Traveling Sjols

Tromso - Day 4.5 / Bergen - Day 1

Our last full day in Tromsø. It feels like the end of the trip, but we’re only at the halfway point. This is the longest trip we’ve been on by only two days, but it feels like so much more. That’s probably because on both our trip to Spain and our first visit to Norway, at least one full day was dedicated to travel. This time around, we have just three hours’ worth of flights to get to the second leg of our tour in Bergen. It’s weird how just a few short days here and there seems to make an incredible difference.

Today, we checked out of our hotel. It was an accident on my part, booking this hotel for four nights instead of five. To be fair, their booking system and the currency exchange conspired to confuse the shit out of me. On the bright side, we found a room for our final night here in a different hotel for $60 less than what we were paying here. Savings!

I took the bus to the airport early to pick up our rental car. We thought it would be fun to explore the surrounding countryside on our own, seeing as we’re right in the heart of so many mountains and islands. No definite plans, but I grabbed a map when we arrived and made note of a few routes that looked promising.

Once I arrived back at the hotel and picked up Sara and our packs, we were off to Sommerøy, an island right at the edge of the Norwegian Sea. Only 45km away from the city, it gave us plenty of time to explore and take our time. That turned out to be a stroke of genius, because we were pulling off the road every few minutes to take pictures of the stark, intimidating mountain ranges and bleak but beautiful scenery. The granite monsters rise out of mossy fields and bogs like fists and elbows, sharp and blunt and immediate.

Sommerøy felt like the end of the earth. Mostly because of the gale force winds that nearly knocked us sideways when we stepped out of the car. The ocean was a supernatural shade of blue-green, almost like someone had dumped food dye into the water as a goof. Waves roiled and thrashed against the coastline.

At one of our stops along the road, Sara got out at ahead of me and was making her way to the sandy beach (yeah, among all of these rocks and mountains and in the middle of such foreboding terrain, there were pristine white sand beaches) when she let out a screech. I turned just in time to see a massive bird fighting against the gusting wind just above where she was standing. It was a white-tailed eagle. The cousin to the bald eagle, they too are endangered and protected by the government, and we can both say with certainty that they are every bit as large as a bald eagle. It had been munching on a cod when Sara literally stumbled within a few feet of it. With a wingspan of 6-8’ and standing waist-high or taller, it was a bit of a shock to have one take off right in front of your face. I give Sara credit for not sprinting back to the car, because, damn…

Once we got back to the city and settled into our new digs, we rested and grabbed a bite to eat. It was only mid-afternoon and I decided that we should make the most of our car rental and take another short jaunt in a few hours. With unlimited daylight, why not? We rested up (still not a lot of full nights sleep, remember) and then headed back out, this time to a different part of the coast.

We came upon a small huddle of houses, behind which was a beautiful waterfall fed by a stream coming off a frozen lake. We got out and wandered around the mossy, boggy, stunted-tree filled landscape for about an hour, just taking pictures and exploring. 

——

The next day, we got up early, grabbed our flight to Oslo, then to Bergen and arrived in the early afternoon. The sun was out and the city was alive. We met up with the caretaker of our apartment, got a quick walkthru, settled in, and then hit the streets to re-acquaint ourselves with Bergen after five years away. 

Right now, we are still scrounging for wifi (none in our apartment, yet…supposedly) and having a great time. Updates may be a bit more sporadic in the coming days, but we’ll try our best to keep it up. Tomorrow is the 17th of May, Norway’s Constitution Day, and the celebration that accompanies it is supposed to be pretty crazy, not to mention that it culminates literally right outside our front door. We’ve been seeing crews putting up partitions and preparing for the massive influx of people since we arrived. Go ahead and do a Google search for “17 May Norway” and you’ll see what we’re going to be in the middle of. It should be exciting to say the least and exhausting to boot. 

We’re off to grab a bite to eat before we retire for the day. More on Bergen soon. 

Tromso - Day 3.5

View from my walk to the Museum

I finally, finally got a full night’s sleep. You have no idea how big a deal that is and neither did I until I woke up to my alarm this morning. I feel so damn rested…which is good, because I’ll soon be off to pick up our rental car from the airport. Then, off to the coast!

Yesterday, we split up for the first part of the day. I headed down to the Tromsø Museum, which ended up being a bit of a let-down. The exhibits on the Sami people, church history in Northern Norway, the geology of the area, and the wildlife were okay, but nothing that blew me away. Plus, since it was Sunday, the place was crawling with small children. Small children in public places are menaces everywhere, not just in the states. They certainly weren’t as ill-behaved as some of the kids I’ve run across back home, but they can certainly make a shitload of noise in an otherwise quiet museum.

But the view on the 3.5km walk there was nice and the park next to the museum, which is located at the southern tip of Tromsø Island, was breathtaking. I know I’ve probably been using that word quite a bit, but when you’re on an island surrounded by massive, snow-covered peaks in every direction, it’s hard not to have your breath taken away.

Southern view…wow.

After a brisk walk back to the hotel, I grabbed a hot dog and a coke to refuel while Sara caught up on her sleep (her sleep schedule has been as messed up as mine). Then, with the clouds clearing off, we went down to the waterfront to enjoy the warmish weather. You have to take advantage of these things when you can.

