Norse saga. Part V – Norwegian Blues

Friday 16 August

Pining for the fjords

The rain started just as we arrived at the railway station. It was just as well we weren’t late, as our reserved seats were very much at the distal end of the train. This would have offered photographic advantages, had the rear window not been befouled and filthy. It’s a seven hour trip from Oslo to Bergen, but the journey passes through some spectacular mountainous scenery and glacial valleys. I’m given to wonder what the occupants of the tiny houses dotted all over actually do for a living, outside the tourist season. There were several nutters in the 8°C rain on mountain bikes.

Photo opportunities were distinctly limited because the train’s windows didn’t open and raindrops obscured the view of the low clouds obscuring the mountains.

Mountains and lakes in the rain from the train.

Low clouds and rugged scenery.

However, we rolled into Bergen as the rain just about stopped. It’s better to spend a wet day on the train than in attempting a walking tour.

After a meal that in my case included a pleasantly gamey and slightly chewy whale steak (they were fresh out of panda), we ambled down to the harbour and booked tomorrow’s fjord cruise. Good weather was forecast for tomorrow: I was hoping that this would hold true.

It seemed that schools, or at least universities, were back on Monday, so the town centre was populated by students in fancy dress. Even the hotel had a sign apologizing about the noise of boisterous undergrads in the street late at night. We scored a room whose window didn’t open to the street. The Place to Be seemed to be a nightclub just up the road where there was a massive toga party, if the huge queue of students in bedsheets was anything to go by. Not a single toga in evidence; plenty of chitons and exomides sported by hardy Norwegians clearly very used to standing around half naked in chilly weather.

Saturday 17 August

The alleged good weather seemed to comprise dull and overcast with spots of rain. Bah! Nevertheless, we boarded the MS White Lady, which set off on its fjord cruise spot on schedule at 1000. The upper deck had a retractable Perspex canopy that was predictably not retracted, leaving only a small space at the stern for up to 100 passengers to crowd and take photographs. Most seemed content to sit in the warm on the lower deck and either look out of the windows or play with their smartphones. I resisted using the GPS on my own phone until we were well on our way back to Bergen.

The sun fought a losing battle with the clouds, only appearing for a couple of minutes, whereas the rain was much more successful. Still, between showers I got some pictures of some of Slartibartfast’s award-winning work. The scenery really is stunning.

One of the countless waterfalls.

Fjord view.

Vike church. This is just about as far north as I have ever been.
(Flying over the North Pole doesn't count.)

Looking north along Ostresundfjord.
The cliff continues at the same angle underwater to a depth of several hundred metres.

Looking south along Ostresundfjord

Lonely house. Bet they don't get troubled by many door-to-door salesmen.

A longer cruise may have been a realistic option had the weather been better, but it looked as if most of the sightseers were glad to get off the boat after just over four hours.

Next came shopping in the ancient wooden Bryggen area, the oldest part of Bergen (reconstructed on the twelfth-century foundations after it was burned to the ground in 1702.) The place is all wonky and wobbly, and looks more like Diagon Alley than anything else. Beloved Wife added to her Christmas ornament collection, and then we walked back through the open market and I picked up a pack of sausages: Venison, Whale, Moose, and Reindeer.

Bryggen, or possibly Diagon Alley

Then a little bit of shopping in Bergen’s department stores, where shop assistants were helpful almost to a fault, and back to the hotel with our booty.

Neo-classical atlantes and caryatids adorn many old buildings all over Scandinavia. Here's one of each, clearly caught taking showers.

As the weather had by now improved a little, we sauntered around the old part of the town and eventually found the bottom end of Bergen’s famous funicular railway. It starts with fun and goes up from there. It was windy at the top, but the views were excellent. The souvenir shop was full of the same old tat available at all souvenir shops in Scandinavia: Vikings, trolls, silly hats with antlers, anthropomorphic reindeer, and pelts and antlers from real reindeer.

The funicular railway.

Funicular time-lapse, viewed from the top.

Winter is Coming.

