Can you imagine being in a place where night never comes? Believe it or not, these places exist in the areas near the North Pole, where the mythical “Midnight Sun” lives.
In these places, during the summer season, the sun never goes down, which is why this phenomenon is generated with 24 hours of uninterrupted light.
The further north you go, the more sunny nights you can enjoy and therefore, many more landscapes, tourism being one of the main sources of value in these places.
Just as they live with this phenomenon in the summer, they also live with the polar night in the winter, this when the sun barely peeks over the horizon line.
Midnight Sun
In simple words, the Midnight Sun phenomenon is when the sun never sets, but how does that happen?
According to what it indicates The country “The Earth revolves around the Sun with an axis tilt of 23.4 degrees with respect to the horizontal plane of our orbit, making it possible for us to have seasons.”
This tilt is the reason that an area around the North Pole is exposed to the sun 24 hours a day during the northern hemisphere summer.
Because of this, people who are in these places will only see the sun approaching the horizon, but when it is at its closest point it will rise again to illuminate where around it.
Of course, while this happens at the North Pole, at the South Pole they will have the opposite phenomenon, since in the Antarctic Circle there will be weeks where dawn will never arrive, this is called polar night.
The areas where the “Midnight Sun” occurs are Alaska, Canada, Greenland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Russia and the extreme north of Iceland, places that take advantage of their 24 hours of light for tourism or day-to-day activities, strengthening its economy.
Norway and its yellow-reddish sky
“Night was approaching again, the sun had barely dipped into the sea and rose again, red, refreshed, as if he had gone to drink. I felt more strange on those nights than anyone could ever imagine…”
This is what the Norwegian writer Knut Hamsun wrote in his work Pan of 1884, this is because many fell in love with the nights with daylight and that sun that never hid.
Norway is a country that knew how to take advantage of its days with the “Midnight Sun”, which is why it encourages travelers to visit areas such as Lofoten or Svalbard, the place where from April 20 to August 22 the sun never sets .
According to Visit Norwaymany of the attractions that are in this area are open 24 hours a day, so if you want to play golf, go for a bike ride or paddle on a river at 3 in the morning, nothing will stop you from doing it.
On the islands of Svalbard, located in the Arctic, you can find a glacier, where you can walk at midnight and observe the reddish sky that gives the “Midnight Sun”, as well as discover a unique nature of the area near the North Pole.
Another special area in Norway is Lofoten and Vesterålen. According to what the site collects, these areas have “spectacular mountain peaks that rise from the sea, and coastal plains where sheep often graze.”
Although the city of Troms or the “Paris of the North” also stand out, where the vision of the “Midnight Sun” may be the best in the country.
Sweden improves its economy with the Midnight Sun.
How to move the economy in a country where winter is harsh, but daylight is only for a couple of hours and then it disappears?
The answer that the Swedes found was to take 100% advantage of the hours of light that the “Midnight Sun” gives them, when they take advantage of opening their bars, hotels and restaurants, among others, to do as many activities as they can outdoors. free.
Euromonitor issued a study indicating that in 2019 consumers in this country spent 13 billion dollars on food services, registering an annual growth of more than 4% since 10 years earlier, it stated BBC.
But they are not only concerned with this, but also with having a strong tourism industry that takes advantage of phenomena such as the “Midnight Sun”.
After the pandemic, tourists are returning to the northern part of Sweden to discover the beautiful landscapes in areas like Abisko, where the sun can stay all day and is an interesting phenomenon for tourists
Jessica Milkéwitz, part of the tourist office of the place, indicates that “it is rare. We did the midnight sun hike last night and around 12:30 we reached the top of the mountain. It was broad daylight, and it’s so weird,” adding that “it’s really unusual to look at the weather forecast and it says ‘partly sunny’ at 2 AM.”
What is it like to live without darkness?
You are yawning because the clock indicates that it is time to sleep; however, the sun is very close to hiding, but it never does and thus the sunset turns into sunrise.
As highlighted Mike Sowden At Wheel&Achor, for the Norwegians, for example, this time of year is not a problem, since they are used to it and it is when they can stay up late and do everything that they cannot do in winter, when they hardly have light.
For them it is the ideal time to be productive, they work until late at night and it is time to do maintenance on their houses or garden.
Although when you are not from the area, the shock is important. Two South Africans left Johannesburg to experience the “Midnight Sun” in Alta, an area in the extreme north of Norway.
They reported their experience to HuffPost where they indicated that “our biological clocks were definitely in a state of shock; It felt like a weird form of jet lag, as our bodies and minds only really felt tired in the early morning, and most nights we went to bed around 2:00 or 3:00 AM.”
Both worked in a shelter that received more than 70 huskies, to which they pointed out that “the ‘day shift’ from 9:00 to 5:00 that we had at home did not exist here, and there was no urgency to finish the work before of the night”.
They add that “when you are in a place like this, there is no reason to fight against the lifestyle: you listen to your body, you go to bed when you are tired and you eat when you are hungry”.
Without a doubt, a very different lifestyle from the one you have when day and night are clearly defined.