Since three years I’m living in the city of Hamburg. Hamburg features many well-known tourist-attractions. Famous sights include the Elbphilharmonie, the Speicherstadt, the city hall, the port, and many many more. Hamburg has a lot of green areas and parks as well (like Planten un Blomen). Still, it is not exactly famous for its nature. However, in the outskirts of the city you can find small nature refuges, like forests and marshes. During the day those are frequented by many walkers, bikers and joggers – especially so during Corona lockdown. If you go there early enough you’ll be almost by yourself.

The images in this post were taken in one of those areas – the size of which is no more than one square kilometer – before and at sunrise. The nice thing about local photography is that you can return to a place easily. So there might be more images of this place (and possibly other local locations) in the future.

In this time of crisis many of us have to deal with severe restrictions in our daily lives. Spending more at home gives us the opportunity to reflect on past adventures, look through the images and wait for the situation to improve again.

I want to share a video with you that documents an adventure trip my wife and I enjoyed last summer in northern Scandinavia – at a time when it never gets dark. Our hike started in Norway and ended in Sweden. We had plenty of time and sometimes spent more than one night in a place. Some of the sequences showing “early morning” sunlight were actually shot between 2 and 3 am.

All the best to you in these difficult times!

Recently, I received requests whether I could provide GPS tracks of my hikes in Lapland. First of all, thank you for your interest! While I’ll happily answer concrete questions regarding trip planning or possible hiking routes, I don’t want to publish any GPS tracks. Here’s why:

For safety’s sake

I don’t want to be responsible for safety issues that may arise when people follow in my footsteps. This is not hypothetical; in fact, conditions are changing a lot dependent on weather and season. While some sections may be safe in clear weather, they’re not in fog or rain. Especially river crossings can be very dangerous in the wrong conditions. It’s necessary to adapt to the current conditions or – if need be – backtrack or change plans.

I do mistakes. They’re in the recorded track data. I wouldn’t want other hikers to do the same mistakes just because they follow a track.

It’s necessary that you inform yourself thoroughly beforehand. What are possible routes? What are alternatives? What kind of terrain do I have to expect where? What is the best season? Where can rivers be forded? And so forth…

To protect nature

My hikes often traverse sensitive wilderness areas. I don’t want to attract “followers” that don’t respect nature or don’t practice leave-no-trace principles. A significant increase in traffic can severely damage the landscape as it has happened in a lot of places all over the world.

Hikers with a genuine interest will put in the effort required for planning a backcountry hike and behave responsibly. After all they’re there to admire the natural beauty! If you’re one of those, feel free to contact me if you have any questions :-)!

Finally it’s all available, the travel report about last autumn’s adventure in Swedish Lapland. You can find it here. I updated also the image gallery about Sarek which consists of photographs taken during four trips in the area.