. Beautiful snow in the valley and forest, but very icy and windy up the top.

A ptarmigan landed here and ran around.

Some nice altocumulus lenticularis clouds.

Tony

Looking towards the Lyngen alps.

Snow getting blown over the ice on the top of Austeråsfjellet.

And a couple of photos of a short walk near Grønnlibruna, on the southeastern point of Kvaløya, a couple of weeks ago.

Tony checking out the ice walls.

I just liked the pine tree.

A reindeer enjoying the sunshine and the view.

Looking towards Tromsø.

Nordtinden

We had fantastic weather in Tromsø today, blue skies and virtually no wind, and since the weather forecast for the next 10 days is terrible (+4˚C and rain) I just had to go out and enjoy the sun while it was here. Nobody else was able to join me, so I decided to do a relaxed snowshoe walk up Nordtinden, on the northwestern side of Kvaløya, which has beautiful views towards the outer islands. I took the snowshoes because I expected icy and windblown snow, but the snow conditions above ca 200 m were better than I expected.

Looking eastwards, back on my track. Lyngen alps in the far distance.

'Selfie' of me and the top cairn on Nordtinden, with Ringvassøya in the background.

View to Vengsøya