there are many ancient customs to celebrate summer solstice or midsummer.
here in tirol – especially around innsbruck – “sonnwendfeuer” (also: “bergfeuer”) is a tradition with pre-christian roots: fires are lit atop the mountains to celebrate the longest day of the year.
a few friends and i took part in the event last saturday, and helped form a sun symbol close to seegrube and hafelekar. weather conditions were not ideal, with heavy clouds and some rain during the day. just before we set the fuel brickets on fire, though, “the rain let up and the sun came up, and we were gettin’ dry” – well, except for the sun. ;)
21:05 – everything’s still covered in fog
hiking up to the fire site
view of innsbruck at 21:24 – still covered in fog
21:25 – the view is clearing up
almost completely clear views of innsbruck at 21:27
panorama: innsbruck and seegrube at dusk
ready for an age-old tradition
fuel placement
summer solstice fires – the sun symbol is set alight
panorama: summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
panorama: summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
bad perspective (from this point of view) made our sun symbol resemble the “set fire to your hair” character from “dumb ways to die”. at the top, you can see a cablecar reaching hafelekar station, which is covered in mist.
view of innsbruck, and a few other solstice fires across the valley
panorama: view of innsbruck at night
summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
summer solstice fires at seegrube, innsbruck
summer solstice fires at seegrube, and the cablecar to hafelekar station.
summer solstice fires and hafelekar station (seegrube, innsbruck)