Farewell Norway

I'd neglected to mention in the first post, but while our cottage was cozy and warm from the wood heat- wood heat must be constantly tended to. The main floor is completely separated from the stairs and bedrooms upstairs. When the owners showed us around that first night, he said 'Norwegians like to sleep cold, with blankets'. Fair enough- me too. It turns out that definitions of cold can vary somewhat. Upstairs was absolutely frigid. I mean, see your breath cold. We cranked the portable electric heaters and Lana lay with each of the girls to get them warm enough to fall asleep. After tossing in our bed for a couple hours, I got the blankets from the extra bedroom downstairs. It was a cold night. (and the bed was just barely 6' long, with a firm head and foot board- a bit cozy for me). All the other nights we ensured the bedrooms were prewarmed a bit before bedtime. Also the weather cooperated and it was never as cold as the first night. Thank goodness, or our memories perhaps would not be so rosy.

Some landscape shots on the way to the airport. As we neared Oslo, the tunnels started. Some just a few hundred metres, others were easily a mile long. The girls counted and we went under 23 within the space of about an hour of drive time. Kept us all occupied anyway.

A beautiful homestead on the shores of Randsfjorden.

A few shots of the interior of our cottage.

The girls loved this unique bed arrangement for them.

What a wonderful trip, we already miss it.

Oslo- part 1

We started our day in Oslo at a flea market and then wandered the wharf shopping district. It was drizzly and a bit miserable. It must be bra month, as the whole wharf was lined with bras strung between the light poles

Amy with Askerhus castle in the background. I'm sure it's important, but it was too yucky to try and get over to it.

Viking Ship Museum!! This was the most important stop of the day.

The actual viking ships were fantastic. Around 80 ft. long and 15 ft. wide, they looked like regular full size ships. Now, not necessarily something I'd cross the ocean in, but much larger than I'd always imagined. The 2 main ships Gokstad and Oseberg were patched up a bit and in mint condition. They were both burial ships found buried in the late 1800s with a chief in one and a high ranking woman in another. The ships had holes for 32 oarsmen and they only 2-3 boards stuck above the water line- so it must have been a pretty wet affair to ride in one of these.

I don't know how well it shows up, but they set planks across the main ship to sit on, and stored goods and weapons underneath.

This is one of the burial shelters found in the middle of the Gokstad. it had the 3 sleds and many other artifacts (see below) underneath it.

The artifacts they found inside the burial ships were fantastic. Again, it showed what fantastic craftsmen they were. Not just war-hungry barbarians living in caves. This was a very intricate and high-level civilization...which happened to find it easier to gain wealth by raiding their neighbors.

This is a horse bridle and each of those squares are silver crafted in intricate designs.

This wagon was really neat.

Three of these sleds were found in the Gokstad ship full of all sorts of goodies to help the chief on his way while dead. Again, just amazing craftsmanship.

The oldest known horse saddle, and some chain 'rattles'. They don't know if the rattles were baby toys or had some religious significance. There isn't much Viking writing that has survived, as they didn't inscribe much in stone. Again, if you're building a civilization and you want it to be well understood centuries later- use stone. (I think they're baby toys)

Here are a few photos the city centre. A bit drab with the rain. The church is the central Dom Kirke in Oslo.

Oslo- part 2

We finished off another rainy day at the Folkenmuseum- one of about a hundred 'open air' village/museums in the country. Seriously, every town seemed to have one. This one claimed to be the largest collection of historic homes and buildings, so we gave it a go. It had buildings from the 1700s to 1950s. We were worn out from the rain at the end and didn't spend much time at the more modern stuff. (don't ask why part 2 of Oslo is posting before part 1. It just sort of happened that way).

The highlight of the park is the Stave Church. They have these scattered about Norway. Once common across Scandinavia, only one survives outside Norway today. They mostly were built in the 1200s and used a vertical beam and plank construction type that allowed them to build so tall. We do still wonder why the Norwegians didn't get into stone buildings more as there was plenty of rock around, but I suppose no shortage of trees either. It does go to show though, if you want a lasting legacy- build in stone. There are tons of Roman and British buildings from antiquity, but not much in Norway besides these churches.

Just fantastic, detailed craftsmanship.

At one stop a lady engaged us in a game of Black Peter. Just like old maid, but the odd one out is a little boy who appears to have been playing in the coal bucket. You can also see not everyone is blond- just the kids in this scientific sample. We saw plenty of fair people, but plenty that weren't as well.

