Windmills and Lighthouses

Åland Exhibition Card for SILFI 2015 (Silkeborg, Denmark)

This week's Sunday Stamps theme gives me a another chance to feature one of Tord Nygren's watercolours of windmills.  Watercolour paints and rainbows seem the perfect combination but for those of us more artistically challenged perhaps a photograph will have to do although perhaps just the pure delight of a rainbow is enough.

The 2015 Danish National Philatelic Exhibition was held in Silkeborg and organised by the local Philatelic Club with of course Åland Post in attendance.  If the town name seems familiar it is near where the ancient preserved bog bodies were discovered (Tollund Man) but for a fun fact related to windmills - Silkeborg's windiest month is January.  From Jutland we travel to

2003: World Heritage Sites, Öland (Design - P-N Nilsson (top) and B A Lundberg; Engraver - L Sjööblom)

the long narrow Danish island of Öland in the Baltic Sea where people have made their home for 5000 years.  The Agricultural Landscape of Southern Öland is a UNESCO World Heritage site and there are lots of windmills (62) one of which can be seen with the Gettinge Gravefield whose standing stones form the shape of a Viking ship, forever becalmed on land, but meanwhile

1972: Anniversaries - HM Coastguard (Design Rosalind Dease)

there is a storm at sea and a ship is in trouble - a 19th Century coastguard calls the alarm.

1978: Flashing Lighthouses on Iceland for 100 years (Design -O Ólafsson)

This is Iceland's first lighthouse 'Reykjanesviti' at Valahnukur built in 1878 but earthquakes and the wild seas on Valahnukur meant that there was a danger of the lighthouse falling into the sea so a new one was built in 1907-08 and the older one no longer exists.

1996: Lighthouses (Design - J Levinsen; Engraver - A Kühlmann)

Happily the 40 metre (128ft) tall Blåvandshuk built in 1900 is still flashing and marks the most western landmark of Denmark.

This pretty little thing is Bovbjerg Lighthouse only 26 metres high but as it stands on a cliff it is 62 metres above sea level,  The lighthouse is painted red to distinguish it from the church towers that were originally used by sailors as a navigation aid before the lighthouse was built in 1877. With its 93 steps up to the viewing platform, cafe and shop it is now a tourist destination.

For all lighthouse lovers here is one you can stay in with a panoramic view of the Baltic Sea and private steps down to the beach. The Møns Lighthouse dating back to 1845 is on the island of the same name (famous for its chalk cliffs and fossils) and today is fully automated.

Watching the Windmills, Kinderdijk, Netherlands

Sunday Stamps II theme this week is - Windmills and Lighthouses - travel for more to See It On A Postcard