James & Heather Travelogues

Heather and I have been thinking about going on holiday late in the year, this year. So we've decided to head away for a week or so, although we are not too sure where. Obviously sunny weather is the attraction, and no doubt Heather would like to get in a few rounds of golf, and we don't want to travel too far. So on the list to consider are:

• Portugal - should be nice beaches and some golf, weather is a bit of an unknown quantity
  
• Canary Islands - should be sunny, etc. but not too sure about the golf
  
• Morroco - sunny no doubt, but golf and maybe safety may be an issue
  

Anyway, a friend of ours will be house-sitting either our current place or if we are fortunate in the next couple of days, our new place. Decisions, decisions...

As the date came closer and closer and the weather got progressively worse; I was seriously contemplating pulling out due to "illness". Nevertheless, on the day we were due to set off, I got in the car. The journey down was uneventful and the weather looked as if it was going to clear up... Fat chance, within 24 hours it was pouring down; by the end of the week our campsite was a swamp (not helped by a farmer pulling out stuck cars with his tractor and chewing up the ground in the process). The rain by itself wasn't too bad, but it was also windy with it - I thought I was going to develop trench foot at one point and I ended up chucking a load of clothing that was damaged by the rain.

Still there was the beer to keep me sane...

Well, our 6 months of travels are officially over. Soon it will be back to job-hunting, finding a new place to live and a return to the normality of a five day working week. However, in the past 6 months Heather and I have been lucky enough to:

see waterfalls cascading off Ayers Rock, dived with turtles on the Great Barrier Reef, mingled with other backpackers in Bangkok, relax on the beaches of Phuket, risk life and limb on the streets of Saigon, drink snake wine on the Mekong, experience May Day in Shanghai, cruise along the Yangtze as the world sailed by, gaze at the beauty of Rome, wander the streets of ancient Pompeii, meet up with good friends in Slovenia, see the Communist relic of Petrajelka juxtaposed with the beauty of Bratislava, be enchanted by the beauty of Prague, been welcomed by the city of Cologne during the World Cup, spend a fortune in Paris (and nothing to show for it), enjoy the Roskilde Rock Festival, sauna naked at 3am in Finland, pub crawl around Turku, find an English pub in Sweden(!), cruise the fjords of Norway and drink cold beer in the warm Arctic Circle.

We have seen a lot, we have lived a lot and we have loved a lot. We have also spent a lot, but life is there to be lived, isn’t it?

After Oslo, we boarded yet another train and headed north. The first stop was the town of Flåm, on the coast of Songefjord fjord (sort of an appropriate name really). On arrival there, we spent a few hours lazing in the sun admiring the beautiful scenery that one expects amongst the fjords. Eventually, our ferry turned up and we crossed the fjord to Ballestrand, a small village where my father and his partner met us, for the drive to their home village of Fjærland.

Fjærland is a tiny village, consisting of no more than about 300 residents and sits at the end of the fjord of the same name. It was to be our temporary home for a couple of weeks (with a slight break in the middle for a trip to the Arctic Circle), and is a beautifully, relaxing location to hang out in. One of the main features of Fjærland is that there are a couple of glaciers located at the top of the mountains surrounding it, which many people visiting the area go climb up. For the more sloth-full, there is also the Glacier Museum that is essentially a cut-down version of the Science Museum, covering glaciers only. The highlight of the museum when we were there was the wide-angle cinema display (about 140 degrees all around) that runs a 15 minute movie flying over the glaciers.

Other activities that we engaged in were cycling (albeit not very far), berry-picking (Fjærland is teeming with wild raspberries, blackberries, strawberries, etc) and going on hikes around the surrounding valleys (to the extent that our bodies or more really our laziness would allow us). Our other major activity was to go fishing on the fjord itself. The water was freezing cold (although a beautiful green/blue colour) and the day we went promised rain, however Heather and I borrowed the small boat from my dad and his partner and putt-putted across the 1km or so wide gap. On my second cast, I land a herring that I duly let go (it was too small to keep I thought, although for a herring it was actually quite big). However later, Heather landed a reasonable sized cod and I landed one of similar size followed by a huge one (ok, it was about 12 inches or 30cm long). These we did keep, and they tasted very nice when cooked that night.

Tomorrow is our last day in Fjærland as we catch a ferry to Bergen at around 2pm. Before that, we may try getting to one of the glaciers and touching it just to say we have done…

After our couple of weeks in Sweden, we caught a day-train from Jönkoping to Oslo, arriving at around 7 in the evening (another day of travelling!). We checked in to our hostel, and wandered off to eat a traditional Norwegian meal of pizza.

The following day, Heather’s mum was off on her own tour of the Norwegian fjords, however Heather and I decided to spend a bit longer in Oslo to check it out. After all, one night was not really enough.

The first place we visited was Oslo castle, which is actively used by departments of the Norwegian defence service. For example, there is the defence logistics service located in a very grand building. Also within the castle grounds, there are a number of museums – one of which is the Resistance Museum that I was particularly keen to visit. At the start of World War 2, Norway (like Sweden) declared its neutrality, however Nazi Germany needed a direct outlet to the North Sea to harass the Royal Navy. As such, Norway’s declaration fell on deaf ears and in a rapid assault by mainly airborne forces, Norway was invaded, surrendering only after France had fallen. The Norwegian Royal Family went in to exile in the United Kingdom (just escaping in time from the SS units that were in pursuit) and the Nazis installed a puppet government to oversee the running of the country.

From the outset, Norwegians in all walks of life resisted the occupying forces by various means. In addition to the attention-getting sabotage, more passive means were also used. For example, the teachers’ union boycotted all lessons when they were told that they had to use German as the primary language, causing mass arrests, deportations, etc. I think the modern British teacher barely has the spine to stand up in a force 3 gale, let alone stand up to a Nazi regime! The museum covers all this in great detail, and (for a pleasant change) actually acknowledged that Britain stood alone for 2-3 years against the Nazi war machine. It was quite surprising to hear an American tourist (on reading the text of one Churchill’s speeches) say "Thank God for Winston Churchill".

The rest of our time in Norway, was spent visiting the Royal Palace, the beach and wandering through the old town. A very pleasant start to Norway.