Down the funicular again, and another wander around Diagon Alley and some more shopping, before we discovered a café on an upper floor that had decent views of the harbour but glazing to keep out the wind, rain, and fishy aroma. I had reindeer patties; Beloved Wife chose Norwegian meatballs.

And then we fell into the arms of Morpheus. 

Sunday 18 August

Aargh, rain! Stair-rods all the way from the hotel to the railway station. Just as well, then, that we were able to do our fjord trip and funicular ride yesterday, when the sights were actually visible.

As the train climbed east, the weather tried to improve. I was repeatedly frustrated when trying to take photos of the glacial valleys because, every time I hit the shutter release on my camera, the train dived into one of the countless tunnels. This happened on repeated consecutive occasions. It certainly didn’t feel like a coincidence.

The weather at Finse was completely rain-lashed and foul. Finse, elevation 1222m, is the highest point on the Norwegian (and possibly the entire Scandinavian) rail system. The place is inaccessible by road. Scott (of the Antarctic) and his team trained here.

Nobody stops at Finse except hardy mountain bikers and hikers, military types doing Arctic training, and the cast and crew of Star Wars “Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back.” Yes, in the winter the place was and is the Ice Planet of Hoth.

Mountain bikes to rent. Only the deranged need apply.

The sixth planet in the remote Hoth system is just there, on the right. Known locally as the Hardangerjøkulen glacier

On 18th August 2013, the outside temperature was 6°C.

The weather improved as we headed east, down the mountain towards Oslo. We were treated to some glorious views of huge valleys, lakes, fjords, clouds hanging among the trees in the valleys, and on one occasion a full double rainbow.

Seven hours after setting off, we rolled into Oslo station and found our hotel. Then we grabbed a bite to eat and activated our unused 24-hour public transport cards to explore Oslo’s suburbs by tram. Beloved Wife really didn’t fancy a chilly evening ferry ride. Maybe tomorrow: I’d discovered that our train didn’t leave until 1300.

Monday 19 August

Tram to the Town Hall, which is where the ferries dock and, incidentally, where we listened to Beethoven’s Ninth a few evenings previously. Our 24-hour passes would be good until 2110, so we took the ferry over to the Folk Museum and Maritime Museum stops, but didn’t get off. I was glad I’d previously taken pictures of Oslo fortress because today there was a massive cruise liner docked right outside the fortress, obscuring all views of and from.

We got to the train ridiculously early and boarded. Ended up chatting to an American who was funding her three-month tour of Europe by transcribing the scribblings of the first four US presidents plus Benjamin Franklin into text format. We chatted and offered possibly useful hints regarding where to go and what to see.

The train went as far at Gothenburg (Göteborg in Swedish) where there was about an hour to locate the next train that would take us to Copenhagen. We ran into the same American traveller, and unfortunately a couple of unruly children whose mother seemed incapable of understanding the fundamental meaning of “quiet carriage”. At last she got out and took her noisy brats away.

It occurred to me to check where the train would stop in Denmark. The train would stop at the airport on its way to Copenhagen central, but crucially would also stop at Ørestad, a few hundred metres from our hotel. I saved about half an hour of train and metro this evening, and a further 30 minutes tomorrow morning. A celebratory beer was called for in the hotel bar. Such a pity the room was so basic, minuscule, and with uncomfortable bunk beds and a dysfunctional internet.

Tuesday 20 August

Appallingly early start in order to ensure a timely arrival at the airport. The hotel breakfast was mediocre.

I should note a hard landscaping detail: rough granite flagstones look great and offer excellent skid resistance when wet or icy, but they’re appalling to drag wheeled suitcases along between the station and the hotel, and back again the next morning.

We got airside and tried to obtain our tax refunds on goods purchased in Norway and Sweden, only to be told that the receipts would first have to be stamped by Customs on groundside. This differs from the UK where all this tax refund business has to take place airside. I sent Beloved Wife without any luggage back into the depths of the airport. She was sent from pillar to post in an obvious attempt to avoid paying any refund of VAT, but eventually succeeded and reappeared with a receipt. Huzzah!

