National Parks

1989: National Parks I (Design - Anders Gullberg; Engravers - Zlatko Jakus and Lars Sjööblom)

The insert card for this FDC says "Blå Junfrun is the most legendary of our national parks.  Seen from the mainand or Oland it is like a bewitching dome with the highest point 86m above sea level. Blå Junfrun became a national park in 1936."   It doesn't tell the full story for this blue granite dome is said to be home to witches and has a mystical stone labyrinth, its name translates into English as The Blue Maiden.

The FDC features a mountain stream which was drawn by the stamp designer Anders Gullberg

and the stamps show the black guillemots  which live on the island and next to them Rhododendron Iapponicum, the only Swedish rhododendron species and below that the fairy slipper orchid (Caypso bulbosa) which grows in the damp mossy forests of Sweden.

The Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus visited Blå Junfrun as he travelled through Sweden classifying flora and fauna 

2017: Birds of Prey (Merlin and Eurasian Hobby)

and one of the birds he classified is seen here flying over water on a Norwegian stamp, the Eurasian Hobby (Falco subbuteo),

2015: National Parks - The Wadden Sea (Design - Jakob Monefeldt; Engraver - Bertil Skov Jørgensen

Staying with another sea facing national park here is the Wadden Sea where the coastline spreads across three countries (Denmark, Netherlands and Germany) each with their own national park, the Danish National Park is the smallest.  The miniature sheet features a Texel sheep and a black tailed godwit roaming the tidal flats and wetlands with a group of harbour seals taking their ease by the shallow waters.

2013: Nuuksio National Park (Design - Teemu Ollikainen)

More water but this time a peaceful Finnish lake in the Nuuksio National Park.

1962: Nikko National Park

Water on the move powering through the Senyru-kyo Narrows, Shiobara in the Nikko National Park.  Shiobara is famous for its hot springs, mountain streams, waterfalls and the beauty of its autumn colours.  The early Japanese national parks stamps were all monochrome so we don't get to see those autumn colours but maybe imagine that the misty steam from the hot springs is obscuring our view.  

Sunday Stamps II prompt this week is the Letter N - here for National Parks, Nature, Norway, Nuuksio, Nikko and Nippon - visit  See It On A Postcard