Crave for Outdoor Excitements (YH #4)

                                                                                            Attribution: Yusuf Hashim
Image: The Aurora Borealis - posted by
Yusuf Hashim on March 30, 2015 (here) 

This is Modern Day Explorer #4
Modern Day Explorer #3 (here)

Yusuf Hashim says:

When most of us go to places like Iceland, foremost in our minds is to experience the Aurora Borealis or the Northern lights, These last three nights, Miss Aurora has been especially hyperactive, stimulated perhaps by the presence of about a dozen red blooded Malaysians, and one Singaporean,warming the cold -4 degrees Celsius Icelandic nights. Its not only been cold but its been snowing rather heavily the last 36 hours, making everything, including the roads and the glaciers in this island of Fire and Ice, completely white.

For the scientifically inclined, Aurora occur when highly charged electrons from the solar wind interact with elements in the earth's atmosphere. Solar winds stream away from the sun at speeds of about 1 million miles per hour. When they reach the earth, some 40 hours after leaving the sun, they follow the lines of magnetic force generated by the earth's core and flow through the magnetosphere, a teardrop-shaped area of highly charged electrical and magnetic fields.

As the electrons enter the earth's upper atmosphere, they will encounter atoms of oxygen and nitrogen at altitudes from 20 to 200 miles above the earth's surface. The colour of the aurora depends on which atom is struck, and the altitude of the meeting. The colour is green when they hit oxygen molecules up to 150 miles in altitude. It is red when they hit oxygen, above 150 miles. When Nitrogen is struck at altitudes below 60 miles, the colour is blue. Abov 60 miles its's purple or violet.

For the more romantically inclined like me, Aurora is simply the Roman goddess of dawn, In the Northern hemisphere its called Aurora Borealis. In the southern hemisphere, they are called Aurora Australis   More of Yusuf Hashim (here)

F for Faraway Places

Hank’s buddy, Yusuf Hashim is still proudly holding the flag up high. A modern day explorer he holds dear the feelings of freedom of choice and is happily gallivanting across the globe. The last we hear he is in Iceland leading a group of 13 photo enthusiasts all over the icy landscape. An accomplished photographer Yusuf relayed beautiful pictures to accompany the account of his travels. Yusuf has already documented these rare pictures in several books and these are available online. Yusuf is one fine guy who has pushed the spirit of adventure several notches higher from levels of our student days at the Royal Military College (here) decades ago!

Faraway places

Beckon to rekindle the

spirit of travels

Endurance called for

off-road encroachments which are

the more exciting

The tough and tumble

are for ‘tourists’ who crave for

outdoor excitements

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