Lofoten Islands, Norway

According to Andrew Eames, writer for travelintelligence, “For anyone with an ounce of poetry in their soul there can be few better places to arrive than Norway’s Lofoten Islands on a calm summer’s eve. ” I’m intrigued. Read about the Lofoten Islands in the article titled; Lofoten Islands.

“Anyone familiar with the way the Cuillins rear out of the sea on the Isle of Skye will have have some idea what the Lofoten islands look like. Both rise to similar heights (around 3,000ft) and come complete with grouse, heather, peat bog and midges – but in the case of the Lofotens somebody has xeroxed the Cuillins and hung them out to dry all along the horizon.

This pristine environment is much as the ice age left it 10,000 years ago. But don’t assume that because the Lofotens are north of the Arctic Circle that they are raw, wind-ravaged places: the season of fruitfulness may be short here, but from mid-May the ground bursts forth with wild flowers and berries, the skies are filled with cuckoos, curlews and eagles, and the water churns with migrating cod and salmon. When the sun shines there’s a clarity in the air here which almost defies description, picking out beaches of clean white sand and piercing water so pure that you can watch the starfish grazing, 30ft down.

And then, of course, for about six weeks right in the middle of the year, there’s the midnight sun. All lighthouses in Lofoten are switched off from 30th April and not turned back on until August 6th, when the sun finally sets.”