January 27 – Soldag in Norway

nPostednon January 27, 2014

Innsome places in northern Norway, the sun hasn’t come up for weeks!nToday, perhaps, it shone again on a village somewhere for the firstntime since the beginning of December. And in that village, today willnbe declared a “Soldag”!

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nSoldagnmeans “Sun Day.” Never mind that it’s Monday! Declaring a Sun Daynis like declaring a Snow Day—school is cancelled for the day, manynpeople skip work, and people enjoy the natural beauty of—in thisncase—sunshine!

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Allnthrough late January and early February, the sun is making its firstnappearance in weeks, and people are celebrating its comeback. Asidenfrom taking a day off of school and work, a masked ball is held atnnight. A “prince of the sun” is chosen to preside over the ball,nand when the sun comes up, everyone removes their masks and lightnfireworks!

n(Thosenof us who live in often-sunny places are always waiting and waitingnfor the dark in order to shoot off fireworks, so it seems funny tonlight fireworks when the sun comes up. But it’s a celebration!

nThenArctic Circle

nDidnyou know that any land that lies between the Arctic Circle and thenpole has this sort of perpetual night in the winter and perpetual daynin the summer? This is because of the tilt of the Earth as it orbitsnaround the sun. n

Innthe Northern Hemisphere’s wintertime, the entire hemisphere is tiltednaway from the sun, so the days get shorter and shorter until thenshortest day of the year, December 21 or 22. Places that lie north ofnthe Arctic Circle have shorter and shorter days until the sunndisappears altogether for days or weeks or maybe even months!

nAsnI mentioned, the flip side of having no sun at all for weeks isnhaving 24 hours of sun in the summer. These polar regions are oftenncalled “land of the midnight sun” because for days or weeks thensun never sets!

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nTonlearn more, check out the diagrams here or the video here.

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Sometimes the Norwegian skies are lit,
not by the sun, but by the aurora borealis.

Innsome places, there is some light even during the “Polar Night,”nwhen the sun never rises, because the sun is just below the horizon.nIt’s a kind of twilight day! But in other places, farther north, itnstays much darker. In those places, the moon can become a very, verynbright light in the sky! Check out this great compilation of time-lapse photographynduring the almost-four-month-long night at Ny-Alesund, an island thatnis ruled by Norway.

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This video has a lot ofnmisspellings and other errors—I suspect that whoever made it isn’tna native English-language speaker. But it shows a more twilight sortnof Polar Night, as well as the midnight sun.

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