Newly awakened

at around 03.25 - i looked out of the balcony, because the red, orange and greenish blue transition at the NNE horizon looked amazingly pretty - without a single cloud in the sky. But then i saw, very faintly to the naked eye, some strange rays stretching out from horizon all the way into the blue.

Since we don't have any mountains in that direction towards Finland, I knew already that this would most likely be caused by to some larger clouds. Yet had no idea how far away those could be. Assuming that these where clouds, I mean.

A look onto the satellite chart

- and the answer to the optical phenomena started to emerge. Two or three newly developed larger Thunderstorm clouds emerged over Finland at its west coast - a whopping 450 km away ! The warm air over Russia, which lead to MAX temperatures up to 31.3°C in St Petersburg yesterday (we had only 13°), creates thunderstorms at the borders to cooler air over Finland and Sweden.

Kind of fascinating, that clouds as far away as 450 km - can create this lovely effect. At Stromboli volcano, Aeolian Islands, i have seen this effect both more often and stronger during summer. Thanks to plenty of larger clouds hovering over Italy, creating Crepuscular rays when you see them from the volcano island of Stromboli.

Sunrise in Snösätra

It is 04.03 - and the sun is about to rise over my place. Fascinating early... Total daylight: 17 hours 20 minutes. I can't believe we are already that deep into the bright half of the year.

Even the nights start to be brighter now (when it is clear), but remain seemingly dark when there are clouds. Well, and in 1 month, it is summer solstice after all.

In Berlin and Hamburg, they call them "The White nights", because you can if you look very, very carefully see, that the nights isn't 100% dark - but there is a faint trace of "light" left in the sky (in clear nights). I remember that from my room in Berlin Schöneberg back in the end of the 1970s, that there was no astronomical night really, around the time of mid June in West Berlin.

Outlook for Stockholm

appears to be a mix - overall more sunshine again with temperatures that could be titled "pre-summer" temperatures. No super high pressure area, but we do get some of the good stuff now and then. In between some clouds and a bit cooler (read; normal temperatures around 17°C) except tomorrow with only 15°C.

Yesterday was of course a chilly day with a mere 13°C, due to the rain and dense clouds during most time of the day.