Hidden and obvious treasures of Norway

We´re already away/on tour for almost a month.... we can´t believe that time is just flying. 

Tonight is our last evening in Oslo, we will be heading of for Stockholm/Gävle tomorrow. We´re excited! We´re happy, but sad to leave here too. But most of all, we´re nervous. Excited because now the journey into the "unknown" starts. Happy, because we finally got to spent some time with friends we didn´t see for a long time. Sad, because those nice every-day-moments now will only be memories for the coming year. And nervous, because we simply dont know what lies ahead. 

To summarize the last 2 weeks: simply fabulous! One of the things we wanted to experience, is to be really part of a culture, part of a family. And I guess we had/felt that!!! So when we came back from Jotunheimen, we didn´t dive into looking only at the tourist sites, we literally spent some evenings on the balcony, the couch (or like tonight behind the computer sorting out the too many pictures we are taking and refusing to delete). We really felt like home. 

Trondheim was of course a little bit like coming home (for those who do not know, Marjolein has been living there for half a year). We´ve had the privilige to stay with Gustav, who has a cosy apartment overlooking the fjord. (Thanks again for allowing us to fill up half your living room with our stuff :-) !!) So that meant easy mornings on the balcony in the sun and long evenings with good coffee. (The weather has been so kind to us!!!) We took a trip out to Berkåk to see where he is building his cabin. When we took a hike in the surroundings, we finally found some multebær, quite precious little fruits that don´t come in thousands! We played an electrical guitar for the first time (A real Steve Vai!!!) and we had time to bake kanelboller!... Fantastic!! Freedom so to say :)

We also met Elisabeth again after 5 years! and spent some great hours with her and her family. We ate a huge pile of wafels together and felt like we´ve never been away. Elisabeths mom is great in handicrafts and we both got a pair of wrist-warmers to keep us warm in the coming colder period. (it was indeed much cooler in Trondheim, at least 5 degrees difference!!) Jan went swimming in the Trondheimfjord, we were ´chauffeured´ around the city to see those things you don´t find as a tourist and we simply laughed our butts of over the small things in life. It was striking to see how much had changed over the last 5 years (for the good), although it felt like nothing had. In the end, the 4-5 days we spent there were too short, as always!

Back in Oslo, we had another week of feeling the good Norwegian life. We were able to go with a boat out on the Oslofjord. Together with Elling & Gørill, Jos (Elling´s dad) and his friend Thomas we set off course to Malmøykalven, a small little island that used to be an isolated tuberculose hospital. Now its half-deserted, a shame as it is a really beautiful place! And even though we´ve been to Norway quite some times, we never really saw the ´hidden treasures´ you normally don´t see as a tourist. There are another 5 islands in the fjord, all reachable in summer by public transport. Langøyene is the only place where actually the Allemannsrett / Every man´s right is applying, and you are allowed camp there. We went there on a really sunny day, not to go camping but to go swimming. Sitting there on the warm stones, overlooking the fjord with no one else around is just incredible. 

With Elling and Gørill, we also went out to the Nordmarka, the northern forest and visited his mother who literally has the forest as her backyard. A wonderful place and together we went out to pick mushrooms. The amount fof 2,5 kg mushrooms (chanterelles and funnel chanterelles) came together, they tasted so nice!!!

So we´ve got to taste sopp (mushrooms) and the traditional way of eating hotdogs: not in a bread roll, but in a pancake like tortilla. It´s actually funny to see that the things you consider to be normal don´t always apply, even when the Norwegian culture feels so close to ours. With warm dinner, everyone starts for himself, you don´t wait to be served. You say ´thanks you´ after dinner, not before. And just like that, there are so many tiny things that make me smirk (but in a positive way!) about this country that I love so much. You keep your sunscreen in the fridge, and you´re not supposed to like Diesel engines as you should drive an gasoline turbo one :). You´d rather stand in the bus instead of sitting next to someone and you don´t talk to people on the street. But in the mountains, you greet everyone. But when asked directly, you will meet with warmth. The kindness of the Norwegians in terms of helping others and friends feels endless to me, but it looks like some of them like to hide it from strangers behind large sunglasses. 

We´re excited about what lies ahead. Next stop: Gävle. A 9 hour journey will take us to the Swedish coast, where we will spend a weekend with Ilse (Marjolein´s cousin). After that we will have some more water in front of us until St.Petersburg, via the Åland islands, Helsinki and Tallinn. More to come in a week! Hopefully the weather remains kind and we can go on our canoetrip through the Åland Islands :)

Until then keep smiling, be happy and enjoy the day as much as possible :)