Land of the Midnight Sun

Back in the mid-90s, my mother

was writing her first historical romance novel.

The story began in Sweden which is

where her grandmother grew up.

She wanted to visit Sweden to get

the feel and do some research,

so guess who got to tag along???

We stayed with my cousin Jim who

was living there at the time.

After 36 hours of travel, Mom and

I were exhausted as we sat

chatting with Jim in the evening.

The sun was shining brightly, but

I was SOOOOOO tired.  I thought it

was about 7pm,  but when

I looked at the clock...it was

MIDNIGHT!

I was fascinated with the

LAND OF THE MIDNIGHT SUN.

The sun was truly up

ALL NIGHT LONG!!!

After a week in Sweden...

since we were so close, we

took a train to Norway.

The scenery was

MAGNIFICENT!

I pulled some photos

from my scrapbook.

We stayed at this hotel

tucked among the Norwegian Fjords.

We happened to be staying there on

JUNE 21st...the longest day of the year.

This is the stunning view from our

hotel room.

On this very day in 1996, I decided to

drag myself out of bed every hour

to photograph that view

and show that the sun never sets!

I was a bit droopy the next day,

but it was worth the hourly wake-ups.

What really woke me up was

THE SWISS ALPS...

yep, we took another side trip

because my mother's dream was to one

day visit Switzerland.

That's me at the highest point

reachable by man

in the Swiss Alps.

I love experiencing

SPLENDOR!

But I'm glad we don't have total darkness here

in the winter.