Sara, taking advantage of the sunny weather

We walked up on the bridge connecting Tromsø to what I suppose is the suburb (for lack of a better term) of Tromsdalen and snapped some photos. Since I was working on only three hours of sleep and had already walked roughly six miles, I excused myself early and headed back to the hotel for some reluctant shut-eye, so I could be coherent in the evening. 

View of Tromsø, looking back from the middle of the bridge.

Tromsdalen, from the middle of the bridge.

After I passed out for a few hours, we wandered out again, grabbed some middling pizza on the waterfront, walked around a bit more to soak in what will be our last good chance to take in Tromsø, and went back to the hotel. 

Today, we head out to the countryside. Sorry this post is short on description and heavy on pictures. I have to run out the door to catch the bus to the airport to get our rental car in just a few minutes.

More later. 

Tromso - Day 2.5

You might be wondering why I’ve been marking these posts by the half day. A big part of that is due to the constant daylight. We’ve missed the Midnight Sun by just a week or two, so the sun itself isn’t above the horizon all day long. Instead, it starts to go down around 9 or 10 at night and twilight descends over the sky…and doesn’t leave until the sun comes back up in the morning. So, even at 3 in the morning (which is when I woke up this morning, by the way) the world is stuck in a perpetual twilight. It’s kind of unnerving, even with the shades drawn.

We both thought that we would get used to it after a day or two, but that hasn’t been the case at all. Instead, we’ve been relegated to sleeping in 3-4 hour chunks whenever we get tired. Sara and I just finished eating breakfast and I’m sitting in the lounge area of our hotel, coffee by my side, while Sara retreated back up to our room to take a nap before we head out for the day. Sometime this afternoon, I’ll probably crash for a few hours, then we’ll head out for the evening. It’s weird. 

The thing is, we have two more days in Tromsø. So once this becomes the norm, we’ll be jetting south to Bergen, which is roughly parallel, latitudinally, to Portland and Seattle. So then we will have to re-adjust to normal day/night. Fun, right? As Sara pointed out, though, it’s better to have that as the second part of our trip, so we won’t be completely screwed up when we get back home. 

Anyway…

Yesterday, we awoke to snow-covered streets. It’s been snowing more or less since Friday night, light and fluffy flakes. It was also very windy and in the mid-30s, so we decided to spend most of it indoors, checking out the art museums and galleries about town. 

But first we stopped in to the Ølhallen, the pub on the grounds of the Mack Brewery, the northernmost brewery in the world. Ølhallen is also the oldest pub in Tromsø and was filled with character and characters. There has always been something about wood-lined walls and well-worn bar furniture and accoutrements that make me feel at home. I’m not sure why, since it’s not like I spend a bunch of time in bars. Maybe the congeniality of such places attracts me, who knows? I am beginning to develop a taste for Mack’s dark pilsner, though. 

After a tasty pint, we hopped across the street to the Tromsø Museum of Contemporary Art, where we took in some exhibits from Tromsø University’s MFA students. To say that they were odd is an understatement. One involved walking through a tunnel made of tarps and birch poles to an almost entirely dark room where a beach scene was being projected onto a wall. Another involved a guy in a track suit running, skipping, and hopping around the room while yelling in Norwegian. Y’know, art. 

After grabbing Sara a quick lunch (for some reason, when we travel, I’m almost never hungry enough to eat lunch, go figure…), we walked down to the North Norway Art Museum (sorry for the websites being in Norwegian, they are honestly the first sites I’ve run across that don’t have English translations). What a pleasant surprise this was. The paintings on exhibit were, for the most part, stunning. There were even a few Edvard Munch pieces on display. The scope and breadth of the collection was so incredibly interesting. From mid-19th century landscapes to abstract art from the 1930s and more modern pieces, it was really impressive. Sara posted some of our favorites in her Facebook photo gallery. You should really check them out. This one really stuck out to me -

After a well-deserved afternoon nap, we grabbed some burgers at the Bla (pronounced Blue-Ah) Rock Cafe, renowned for it’s burgers and plethora of rock paraphernalia adorning the walls. There were vintage posters from just about every grunge band out of Seattle in the 90s, old punk posters from the Cramps, Dead Kennedys and Iggy Pop, tons of guitars hanging from the walls, even a drumset managed to find it’s way into the rafters.

We stepped outside into more snowfall. The perpetual twilight had begun again and we lingered along the waterfront, fiddling around on some playground equipment in a public square and did some people watching before heading back to our hotel room and calling it a day…or night. It really is hard to tell for sure anymore.

Today we head to the south of the island to visit the Tromsø Museum and a few other places and tomorrow, we’re renting a car and exploring the surrounding islands.  

We have arrived in Tromsø!

Yeah, it’s kinda pretty here. Especially when the sun is out. 

Neither of us got much sleep on our flights, so we crashed in the afternoon, walked around through the early evening, got a tasty burger at a dive bar, walked around some more, and now we’re back at our hotel room, winding down for the night so that we can be good and rested for the rest of the trip. 

We’ll be figuring out a way to share some more photos with everyone in the coming days. There are going to be TONS of them. 

For now, though, we sleep.