The flights were pretty much uneventful. At Dubai airport, the taxi rank has been moved.

And when we got home, one of our rickety air conditioners refused to fire up. Chasing the landlord: something else to add to my ‘To Do’ list.

Welcome back to reality.

Post Script

If we’d booked individual train and ferry tickets on line, cost would have been around $1261. Our EuroRail passes, plus reservation fees, plus cabins on the ferry came to $1168: marginally cheaper, but with Ultimate Flexibility.  We actually used seven of our eight allocated journeys. I guess you pretty much have to max out the ticket in order to make it financially worthwhile.

]}:-{>

Norse saga. Part IV – Norway Horsey

Wednesday 14 August

Twilight moon through some rigging.

We had an early departure from our subterranean Stockholm hotel, whose corridors looked exactly like those on the ferry. We didn’t have time for breakfast, but as that wasn’t included in the room rate it wasn’t a loss. The train to Oslo was not a sleek bullet train, but it seemed to travel fast enough through some very pretty fields, forests, and lakeland scenery.

Unfortunately, some yoof sitting exactly opposite us could have been the star of all Swedish translations of Tom Stoppard’s Talking Heads plays. This motormouth didn’t let up for six hours. If it wasn’t his mates (who couldn’t get a word in edgeways) it was his telephone victims. Even the next carriage, full of screaming brats, was inaudible: drowned out by Monologue Man.

The hotel turned out to be rather further from the railway station than originally planned, and then owing to map-reading challenges, wasn’t actually so far after all. We checked in, dropped our bags, changed, and then headed out for an afternoon snack and to be amused by the buskers, who included a double-bass player, and someone playing Bach’s Toccata in D-Minor on a piano accordion. The Living Statues don’t seem to get the idea at all, especially the ‘statue’ bit.

Oslo Fortress is free to get in, which was just as well because the various exhibitions where admission is payable were shut this late in the afternoon. The setting sun offered excellent light for interesting photographs.

Main entrance to Oslo fortress. There's a bridge over a dry moat and a wooden drawbridge.

Looks like someone's only blown the bloody doors off.

Inside Oslo fortress.

Oslo fortress: sea view.

And down on the quayside, the Mazda MX-5 Owners Club was having an informal meeting, so we chatted to the owners. Beloved Wife thinks she knows what her next car might be.

The light blue Miata/MX5 looks like it does the occasional track day. The dark blue one is more desirable because it has a retractable hard top that doesn't use up any space in the boot.

A lot of people were strolling on the sea front, and there was some kind of stage set up. It turned out that the Olso Philharmonic was about to perform Beethoven’s 9^th Symphony to an open-air audience, so instead of immediately heading for food, we hung around and listened. Additional soloists included Olaf Ericsson on the Harley-Davidson, and some yapping from Bark.

After sunset, which occurs just after 9pm in Oslo, the temperature dropped markedly. Immediately following the concert, we headed off to the nearest plausible restaurant. Chinese green tea, Hot and Sour soup, and Pork and Chilli were all extremely welcome, as was the 30m walk from the restaurant to the hotel.

Thursday 15 August

The hotel breakfast is comprehensive and excellent. At last, bacon! And fried eggs too. Then to the sea front for a ferry across the bay.

Ferry 91 is a bus for the purposes of public transport tickets. I headed off to obtain day passes from a machine on the quayside, only to be thwarted by the demand for payment. The machine didn’t take cash, would only accept a card with an embedded chip, and then wanted nothing to do with the six-digit PIN supplied by my Local Global bank. It’s four digits in Norway, or it’s no way.

I got day passes for cash from a manned booth, and got aboard the ferry mere nanoseconds before cast-off, and nobody checked the tickets anyway. We’re supposed to activate the 24-hour tickets by wafting them in front of a card reader on board, but no such device was in evidence.

After disembarking (‘debarking’ is what you do to tree trunks) our first destination was the Norsk Folkemuseum, a large partially wooded area of reassembled historical buildings from Norway’s past. The stave church has been dendrochronologically dated to 1212, complete with dragons in some conflation of Christianity and Nordic myth, and was refurbished in the nineteenth. 

