We call the shortest day and the longest night of the year winter solstice. It is when the sun’s elevation in the sky is at its lowest which will be tonight at 4:49. So December 22 is the shortest day of the year.
In Reykjavík the sun crawls over the horizon at 11:23, it is at its highest at 13:26 and sets again at 15:30. After tomorrow the days will start to get longer, something almost everyone looks forward to. Happy Solstice 🙂
It is 16 days to Christmas and the sun just crawls above the horizon these days. Winter solstice is on December 22. It is the day in the year that is the shortest with the longest night. Today sunrise was at 11:05 and sunset at 15:35. It was light for 4 hours and 29 minutes.
The sun now rises at about ten o’clock in the morning and sets at about half past four. We see the days become shorter and twilight takes up a bigger part if the day time. Sometimes the sun is a great nuisance, – it is low on the horizon and gets in ones eyes e.g. when driving.
Low on the horizon the sun lights up the clouds lending them brighter colours .
Aurora Borealis light up the estuary where Ölfusá River flows into the Northern Atlantic. In the dead calm just before midnight the sea was like a mirror creating a magnificent sensation. Seldom have I seen the sea as calm as last night.
Holtsós is a tidal lagoon separated from the ocean with only a thin strip of sand. In the calm weather at dusk on Saturday, it was lit up by the setting sun as we were driving home from our day’s outing under Eyjafjöll, South Iceland.
We had a full Moon tonight and the sky was clear so you could not have missed it if you were looking. We watched as it crawled up into the sky, changing colours from almost orange to yellow and then to white as dusk was falling. –Such a wonderful sight.
The Moon is full when it is completely illuminated as seen from the Earth. This occurs when the Moon is opposite to the Sun. The lunar month is 29-30 days so we have a full Moon about 12 times a year.
Beautiful colours lend a magical light to the early morning just before sunrise.
Again tonight the Northern Lights continued to light up the sky. I never tire of photographing them and hope that you too, enjoy seeing them here.
Several webpages give forecasts of expected Aurora activity. This is from the Icelandic Met Office:
http://en.vedur.is/weather/forecasts/aurora/
