It has been a long and cold winter in Sweden. After a very short Autumn, it started snowing in October and powdered snow lay on the ground until March. The temperature remained below zero for almost five months, sometimes plummeting as low as -27°.
But today is a different story. The sun is shining, the sky is blue and daily temperatures are regularly reaching the high teens, not bad for April. Swedish sunbathers are out in force, even now from my 14th floor lounge I can see bikini-clad beauties (and some not so beautiful) lying prone on their balconies. And the streets are full of people strolling along sunflower-like, with faces upturned towards the warmth. I always wondered why Swedes are so tanned but now I realise that it is because they don’t waste a single second of the sun when it’s around and who can blame them after such a bleak winter!
Weather-wise this week is quite strange. It feels like summer yet looks like winter. There are still no leaves on the trees, although if you look closely you can see small buds forming on the skeletal branches. In places there are still remnants of snow piles pushed to the side of carparks and now blackened with grit and mud. Most strange to me is the fact that the streets are littered with crisp, brown Autumnal leaves. They look like they have just fallen yet they fell overnight one week back in October and have lain frozen under layers of ice and snow for the last 6 months. Until now when they are freely blowing around perfectly preserved.
But the flowers of spring have started to grow in the fields and parks, offering a welcome hint of summer colour!
This is my photo tribute to the Spring.
