Not alpine but lot of rocks

[Hoy]

I can't beat Lori's fantastic alpine tour but here is my version of rocky affairs at the moment.

The Archipelago of Kragerø, Norway, consists of about 450 islands, many small and some larger (up to about 8 x5 km²). Most of them are covered by pine forest. The area is a popular place for boating with lots of narrow fjords, inlets, beaches etc. Almost all islands have summerhouses and a few have year-round residents. At the southeast coast you get the best summer weather in Norway here.

Two of the islands consist of moraine - sand, pebbles and  boulders; and clay underneath. On these islands the flora is richer and it is popular to picnic here. Small roads and paths make it easy to walk around (or bike).

Here are some pics taken today - nice weather but windy so I got soaked, we had to cross open sea to get to the utmost island of Stråholmen. First the small "village" on the island.
(Have to load only 2 pics at the time)

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More village....

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Ocean view
(Rocks and flowers to follow...)

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The weather can be tough on the utmost islands. Here the juniper has flattened out.
It is a lot of small freshwater ponds here filled by rainstorms.

[Hoy]

The rock is mineral rich and contains iron ore of high quality but low volume fortunately. The last iron mine closed 50 years ago. More than 100 years ago some people made fortunes digging rare elements like thorium and niobium. One of the Worlds largest thorium deposits is not far away on the mainland.

[Hoy]

Rosa rugosa is common along the shores. It is a garden escape and not all people like that!

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The majority of the plants are rather common but they can still be attractive!
(Coffeetime - a few more in a while)

[Lori S.]

Wow, fabulous rock formations and erosion!  Love the lichens.
The stone walls are very interesting... they don't look high enough to contain livestock so were they just property divisions or... ?
The last plant you showed - Honkenya peploides - looks wonderful, terrific foliage!  It is circumpolar, apparently.

Re. Rosa rugosa, there are a lot worse weeds. 

[Hoy]

Wow, fabulous rock formations and erosion!  Love the lichens.
The stone walls are very interesting... they don't look high enough to contain livestock so were they just property divisions or... ?
The last plant you showed - Honkenya peploides - looks wonderful, terrific foliage!  It is circumpolar, apparently.

Re. Rosa rugosa, there are a lot worse weeds. 

I think in old times the stone walls were covered by spiny bushes. They were property divisions as well. Families typically had one cow for milk and lived of fish and potatoes.. The husbands were pilots waiting for the ships to arrive.

Honkenya is leaves, the flowers are small and insignificant.

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First coffee then dishwashing (the manual way).

Nice little Sagina nodosa on shallow sandy soil.
Potentilla anserina covers large patches with creeping stems.

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Tiny but handsome Geranium.
Calystegia sepium where it belongs at the seashore.

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Holes in the bedrock made by grinding stones in running water under the cover of ice during the last ice age. These holes can be several meters deep and wide. We call them "jettegryter" = "giants pans". Do you have a word for such holes in English?

Here a bullrush finds enough water even in dry spells in summer.

[Hoy]

Lotus corniculatus is very common. You can find it from the seashore to high up in the mountains.
Seakale smells and tastes - very strongly - as kale. Too late for flowers though.

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Last pictures for this time. Takes time to load these with a cellphone!

Minilakes almost like the fjords.

[Lori S.]

Terrific set of photos.  What a fascinating area for a coastal hike!

Potentilla anserina cowers large patches with creeping stems.

Another circumpolar one that I haven't seen in a while.  Oddly enough, there's a British Columbia plant nursery that sells it, and claims it to be a zone 6 plant!   

Tiny but handsome Geranium.
Calystegia sepium where it belongs at the seashore.

Yes, to all comments!

Holes in the bedrock made by grinding stones in running water under the cover of ice during the last ice age. We call them "jettegryter" = "giants pans". Do you have a word for such holes in English?

You know, I think there is likely a word, but I'll be darned if I can come up with one!  "Plunge pool" is about the closest I can think of - where rocks are blasted around in a pocket by the force of water, and continue to erode out a chute. 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plunge_pool
(Water-eroded pockets like that may be called tinaja in the desert southwest U.S., but that's not quite the same... not normally glacially-related, I don't think.)

Nice to see seakale in it's natural habitat.  (I grow it but it won't bloom for a while yet.)  Same for birdsfoot trefoil (Lotus corniculatus).

Nice tour of the island!