Gol stave church, resited in this museum.

Dragons!

Stave church interior.

Some of the buildings were populated by Living History people in costume. A nineteenth-century schoolroom demonstrated those infamous Victorian values: one of the punters’ children was visibly disturbed when he saw a naughty schoolboy being given a simulated caning. They don’t do that in Scandinavia any more: it’s the law.

Schoolroom. The lesson was in Norwegian, but the map seems to indicate the lesson was about Palestine.

Other delights included the bread-making, and a 1950 farm with real, live animals. Well, a pig. While the girls on a school field trip went to find the animals, the boys all climbed aboard an ancient tractor.

I was assured by a re-enacting farmer that this lady will never find her way on to a dinner plate. She's got a lovely porcinality, and is ideally suited for a petting zoo.

My great uncle had one of these, and when I was that young I too used to climb all over it.

We didn’t bother with the horse and buggy ride. The horse was, I had explained to me because I know about 0.0001% of what there is to know about horses, a Norwegian Fjord Horse. Small, strong, low maintenance, good temperament, and a very old breed. The animal’s mane had been clipped to show off a distinctive and completely natural dark stripe. Here, at last, is the reference to the Norway horsey mentioned in the blog post title!

The stripe is emphasised by roaching(US)/hogging(UK) the mane.

We chatted briefly to some costumed musicians and I tried to play a ram’s-horn recorder, a musical instrument that probably suits me far too well. I couldn’t get Bach’s Bourée out of it (too many black notes) but was more successful with the Horses’ Bransle. Then the re-enactors stepped outside for some traditional music and dancing.

Traditional Scandinavian dancing.

Fiddling about.

It was a short walk from the Folk Museum to the Vikingskiphuset. In this apparently converted church are three Viking longships, funeral artifacts, and the mortal remains of three Vikings. These were all originally unearthed from burial mounds in the 1920s, unless you count the grave robbers in the ninth century who had it away with the gold and jewels and scattered the human remains over a wide area.

The Oseberg ship.

Exquisite carving work on the prow.

Further to matters maritime, the walk from the Viking Ship museum to the Thor Heyerdahl Kon-Tiki museum looked like a long one, so we returned to the ferry and caught No 91 for a very short boat ride. Kon-Tiki and the Maritime museums all shut at 1800, and it was now 1710, so we chose Kon-Tiki and spent fifty minutes checking out the photo galleries and both Kon-Tiki (1947: balsa wood raft that travelled from South America to Polynesia) and Ra II (1970: papyrus boat that sailed from Morocco to Barbados).

Kon-Tiki.

Ra II.

And there was stuff about Easter Island too. Did you know that the famous stern stone-faced moai are actually from the waist up and not just head and shoulders? For unknown reasons, most of the carved body details are buried. Heyerdahl’s team took a shipload of plaster with them specifically to make a cast of a full-length statue, and this full-size copy is in the museum. The moai are, in fact, huge.

Naturally, because all the museums shut at spot on 1800, the queue for the 1830 ferry back to Oslo centre was immense and the ferry left full with a large queue remaining.

It was sunny, and there was a bit of a breeze, so the rag-and-stick brigade was all out in force. One racing yacht was presumably practising as back and forth it sailed. Downwind with the spinnaker deployed, then tacking upwind, and repeat. The amusement of standing in a queue watching the boats would have been much reduced had the weather been wet.

Tacking upwind.

Running before the wind.

The next ferry was due at 1900, but the local public transport actually sent a special extra at 1845 to remove us, and most of the queue, back to Oslo city centre.

So back to the hotel for a short break, then we headed out for a most excellent steak dinner at the Nyborg Steakhouse right near that main railway station. Not cheap, but nothing is in Norway. Then back to the hotel, picking our way between the hen parties and professional beggars on their mobile phones, to a well-earned tryptophan coma.

]}:-{>

Norse saga. Part III - Far from Finnished

Saturday 10 August

Suomenlinna: The Fortress of Finland.

