the last days, i’ve been travelling back south, arriving at helsinki airport tomorrow to fly back to zürich. when i started driving south in lapland, it was still ruska time:

(these shots are from the first time i the clouds broke open and let sunlight through on my way south, after having seen a dense cloud cover for the last whatever many days.) the farther south i got, the less colorful the landscape got. but then, there were other interesting things to see.

vikajärvi.

on my way north, i drove directly from kemijärvi to sodankylä, hence missing vikajärvi, the town i stayed in for 10 days last year in march. but on my way back south, with my first stop-over being kemi, the best way was going straight through vikajärvi. i couldn’t resist to get a better view of some places during fall:

compare the first photo to this one, and the place where i shot the last two photos is depicted here. everything looks quite different, eh?

kemi.

my first stop-over was kemi, finland’s northernmost city at a coast to an ocean. (it is located at the bothnian bay.) here are a few impressions from a stroll to the old harbor:

lumijoki: bay of bothnia.

continuing the next day to vaasa, i did a stop in varjakka near lumijoki to get another, more beachy view on the bothnian bay:

unfortunately, the weather got bad around that point, as on the way to varjakka and back there were a lot of nice views…

(lumijoki lies in pohjois-pohjanmaa, which roughly translates to northern northland. considering that there is a lot more north of it, the name is quite a fail :) )

öja.

somewhere before vaasa, i took a small detour and visited the island öja. unfortunatley, the weather was still not very exciting…

from vaasa i continued further south to turku.

turun linna.

when arriving in turku, i was too early to check in into my hotel, so i drove in the direction of the harbor to see some sea. but then i saw turku’s castle and decided to take a closer look at it. the castle was built over 700 years ago and is still mostly intact. one can nowadays walk through a maze of rooms and enjoy many great views, on both medieval and renaissance parts, and there is also a prehistoric exhibition running. it’s definitely a great place to visit! here are some impressions:

turun tuomiokirkko and surroundings.

after dropping my stuff off at the hotel and refreshing myself, i went to see the tuomiokirkko and its surroundings. here are some impressions:

here’s my project 52 shot for the twentyfirst week. the topic was

sucht.

this one wasn’t too hard. instead of photographing chocolate, alcohol, computers, cats, i chose something making me go outside several times a night during the last days: northern lights, also called aurora borealis. these ones i photographed next to my mökki near ivalo, lappland. please click the photo to get a larger version:

technical details: 2s, f/4.5, 16mm fisheye, iso 3200.

here’s my project 52 shot for the nineteenth week. the topic was

die grüne hölle.

it is hard to find a green hell at the places where i am. something remotely similar, a greeny forestal view, presented itself to me while being in the finnish lakelands, near mikkeli, not too far from the whooping swan. please click the photo to get a larger version:

technical details: 1/200s, f/8, 35mm, iso 200.

here’s my project 52 shot for the seventeenth week. pretty late, though. the topic was

fedriges.

while being in the finnish lakelands near mikkeli, i took a photo of a whooper swan fluffing up on a lake – a perfect motive for this topic. please click the photo to get a larger version:

technical details: 1/500s, f/8, 400mm, iso 200.

while staying in ivalo, i did a daytrip to kirkenes in norway, and dipped my feet into the barents sea. it was pretty cold, and didn’t got any warmer while staying in it a bit longer. i’d still jump in if i would have taken my swimming gear with me… this is a thing you don’t do that often. as before in ivalo, it was cloudy. and rained a bit. but nonetheless, it was beautiful. lappland is just beautiful. the barents sea reminds me a lot of the north sea. which reminds me that i haven’t been there for quite some time.