This is a barn from the 1940s. Still common across the countryside today we saw lots of barns like this with the upper level connecting to a hill (not hard to do in this topography) so you could drive a tractor right up. We saw our owners drive their tractor up, so the idea must work.

An assortment of buildings from late 1700s to mid 1800s. Quite similar to what we saw in Finland- often built up off the ground.

This building was amazing. They said it was common to have interior walls well decorated, but this was definitely an expensive home from mid 1800s. Fantastic artwork.

Ended at the general store and the Telemark collection of homes where this lady was making lefse. Rolling it out on a huge butcher table and then cooking on a very cool round stove, with a clean round top- just like lefse griddles today!

She was a great source of lefse knowledge and is where we learned the difference between flatbread/potato lefse, and sweet/thick lefse- which is what she was making. She said the flat, potato kind was a mainstay for how they ate all their food. Anyone who's made it knows there is a great degree of skill to come up with a successful product. 'Lefse ladies' would travel from farm to farm and stay for a few days making huge amounts of lefse which would then be stored and used over the next six months. Generally they'd have a lefse lady come two times a year.

She also said, while butter and sugar may taste good, they wouldn't have used sugar as it was too expensive. Thus the sweet lefse. It puffs up to maybe a quarter inch thick and is just sweet enough you can eat it with plain butter (they flogged pieces for $5, which we gave in and bought even though everything in our minds was telling us a demo food should be free).

After the museum we did go shopping downtown, but had no luck finding anything 'Norwegian'. It was a bunch of chain stores and fairly uninteresting stuff. After our authentic meal at Subway we took the curvy road along the lake back to our cabin. A nice city and cool museums, but we liked the countryside better in general.

Norway- the non-Tourist Version

We slept in, walked down to the lake and checked out the animals on the farm. Of course we played some family games in our cozy cabin. A great relaxing day.

They love the cats.

After a leisurely morning we drove a half hour up to Dokka. It is the nearest city of any size and has just under 3,000 people. It clearly draws people from a wide area as it had a very lively downtown. Our first stop was a thrift store. We found Amy some boots and a few other trinkets. Most importantly, we found a vintage Krumkakke iron!!

It didn't have a price so I timidly asked the 3 old ladies drinking coffee if they spoke English. One hopped right up and said she was from Minneapolis. We told her we used to live in Robbinsdale, and she was off. She chatted and chatted and was so excited to see people from her homeland. that was a fun experience. The iron was only $20 too. See the roller below.

We found the rosette iron and sanbakkle tins in Lillehammer.

We got some yarn at another shop and a lantern. They all have lanterns all over their homes. I had to use one to get extra wood from the shed one night, so they are useful still. We stopped by Salvation Army and got some scarves and a few other fun things. It was a great day of shopping, but we didn't find much that 'looked Norwegian' so not many souveniers for family were found.

We were just starting dinner when the owner lady popped in and asked if we wanted to help feed the animals. I've never seen the girls get their coats and boots on so fast. They gave hay to the sheep and a bit of feed to cats. Then we helped guide the horses in from pasture into their stalls. Great practice to see how they handle chores as they want to live on a farm when we move back to the States.

As we missed a chance to ride the horses because of drizzly rain all day, the owner graciously dried the horse, covered it with a blanket and let the girls sit on him anyway. They thought that was great.

Emily seemed a bit more comfortable than Amy.

As we finished in the barn, the owner said, "Friday is sauna night, do you want to come?" We said we'd maybe come to watch, but while finishing our dinner I decided that I best test the strength of my Norwegian blood. The sauna is the building down by the lake. half of it is kitchen with some nice tables to sit at, and then a little sauna in the back corner.

There was one old guy in the sauna already getting is toasty. The mom and one daughter were in as well. After five minutes or so, the natives were just starting to get shiny. I looked at my body and was coated in huge beads of sweat, so I'm certainly not in sauna shape like they are.

They said some people in the area will come any Friday of the year. On New Year's Day it was -3F and they had over 15 people at the sauna! Eventually they all hopped up and moved quickly to the dock and down the boat ramp. You just walk in waist deep, dunk down and swim to shore, and quickly walk back to the sauna. The pictures aren't great as it was very dark, but I did it. A full sauna routine is 3 times sauna-lake sequences, ending with a lake "bath" so you end clean.

It was 36F in the lake and the air, but to be honest did not feel near as miserable as I thought. It was great actually. I'd definitely go again, although I'm not sure about the dead of winter when they cut a hole in the ice. This picture perhaps captured how cold it felt and maybe the warm memory of wanting to be tough has fogged my mind.

All in all it was a really fun day to do some real local activities and feel Norwegian for a day.