Upon arrival at Helsinki, it transpired that the ferry port and our hotel were at opposite ends of town. A €20 taxi ride sorted that out, and we also learned that the tram would take us directly from the hotel to our return ferry on Monday.

The tram trip into town cost €2.60 each. Then we bought day passes, which would be valid for 24 hours of unlimited public transport, except for the ferry we took to Suomenlinna (The Fortress of Finland). Having got there, we discovered that a different ferry service would have accepted our day passes, although it went to and from different quays.

I was actually glad I’d decided to wear my new Vibram® hobbit feet today. Every surfaced area on Suomenlinna was either sharp gravel of massive rounded cobbles, except for one grassed area that was covered in goose poo.

Suomenlinna: The King's Gate

Suomenlinna church is used as a lighthouse.

You can just see our ferry over there in the far right background.

Suoemlinna is a group of small islands covered with fortifications dating originally from the mid 1700s, and also various wooden and brick-built buildings. The church has a dome that includes an extant lighthouse some 52m above sea level. Wandering around the islands, we discovered the First Helsinki Classic Boat Rally, so the yacht harbour was chockablock with glorious wooden yachts and motor boats.

Yachts, yachts everywhere

Wood or Tupperware? What would you choose?

I think this motor cruiser looks wonderful.

Is this a Riva?

Another boat worth a look was a 1933 submarine with its three torpedoes, two engines, and two enormous doorways now cut into the hull to provide access and egress. I chatted to an American who was busy telling his small son how Grandad used to sail in a larger version of this vessel. Grandad never got to launch a Trident missile in anger, for which we are probably all grateful, but having retired from the US Navy, it seems he got a more satisfying job at Cape Canaveral putting space shuttles into orbit.

Submarine.

Submarine stern gear.

Engine room: the electric bit, for use when submerged.

Torpedo tube.

We returned to Helsinki’s mainland and sought food. The guide book mentioned that Café Kappeli was a good place for traditional Finnish fare. The bouncer on the door looked us up and down. A kilt is National Costume (just not mine, but I wasn’t going to say so) and anyway there’s a long and auspicious tradition of Kilted Warriors this far north. Vibram® hobbit feet don’t violate any No Shoes: No Service rule, and they’re not sandals either.

I had the reindeer tongue starter, on a bed of reindeer mousse, and that was followed by medium-rare roasted reindeer with vegetables and a delicious rowanberry sauce. The whole thing was delicious, actually, for someone who enjoys meat that’s slightly gamey. Beloved Wife had the beef, but because she’d not had a starter, a dessert was justified. Blueberry cheesecake with blueberry ice-cream and drizzled with blueberry juice. Mmmmm!

Only for people who like blueberries.

All the shops were shut by the time we emerged from the restaurant, so we wandered around and resisted the dubious allure of buskers, caricature artists, and a religious orator. We checked out some of the architecture and then rode the tram to the end of the line and back again to our hotel. Plans to alight at the end and look at the sea were abandoned when it became obvious that there was no entertainment to be had in the residential suburbs. Our day passes would expire at 2000 on Sunday, so some exploration of Helsinki was planned. We both hoped that the place wouldn’t be shut on Sunday.

Sunday 11 August

According to the guide books, the Finns are avid coffee drinkers. This seems to be confirmed by the kitchen area of a downtown department store that was mostly devoted to coffee machines. I suspect Mellow Birds may be a prohibited substance in Finland. This keenness to make decent coffee didn’t stop me experiencing a particularly revolting cup this morning at breakfast. I don’t care that it was from a machine: a device that grinds beans and pours liquid should be capable of making a decent cup. The other apparently identical machine was much better, so I suspect dirty filters or some such. The hotel staff were hugely apologetic, and the following morning the errant machine had been fixed.

Our first port of call was a spectacular modern church hewn out of solid granite. Temppeliaukion kirkko, the Church in the Rock is basically a circular hole in the ground covered by a huge copper dome that’s supported by concrete flying buttresses. The place was packed with tourists. Now, I’m not in any way religious, but even I know that it’s considered bad form to wear a hat in church. Tell that to Indiana Jones’ grandson and the host of back-to-front baseball caps.

