Back                                    Continued

Sunday 5th was spent looking around Narvik, a town boasting an ice-free port established to handle the iron ore brought by train from Nth Sweden. This town was also heavily bombed during WW2 by the Germans and it’s port is a ship’s graveyard with over 50 sunken ships. The history museum was most interesting and provided warm relief from the blizzard outdoors.

We had a 7.00am start on the 6th and spent until 9.00pm travelling down to Trondheim. The scenery along the way was amazing as this was the beginning of the fjord country. As we got in late that night and were exhausted from travelling, we didn’t worry too much about where we camped. We were woken up very early the next morning to the pounding footsteps outside our tent, much to the joggers’ amusement and our embarrassment we were camped in the town’s central park! As it was 4 days without a shower, hygiene called and our clothes were walking by themselves so we treated ourselves to a night in a hostel. I was in such a hurry to exfoliate that I jumped into the first set of shower rooms there was, ahhhh, hot water!! Tracey chose not to follow my example, as I mistakenly was in the mens, and in true Nordic style there were no doors or curtains. We had a good laugh about the possible consequences, but in the middle of the day the place was empty,,, luckily!!

Feeling refreshed we wandered down to the fish market to get some fresh dinner, and the super fresh selection looked superb. We opted for some fresh prawns as an "entree", and got some Seifish (what an imaginative name!) for mains which we mixed with a mild curry sauce on pasta. It would have been perfect with a white chilled wine, but as this is the land of tee-totallers we had to opt for light beer from the supermarket instead. It was past 3pm, the closing time of the Vinmonopolet (self-explanatory) and that’s the only place that can legally sell alcohol. There are only 2 of these shops in the whole town!. With all the hassle, let alone the price, it’s no wonder people don’t drink!

Saw some sights, mainly wandering around the wide streets and looking at the wooden architecture. Scandinavia’s BIGGEST medieval building, the Nidaros Domkirke, which has been rebuilt and replaced several times since 1035 when it was first built. More interestingly, it’s the place where Norwegian monarchs are crowned, and when you see the spacious, magnificent interior you can understand why.

On Wed. 8th we took the train south, and after a few hours changed at Dombas. As we had a couple of hours to kill we wandered the few hundred metres into the village centre to have a look and pick up whatever info we could from the tourist office. There we got the same story we have heard all along, "sorry, everything’s closed, you’re too early",, as we had to keep reminding ourselves, at least the scenery is free and open. At least we saw our first Troll here (a big plastic model outside the tourist shop) so climbed on his giant knee for a photo. We’re not shy!! I then put my teacher’s hat on and told Tracey the story of the 3 Billy Goats Gruff which she claims that she has never heard!!

The rest of our train journey took us to Andalsnes which was a small town on the edge of a fjord. There wasn’t much to the town centre, and we walked it in 5mins. As the evening was getting on, we just set up camp 200m up the small mountain that provided the backdrop to the town. From there we had quite a view of the evening lights of the town, and the bigger mountains that enclosed the fjord. Initially we were going to camp at the base under this overhang that houses 2 big metal doors going into the mountain. It gave natural shelter from the rain, but we got the creeps when we learned the doors were to enter an air-raid shelter for the whole town in times of war!

Anyway, back at the camp site sitting there unobtrusively and far enough off the path to be undetected, our solitude was broken by a couple of dozen scouts walking around us on their way to an evening "ceremony" . I suppose we were a good advertisement as there we were camping in an environmentally friendly way, we were cooking a delicious Singapore noodle dinner, and we were all the way from Aust. travelling the world!! Their leader asked us if we were scouts, we said yes, which is only a little white lie as I was an expert Ranger!! and Tracey
was a girl guide for one session before she decided it was boring and poxy. Their leader gave us some home made cake from their "supper" provisions, and we resisted our instinct to mug her for the rest as it was good!!. The rest of our evening was uninterrupted and we were in the tent when we heard them file past again.

Thursday 9th was a bit of a miserable day, not much good for scenery, so we visited the nearby town of Mould "town of roses", of course too early for that. The main point of the trip was a scenic bus ride one way, and a speedboat trip and different bus route back. Not much to do in the town itself as a fire destroyed a lot of the traditional wooden buildings in 1916, and the
German bombs got what was left. As a result there are a lot of ugly brick and plaster buildings. We went and saw the fir tree King Olav sheltered from the bombs in WW2 - that was a blast ,,, NOT!! Then we climbed for two hours up the small mountain behind the town for a view. It was quite a treasure hunt for a very faint trail, not much signposting, and the top
half was snow or bog. We found the café at the top eventually, and although it was officially closed, there was a lady inside who let us make lunch from our own provisions. Although very grey, the view from the top was still good and we could see lots of fragments of islands in the huge fjord that was more like a bay.