The photographs of Finnish midsummer bonfire were taken on June 23rd at Laaksolahti in Espoo, the place that was depicted in my photobook Impressions of Midsummer's Eve (also available at Blurb).
Today I rode the bicycle to Seutula, returning via the road that goes by the airport. I tried out the new Specialized Elite TR shoes, and they proved to be an excellent fit.
(Posting title is from the poem MyKillAdoreHer by Paul Martínez Pompa.)
The photographs of Finnish midsummer bonfire were taken on June 24th at Laaksolahti, the place that was depicted in my photobook Impressions of Midsummer's Eve (also available at Blurb).
This morning I rode the bicycle for 2 1/2 hours, the longest ride this year. I circled around Vanhankaupunginlahti bay, through Viikki Arboretum, enjoying the landscape. There are a lot of places in Helsinki which I have never visited, and I plan to visit some of them this summer. I have got 3026 km riding the bicycle so far this year.
(Posting title is from the poem Between Hallowe'en and Bonfire Night by Roddy Lumsden.)
These photographs were taken in Nuuksio on October 15th. Burn-clearing is rarely used for forestry purposes.
(Posting title is from the poem The Glass Essay by Anne Carson.)
I walked yesterday for 2 1/2 hours with the children. In six days I have got 13 hours of exercise.
It is a small world. I got a twitter reply about the first photograph posted here yesterday, from a person in it, even though the people in the photograph were mostly facing away from the camera, watching the bonfire. But who knows, maybe some day trees and plants are also going to tweet in reply, not to speak of the birds.
(Posting title is from the poem Summer at North Farm by Stephen Kuusisto.)
These photographs were taken yesterday on Midsummer's Eve in Espoo, at lake Pitkäjärvi, watching a bonfire being set up. This has become a tradition. The weather was great, much better than last year. The children enjoyed themselves, and even the mosquitoes didn't matter much.
Five years ago I made a photo book about midsummer, available at Scribd and Blurb.
(Posting title is from the poem The Chichimecas by Richard Garcia.)
Yesterday I had a small pause in riding the bicycle by lake Soltingsträsk, where there is a place for warming up inside a little cabin. Or there used to be, as the cabin was burned down and the chimney was broken in pieces. Even the nearby trees had suffered from the fire.
It is several years since I last was here, so I have no idea how recent the fire was, maybe this spring or early summer, looking at the fireweed growing beside the ruined cabin.
Lake Soltingsträsk is a rather beautiful place, but I haven't visited it often. Below you can see how the lake looked in November 2009. And then I took photographs from inside the cabin as well.
(Posting title is from the poem The Fire of Drift-wood by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.)
Here are two more photographs taken on Midsummer's Eve. Watching the fire from boats is a tradition for many, I think I have seen the same boats and people in this place year after year, rowing from the other side of the lake to join the festivities.
(Posting title is from the poem A Boat by Richard Brautigan.)
Here is a second installment of photographs from Midsummer's Eve, watching a bonfire being set up by lake Pitkäjärvi. We were having picnic by the shore, and luckily there were few mosquitoes to bother us.
(Posting title is from the poem To Mistress Margaret Hussey by John Skelton.)
Here are four photographs from last Sunday, taken while walking in Vaakkoi, going to lake Iso Lehmälampi and back from there.
There was a cut in the forest, and at first I didn't realize what was different about it, but then it hit me: the ground had been burned with fire, a practise that is very rare nowadays, not only because of the danger of setting up an out-of-control forest fire. Fireweed, birch and rowan had started the regeneration of the forest in the cut.
And at lake Iso Lehmälampi there was echo, but such one that it only carried high frequences. When the daughters said something, it came back, but when I tried, nothing happened.
(Posting title is from the poem Echo by Daryl Hine.)
I returned to lake Kaitalampi in Luukki on Friday with my two oldest daughters, who wanted to have a picnic at a new fireplace we discovered by the lake on Thursday.
The fireplace must have been constructed last Autumn, and we had no idea about it until we stumbled on the place by the lake. It is farther away from the road than the other two fireplace on the east side of the lake, in a nice sheltered spot.
We warmed up by the fire, had picnic, and enjoyed the day, even though it was grey because of the thick cloud cover, and occasionally it was also snowing.
(Posting title is from the poem Dark View by Heather McHugh.)
I took these photographs yesterday by lake Halkolampi in Luukki, where I went for a walk with the children. Today was such a busy day that there was little time for anything. I even had to go shopping, twice. Busy days ahead, also.
(Posting title is from the poem A World to Do by Theodore Weiss.)
I'm still behind in importing photographs to the computer. These photographs were taken on Sunday at Luukki, where I was also on Saturday. This time I was there around noon, with my oldest daughter. We went to lake Väärälampi and returned via lake Halkolampi, though the route wasn't exactly the same as on Saturday. Once again we had picnic by a fire at Halkolampi, this has become almost a tradition.
(Posting title is from the poem Tradition by Lorine Niedecker.)
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