Church in the Rock interior.

Church in the Rock exterior.

Other churches we visited today were Uspenskin katedraali, the Russian Orthodox brick edifice near the port and the largest in Europe, and the Helsingia tuomiokirkko, a huge white Lutheran cathedral atop an enormous flight of steps. It’s surprisingly plain inside, except for the organ whose pipes are decorated in Baroque on Speed.

Russian Orthodox church.

Plenty of ornamentation in the Russian Orthodox style.

A classic onion dome.

Helsingia tuomiokirkko.

Inside, the church is surprisingly plain...

...except for this vast musical instrument.

A little shopping and photos, then back to the hotel to drop of purchases before heading out for something to eat and drink. Isn’t a day ticket of unlimited public transport great?

St Peter. He with the keys to the Pearly Gates.

Trolls guard one of Helsinki's department stores.

A rather disturbing lack of PPE whilst metal bashing.

I can't work out if this Viking has an agricultural implement or a musical instrument.

An exomis probably doesn't count as Personal Protection Equipment.

Love the Art Deco.

Zacharis Topelius, lyric poet, writer of historical romances, professor of Finnish, Russian, and Nordic history, and editor-in-chief of the Helsingfors Gazette.

Atlantes, which is the correct term for male caryatids I hear.

After ‘deer’ [sic] pizza - another first - and a beer brewed in Bergen, (Beloved Wife had ham and pepperoni and a Blueberry Collins), we took the scenic route by tram back to the hotel.

The pool and sauna was still open for an hour. I managed fifteen minutes at 100°C and 70% humidity. Then a couple of Chinese guys joined me and poured water on the hot coals. None of us could breathe superheated steam, and they ran howling from the sauna. I bent double until the steam evaporated. I’m not used to saunas, and the one at Fitness First in Dubai is set at a mere 80°C.

Monday 12 August

Our last day in Helsinki. We checked out of the hotel and then took the tram into town, leaving our bags for collection later. It was raining really quite hard, but after the squall had passed we found our way to St John’s church. But first we visited the Design Museum. This one was rather better than the one in Copenhagen, not least because it wasn’t half closed for refurbishment. There were plenty of IKEA chairs, of course, and blasts from the past that included Rukka motorcycle gear and a 1985 mobile phone stuck to a car battery. Odd, isn’t it, that state-of-the-art furniture from 1940s Scandinavia still looks modern? Compare with the furniture we grew up with.

St John’s is a huge church that includes rows and rows of pews in a Circle as well as the Stalls. It’s possible to walk right around the church on the upper level and look down at the congregation from behind the altar. Apparently the church is used for concerts as well as for worship, and can’t half pack them in.

St John's church. The twin spires are visible from most of Helsinki.

The nave of St John's church

Carving detail on the screen behind the altar.

Looking down the nave from the upper storey. An angel's point of view, perhaps.

 As rain was still threatening, Beloved Wife decreed that we go into town and buy a new umbrella. The new device is magnificent. Push a button on the handle to deploy, and then push the same button to collapse. I’m officially impressed.

We retrieved our luggage from the hotel and found our way to the ferry terminal in good time. It transpired that no cabins were available, and so once on board, Beloved Wife and I found a quietish corner and set up camp. Immediately after casting off, she tried again, and by some miracle a cabin was now available, and we wouldn’t have to spend all night listening to the Whack-a-Mole and the pinball machines in the next room.

The moral of the story is to ensure that cabins are booked both ways at the same time as the ferry tickets.

Beloved Wife collapsed for an early night. I discovered Finnish kåråøkë, that wasn’t bad on the whole. I tried to sing along under my breath but was continually thwarted by all the diäcrïticål marks in the Finnish sübtitlës. After a snack at the tapas bar and some Jägermeister, I went back, but by now the kåråøkë had been replaced by a disastrous Finnish püb sïngër. I can tell when an early night is called for.

]}:-{>