I’ve been in Höga Kusten in the last weeks, magnificent strecht of this magnificent country; it will take some days before I could show some shots from that area. Meanwhile, the real spring came to Särna, and I celebrate it with some more pictures from April, showing the end of the winter and the last spasms of cold.

A similar situation to the one from the previous post, but with one more element.

One for the season: the sudden increasing of temperatures, after a cold beginning of spring, produces the typical circumstances where snow and ice are melting of wide surface (in this case, a meadow). Another difference in temperatures, but this time in the color cast between the sunlit birches and the last snow reflecting the clear sky, provides the final touch to an effective image (although shouldn't be me to tell that).

As a periscope lifted to find out if spring is coming, a dry plant emerges from the waves of a snowy sea.

It has been a really mild winter, which prevented me from taking any more pictures of winter wonderland landscapes, due to the lack of those extreme phenomena so exotic and photogenic. During the last weekend, however, a furious blizzard raged for two whole days, with wind gusts up to 90 km/h, mixed to icy snow. A terrible trial for the small birds which are spending winter here around.
The following day I found a redpoll on the feeder, few centimeters from my kitchen window (a traditional place for the Swedish feeders: that way everybody eats in sight of each other, human and birds). Static, with that puffed and ruffled plumage typical of ill birds; a poor thing, which stayed in place, passively perched in a corner, squeezing against the feeder frame, sometime pecking few seeds (not a silly idea to get a shelter on a whole tank full of food...).
I feared the worse, uncertain whether to intervene or to respect the principle of not interfering (a classical dilemma for anyone who vibrates with empathy for animals). Deep in the night, the redpool was still there, and I was giving for granted that I would have picked it up from the snow, the next morning; however, the seeds & rest treatment clearly had a positive outcome: no sign of the bird, the day after.
One of those rare occasions when I am happy NOT to see an animal.

Just go beyond the appearances.

When the sun meets the mist, the forest gets magical. I've been quite busy lately, so I can't add much more along with the photos in the Chronicles (thanks god, someone will say).

Like the early Picasso, the Northern sky has its own blue and pink periods… only at the same time.

When winter is deepest and the days shortest, sometime happens that the horizon at sunset turns into two distinct and contiguous stripes of blue and pink (and, pay attention, on the opposite side of the setting sun).

It’s a phenomenon I only met at these latitudes or northward, to which I now associate it as well as Northern Lights, 30 degrees below, dippers on ice slabs and all the other typical products from this spectacular world in white.