Dried fish snacks at midnight

The midnight sun makes you feel like you’re on drugs. 

How else could the sky look as clear and blue as noon, while the light is yellow like a sunset?  This phenomenon happens in the arctic latitudes around June/July when the sun never dips below the horizon.  There’s 24-hours of daylight…spectacular, inexplicably magical, really-beautiful-but-I-wish-this-stupid-hostel-had-curtains-so-I-could-sleep daylight. 

I’m not sure how it feels for other people, but I believe our midnight sun euphoria was heightened by the Amazing Race challenges we had to surpass to get to our arctic sun-watching destination:

– Tempermental arctic weather forecast:  We obsessively stalked the forecast for two weeks on three websites before booking our flight the day before departure. As our plane departed, the forecast was for cloudless skies.  By the time we arrived several hours later, massive arctic cloud banks were gathering exactly where the sun would be dipping that night. 

– Location, location, location:  Immediately upon arrival in the Lofoten Islands, we realized that we couldn’t see the midnight sun from the southeastern side of the mountainous island where we booked our stay.  The sun dips in the northwest.  Yes, we were in precisely the right place notto see the sun.  And there was no rental car agency in the town of A i Lofoten, population 11, where our ferry docked. 

These are the mountains I'm talking about.

– Youth hostel, old people:  We booked our 2-night stay in a youth hostel, the only room available in high season.  Fab and I are both 37 years old.  A youth hostel is alsoprecisely the wrong place to be.  The hostel had bunk beds and handkerchiefs for curtains.  I repeat, handkerchiefs for curtains.  In the land of 24 hour sun.

As fake Amazing Race contestants, we were ready to kick some ass to see the midnight sun.  We were going to see the damn sun.  No matter what.

First off, we needed to get to the midnight sun watching spot.  Then we would deal with the clouds.   Our options: 

a) spontaneously hike 7 hours over a mountain pass to a spot on the uninhabited, north-facing other side of the island, hike back to hostel at 1am

b) bike 34 kilometers each way over above-pictured mountainous arctic terrain to northern beach, or

c) take a bus (which stopped running at 9pm) to a town 64 km away to pay exorbitant fee for the last rental car within a 3 island radius.  Car only available for 18.5 hours. 

We selected Option C.  And as we drove up at 11pm to our midnight sun watching spot, the clouds parted.  I swear. 

Okay, we’re not meteorologists and we were being a little paranoid.  I told you, the midnight sun is like drugs.  The cloud banks were never actually where the sun was dipping.  We were looking in the wrong spot.  But still.

The light is inexplicably beautiful and makes you do strange, cheesy things.  I was moved to take a picture of a white horse in a midnight sunny meadow, munching grass in the golden sun.  I’ll post it later, so you believe me. 

A little before midnight, a retired Norwegian fisherman and veteran of the north sea oil rigs stopped by our watching spot for a chat.  He was a tough salty sea dog.  Like all Norwegians, he spoke nearly perfect English and was extremely kind.  He offered us some of the dried cod he was carrying around in a plastic bag, a popular local snack, eaten right off the skin of the fish.  He left a little before midnight, giving us the rest of the fish, bag, skin and all, to snack on til til the sun started rising again. 

12:30am Lofoten