If you’re tired of pictures of waterfalls, you’re in luck, because today we ferried out of the fjords to the coast and will be in more urban settings for the next week+. But here’s one more waterfall pic for the road, plus an important reminder. The signage in Norway has so far been stellar.
A stunning overland drive north through fjordland. Mountains, waterfalls, glaciers, and gorgeousness, over and over and over. Sooooo much water. I’m pretty sure Norway will be the last country to run out of freshwater in the coming global warming apocalypse. Can I just stay here?
An amazing day among the fjords of Norway. It felt like five days in one! In the morning we took a gorgeous bike ride to one of the myriad waterfalls around Flam.
Then we went to a floating sauna where we could cool down by jumping into the fjord (I’ll spare my readers photos), and rounded out the afternoon with a water ferry ride on to the town of Balestrand.
Beauty upon beauty upon beauty….
Stunning train ride today between Myrdal and Flam, and then the food version of that, with a beer flight and Viking plank for dinner. Wow, wow, wow!
It’s pride weekend here but the celebrations were downscaled after a mass shooting at a gay bar in the city on Saturday night. Too sad.
But we are still enjoying the peaceful beauty of this city, having such a memorable family time, and feeling so lucky to be here.
The Hurtigruten ferry’s last stop (before it turns around and goes back to Bergen) is the town of Kirkenes, only about 10 miles from the Russian border. WWII hit this area hard for interesting reasons (Tom Hanks, I smell your next movie!) and in interesting ways, including people (such as our tour guide, now in his 80’s) living underground in an old iron mine for long periods of time. We learned all about it, appreciated the landscape, crept right up to the border (Russia, I sure do hope to see you again at a time when an actual visit is possible!) and said goodbye to the ship. We are Oslo-bound tonight, and phase two of the Scandinavian adventure starts tomorrow!
Hallo, from the top of Scandinavia! The northernmost point of Norway was as beautiful (and windy) as you’d expect.
Then again, there really are not too many places here that aren’t beautiful, so you could choose just about anywhere and it would be great. And the cities so far just seem so mellow and pleasant to live in. Which is a pretty good quality in a city.
So amazing to have crossed into the Arctic on Solstice.
So amazing that the clouds parted to allow us to see Lofoton—the part of this cruise I was most looking forward to—after 24 hours of thick clouds and rain.
And oh, the scenery of Lofoten. So amazing.
AND THEN: the weather was so nice the ship was able to go up Trollsfjord. Come on, now.
Only three years in the planning (#ThanksCOVID!).
Bergen has ponied up generously with its infamously rainy summer weather but I did get a few photos when the skies temporarily cleared. Wowee!
Heading toward Atigun pass, the day was so windless that the roadside ponds mirrored the mountains.
Now I'm in Fairbanks, soon to head to the airport to continue the trip south. So that's all from me, from Alaska, for now.
I'll be back "here" (blog-land) soon, coming to you from northerly climes in another part of the world. COVID-and-all-else willing, see you in the second half of this month...in Scandinavia!
I got to go help Science Tech (and friend) M take yesterday morning's meltwater flow measurements for a long-running project.
Three weeks ago, six of us went out to this site for two full afternoons of digging down to the ground level through 4+ feet of snow, and it's kind of shocking to see that endless field of frozen white now look like this...
