Arctic churches: simple and colourful

Arctic churches are usually a landmark, sometimes the best building around; most look like this: wooden made, a rectangular body , a single bell tower on the front face, walls coloured red, blue, brown, gray - in general an attractive and rather joyful building, not a dark heavy one.

Inside, a single nave, columns are rare, no chapels, transept in a few, and a modest altar. Now and then, a side chapel, a vestibule or covered entrance, some woodwork.

Some examples, a mini-album:

1. Grise fiord, Arctic Archipelago, Canada

2. Uelen, Russia, Northeast Siberia.

3. Vardø, Norway

4. Uummannaq, Greenland

One of few stone churches in the Arctic !

5. Tuktoyaktuk, Canada, Northwest Territories

That's a church! Even has a cross plant and a roof skylight.

6. Ittileq, Greenland

7. Unalaska, Aleutian Islands, Alaska

Topped with russian orthodox onion-shaped domes:

8. Arctic Bay, Baffin Island, Canada

9. Upernavik, Greenland

By now, you may have noticed: most greenlandic churches are vivid red.

10. Tasiilaq, Greenland

This church is now Ammassalik Museum

Church bench decoration, inuit theme

11. Mo-i-rana, Norway

12. Longyearbyen , Svalbard Island

13. Sisimiut, Greenland

Sisimiut is well known for its two colonial - era churches: the red one...

... and the blue one:

14 . Kimmirut, Arctic Archipelago, Canada

An anglican church built in 1909.

15. Resolute, Arctic Archipelago, Canada

16. Qaqortoq, Greenland

17. Nuuk, Greenland capital's old church

18. A jewel: Ilulissat, Greenland

For a medieval stone church in arctic latitudes, see

http://ultima0thule.blogspot.com/2011/02/trondenes-church-norway.html

Þingvellir (Thingvellir) , an atlantic creek and a viking parliament

Thingvellir, Iceland, is the historic site of the oldest parliament in the world, one of the most spectacular parks in Iceland and a huge surface creek between tectonic plates.

Here the Mid-Atlantic Ridge comes above water: Thingvellir is an enormous geologic rift between the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates.

One of the most beautiful places in Iceland, Thingvellir National Park is also central to the nation's history: it was home to the first parliament in the world. Icelandic Vikings began meeting here annually in the 10th century, gathering around a giant rock formation to create new laws and amend previous ones.

The Mid-Atlantic Ridge is a divergent boundary, so as the two plates are slowly moving apart Iceland will sometime in the future break into two seperate land masses with the Atlantic Ocean between!

These two continents are drifting apart, due to the tectonic plates, at the speed of 2 m per century, so the land here is constantly sinking due to the land-masses splitting apart, and thus a huge graben, or rift valley, is forming.

The Alþingi or Althing (viking parliament) was founded here around 930 AD, and assembled each summer. Later it functioned as a court of law until 1798. Many crucial events in Iceland's history took place here, such as the adoption of Christianity around 1000 AD, and the foundation of the modern Icelandic Republic in 1944.

19th century rendering of the Law Rock in Þingvellir.

Public addresses on matters of importance were delivered at the Law. The Lögrétta, the legislative section of the assembly, was its most powerful institution.

Since 1930 Þingvellir has been a National Park, and in 2004 ist was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.

Þingvellir National Park

The property includes the Þingvellir National Park and the remains of the Althing itself: fragments of around 50 booths built from turf and stone, remains from the 10th century thought to be buried underground. Also Lake Þingvallavatn, with a rich geological history and ecossistem, and the Öxarárfoss (waterfall of the Öxarár river) are protected attractions of the Park.

Old church where the Öxarár river joins the Þingvallavatn lake

Öxarárfoss waterfall

Vernadsky, the funniest antarctic station

This time, the extreme south:

Vernadsky Research Base is a Ukrainian Station at Marina Point on Galindez Island, in Antarctica.

Coordinates: 65°15'S, 64°16'W

The station consists of nine buildings standing on rock foundations. A 1961 extension at the east end of the hut provided living quarters for 15 people.

The base was established as "Faraday Station" by the British in 1947; later it moved to the present site on Galindez Island in May 1954.

Major alterations in 1980 updated the living and working accommodation.

A two-storey extension provides sleeping accommodation for 24 people.

Ukraine took over the operation of the base in February 1996.

The price was symbolic: just one pound !

The original coin now decorates the station lounge:

Akademik Vernadsky Station:

http://www.antarctida.kiev.ua/english/

The Ukrainian Antarctic Center continues a programme of meteorology, upper atmospheric physics, geomagnetism, ozone, seismology, glaciology, ecology, biology and physiology research.

The discovery of the ozone hole was made at that very location.

Upstairs are a lounge, library, dining room, gift store and kitchen. The research team os granted some confort and space.

The docking building

The shop and visitor's center

Long course post from faraway...

Maybe the most southerly shop in the world.

A short video about Vernadsky base:

Las Médulas - roman legacy landscape in northern Iberia

This time, not an arctic location - but a place in northern Spain that is known of few, in the region of Asturias, not far from the cities of Léon and Astorga.

Las Médulas were the most important gold mines of all Roman empire. They were explored from 19 B.C. until mid-3rd century.

"Mons Medullius", also the site of asturian battles.

Now the remaining land, richly forested, offers a strange scenery of beauty, history and geology. That´s why it is classified by UNESCO as one of the nature's wonders of Spain.

The Asturian territory was known by the romans for its soil, rich in metals like iron, tin and gold. Pliny, who visited the region for some years, wrote:

"The mountains of Hispania, barren and sterile, and producing nothing else worthy, had at least to produce gold"

The gold fever, that opened around 50 exploitation sites, may have been caused by the introduction of the gold coin the aureus, part of an impostant monetary reform by imperor Augustus.

Pliny estimates a "6 500 Kg per year" production of gold; that would be 6 to 7% of the roman annual erary income! The profits were certainly more modest, as according to modern research gold was only around 1 gram per cubic meter, with scarce bigger nuggets - Pliny refering palagas of more than 3 Kg !!

Pliny described the mining technique:

"This type of mine has been given the name of Ruina Montium. The cracks made in the entrails of the stone are so dangerous that it would be easier to find purpurine or pearls at the bottom of the sea than make scars in the rock."

"Broken, the mountain falls in on itself with a noise louder and a wind more violent than any human mind could imagine…"

Oaks, chestnut trees, willows, alders, cork trees, and vigorous heather ( up to 2m high), form a dense and varied grove.

The capricious forms of the ruined mounts interact with the bush and forest, creating an uncommon landscape, with the rosy peaks emerging from the green canopies.

• http://www.fundacionlasmedulas.org/parque/index.jsp

Aurora Borealis, northern lights

Terje Sorgjerd, from Oslo, spent a week filming one of the largest Auroras of recent years, and what a magnificent film he gave us:

Shot in and around Kirkenes (Norway) and Pas National Park, bordering Russia, at 70º N 30º E. Temperatures around -25º Celsius.