It's raining, raining, raining...

People are often asking me if I'm getting depressed with that long dark season we're having here. No, actually I'm not. A dark season is just a period between two half a year long polar day without darkness. Dark season is ok as long we're having snow. But there is one thing which makes me to feel low. That's a mild period in winter, doesn't matter if that's in dark or light time.

We have been having almost +5 degrees Celcius and it's raining. Everything is icy and that little snow what we were having is disappearing. I don't actually mind that my shoes are totally soaking wet but it's really irritating to be walking on the slippery roads even though I'm having spikes on my shoes. I don't see anything good to have warm weather in the middle of winter!

Vet in the town

When vet is coming to town it's time to check for vaccinations for dogs and also if there is some other things which are bothering, they can be check. Our dog is pretty sure to get vaccination is something which can be lethal - it's worth to be fighting for life. Almost 30 kilos of panicking dog isn't that easy to hold but this years vaccination went relatively fine.

Our dog has been having some troubles with his ears and last autumn when we were on holiday we took him to vet. He was having infection in his ears. He didn't get totally fine after that treatment so vet was checking again his ears. Yes, an ear was still infected. Now he got some antibiotics for addition to ear drops.

It was written that antibiotics were having some taste on them which makes dogs and cats to eat them happily. I'm not believing everything what is told so I hide the tablet in a meat ball. He took the meat ball, ate it and spat the pill out. Now I understood why the tablet was that screaming pink - it's much easier to find it from the floor with that colour.

I can't believe that he who has designed the medicine bottle for ear drops is having a dog. At least our dog isn't waiting still that we could just drop that liquid on his ears. Drops are feeling uncomfortable (just try to put some drops in your own ears!) and when he's moving his head that pointy and pretty sharp tip of the bottle is sticking him in the ear making medicating also painful. And to being honest I'm not sure if I can count 3-4 drops but he's just getting a random amount of medicine. I really want to quit the infection so I needed to fix somehow the bottle. I added a spray nozzle on it and it's working actually brilliantly. One spray is enough and it's spreads medicine nicely on thin layer in the ear. Quick and easy! Why they just wouldn't make that kind of bottles?

Shimmer behind the mountains

Some earlier years I have been waiting eagerly first shimmer behind the mountains. Now it just came and I'm just looking it amazed. Is the sky getting really lighter already? Is the dark season defeated? We'll get some real twilight in the end of the month, but we can clearly see the darkest time of the year is behind.

We just had an amazingly beautiful weekend. We went to the other side of the fjord and spend the weekend in a cabin. It was nice to wake up late and eat a breakfast with candle light, looking shimmering sky on the south, behind the town. Later incredibly bright full moon lightened terrain. Starlight was bland, but northern lights were dancing all over the sky. The dark time can be really ravishing!

New Year celebration in Svea

I had my last working week in Svea over New Year. In the New Years evening everybody gathered in the canteen and we had a really nice meal together. At midnight there were pretty impressive fire works. Otherwise work week was just like normal. No any extra free just because of New Year.

We got one extra unplanned overnighting in Svea. We were outside looking for landing airplane - and just before touch down it took suddenly up again. Because of the turbulences it couldn't land. After one more attempt it gave up and returned to Longyearbyen. We got a change to fly back to Longyearbyen day after.

Time in Svea is over for now but I'm hoping I could go back next summer again.

Happy Christmas!

We have had five fantastic Christmas celebration in Svalbard. Two years we have been in the town, one year in Svea and twice had a cosy Christmas in a cabin. This year we decided to do something totally different. We took a little bag and our dog with us and flew to Tromsø. We got a change to borrow our friends house in Kvaløya - thanks for her! Here we have couple of hours twilight in the middle of the day and Christmas peace over us. And that's about everything we need for a Happy Christmas!

Merry Christmas for all of you!

Chrismas is arriving also in Svea

Christmas has arrived even in Svea. Christmas decorations and good Christmas meals are giving a sense of occasion, even though people working as normally. A coal town is busy even in these holidays. We left Svea before Christmas but many are celebrating in Svea while they working.

Evening with Ginger breads

Even though all Norway included Svalbard has been suffering for butter shortage we had our yearly Ginger bread baking evening for girls. Luckily people in Svalbard are used to squirrel away amazing things in their freezers - included butter. 1,5 kg fat, 2 kg sugar, 5 kg flour, 1 dl spices and little cognac became a delicious dough with Swedish Ginger bread recipe. Recipe is Swedish because tradition were started by a partly Swedish girl. And tradition is still going on even though the first Ginger bread bakers have been moving away from Svalbard.

A total moon eclipse

We were lucky to see a total moon eclipse again. Last year it was in an early morning and then it was freezing cold and good breeze. This year we were lucky. The total eclipse was a Saturday afternoon and even it was quite cold it was actually totally ok because there weren't any wind. We had a little skiing trip in Andventdalen, just to go little bit out of the town lights. There were unbelievable amount of cars on Adventdalen way! Lot of people had taken a trip with a car to take pictures of the reddish moon.