Arctic Circle

We just got back from a trip to Norway, and traveled north of the Arctic Circle.  Since it was almost the June solstice, we have 24 hours of daylight.  We used trains, automobiles, Hurtigren ferries, and an airplane.

Route of the ship in red, overlaid on the Norwegian topo map.  The ferry makes a big deal of crossing the Arctic Circle, and encourages everyone to come up on deck to see the monument on Vikingen Island.

Vikingen Island, with the monument on the right side.

Closeup of the monument.

The passengers on deck to get pictures, providing some idea of the conditions at 0715.

In my intro oceanography and physical geography classes, we teach that the Arctic Circel is as 66.5 degrees north.  The Norwegian maps show the monument at 66.53 degrees, but shows something else a few km to the north.  I did not stay on deck to investigate it at the time

The Arctic Circle in 2015, at 66.56 north.  If you want to be precise,  66.5 is not accurate enough, and you also have to account for the fact that the earth wobbles, and the Arctic Circle migrates about 15 m a year.  It would have been at Vikingen quite some time ago, so there may have been some licence with the placement of the monument to create a tourist trip moment for the cruise ships.

The Prime Meridian used to have a similar monument, and a lone of people lined up to get their picture with each leg in a different hemisphere.  There are issues with the exact location, and the Observatory has to explain why your GPS does not show 0 when you straddle the line.  The last time I was at Greenwich, the monument was gone, and with no need for a backdrop, the lines to get the picutre were gone.