Backpacking in Norway is a lot like dating a supermodel. It's spectacular, and beautiful and you love every minute but deep down you know you can't afford it. Foolishly I decided to spend an entire wek here visiting my old teammate TC. Scandanavia in general hadn't been too bad up until this point. Sweden had been expensive, but only because I'd decided to go out drinking every night, Norway however took one look at my $500 budget for the week and just laughed. It doesn't help that the currency is the krona, which has the has a decimal place one spot to the right, meaning you're always spending in tens and hundreds, but the worst part is that our dollar only buys six kronas. The net effect of this is you go buy two beers and all of a sudden all of your money is gone.
However, just like with a supermodel, if you spend too much time worrying about how much you're spending while you're here, then you're missing the point. Norway is spectacular. I arrived on an overnight bus from Stockholm at 530am, then proceeded to get completely lost trying to find TC's place. I managed to lug my backpack around for 2 hours, being told the wrong directions by 3 different cabbies, before finally getting spot on directions from a blonde beauty going for her morning jog (there's a lesson in there somewhere I'm sure). TC wasn't actually living at his apartment yet, as he'd just bought it. So I had to wait another hour before he got there, meaning I had to wait even longer to get some real sleep on a cushioned surface. However when TC arrived I was presented with a beer and told to suit up as we were hitting the town after a champagne breakfast with his mates. I figured, what the hell, when in Rome, do what the drunken rich classy norwegians do. One of his mates donated me a suit, which was very lucky as this would have been a new low for me in a life of chronically underdressing, rocking skate shoes, jeans and a wrinkled shirt in a posse of guys who looked like they were straight out of Mad Men.
I heard the phrase 'Norway's Independence day' thrown around a few times, but I'm pretty sure this was just a standard Thursday in Oslo. It was a crazy party. After breakfast champagne, beer and shots and a delicious spread of cheese and italian meats on bread rolls (they have this for breakfast all over Scandanavia, I'm moving here if I ever become a cardiologist!) we headed out onto the town where pretty much all of Oslo was out in traditional dress or suits, and with a beer in their hand.
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| Herr TC Valle and myself classier than we ever were at Lander |
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| This photo is only to show the norwegian traditional dress. |
I won't bore you with too many details of the day, partly because it was a lot of shameless spring break style shenanigans that shouldn't be mentioned in polite company, but mainly because by the end of the night my memory got a bit fuzzy. One thing I do remember was the graduating high school students and their party buses. Apparently Norwegians looked at the one week debauchery of schoolies in Aus, or spring break in the US, and thought it was a bit weak. Instead their high school leavers get their own bus which they ride around in, drinking, pulling pranks and generally causing chaos for A MONTH!! They then do their final exams a week after this! Christ I'm glad I didn't go to school here. I managed to miss pretty much all the iconic high school parties because I was playing tennis. Considering I got in trouble for staying late at a party two weeks before the HSC, I'm pretty sure my parents would've had me as the only student to miss all of Schoolies month.
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| And that's how you become the wealthiest per capita country in the world... |
The next day, with both of us nursing hangovers, we headed for the fjords. TCs dad had let us borrow his BMW (as you do) and we were heading across the middle of the country to Stavangar. Most people thought we were crazy doing this, as you can drive faster by the south coast, or fly for almost the same cost and in 7 hours less time. Most people are missing out. The drive was one of the most amazing things I've ever done. There was everything, from rolling rivers, alpine roads through snow fields, ferry rides, and the most spectacular roads weaving alongside the fjords. It was also great fun as TC and I proved once again that planning is for suckers. We didn't really plan our way across and may have taken the slightly scenic route. By that I mean we had to double back at one point and then ended up on a route where we had to catch a ferry at midnight, a time we weren't 100% sure the ferry would be running at. If the ferry wasn't running we would have arrived around 4am. The end result of this was we got a ferry ride at sunset, free hot dogs (which in Norway are wraped in bacon!!) and chocolate buns from a servo restaurant we stopped into to ask about the ferry times, and we literaly drove straight onto the midnight ferry as we arrived, exactly as it docked.
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| Bacon AND crispy onion AND their own special hot dog sauce. What a country. |
We managed to take a couple of hundred photos along the way, usually with TC yelling "tunnel" or "fjord" and demanding I take the photo. I also introduced TC to the jumping photo, which ended up dominating most of the rest of the photos for the trip. We ended up getting in at 1am to TCs friends Christian and June's place, who had beers and shrimp sandwiches waiting for us. Pretty tough day really.
We ended up going to two different fjord spots, one called the preachers pulpit, and another where there's a rock stuck between two cliffs (don't remember the name). In keeping with the theme of the trip we did pretty much no planning and just rocked up with a couple of bananas and half a bottle of water. Our hike sort of turned into a bear grylls episode from there. If he does an episode where the scenario is someone getting teleported from their desk at work onto the top of a snow covered cliff then I'm pretty sure TC will get paid royalties. We got told that it was a 30 minute to 1 hour hike, and that there may be a little snow on the wedged rock. Turns out there was 2 metres deep snow on half of the hike, the route took about 4 hrs total, and the wedged rock was completely inaccessible thanks to snow covering the track leading to it. However we trudged onwards, despite the fancy hiking gear wearing people looking at us doubtfully and trying to warn us not to go. In the end it was so worth it, and the hike was really fun. One part had a hill about 200m high at an angle of like 35° which was covered in deep snow. It was a bastard to ascend, but the descent on the way back was awesome, and we did it in about 20 seconds. The view at the end of the hike was incredible, and naturally we took another couple of hundred jumping photos. We capped off the day with the champions league final, and a well earned beer, and then a whole bunch of ill advised ones.
Also, just as an aside, below there will be some photos of people near very high cliff faces possibly jumping or hanging over the edge of drops up to 800m high. Norway, with all of its wealth, has invested in see through safety rope systems, which are attached to each hiker. You wont see these in the photos because they're see through! Therefore if you happen to be the mother of anyone in the following photos, you'll have nothing to worry about and can just enjoy the lovely scenery.
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| The drive on the way up, when we began to realise it might not just be a light dusting of snow. |
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| Saskwatch sighting |
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| TC's 'hiking' shoes letting him down. |
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| Knackered Valle |
The next day we did the much easier (and not snowed in) hike to the preachers pulpit. I'll just let the photos talk for this place.
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| That little speck is me. |
We then did the long drive home and I've been spending the last few days just hanging out in Oslo with TC and his family. I checked out a couple of cool things in the city. One was the park in town (forgot the name again) that has some very cool sculptures. I want to find out the story behind it because this guy would've been an interesting spouse. Although his angry kid statue is so perfect.
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| Thats a big knife. Seriously though, why do palaces require guards to stand there for hours on end. Surely one dude and a bunch of security cameras and a phone would do, like it does for security everywhere else. |
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| The extremely lovely Mrs Valle and an empty dishy that had only minutes before contained a massive lasagne. |
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| Alright America, we'll see your Washington monument and raise you some naked dudes. |
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| Like I said, this guy had an interesting family life. |
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| Baby Alan Jones |
I also checked out their ski jump that overlooks the city. I've decided I now want to go watch this sport live!
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| Some Norwegian dude and his faithful poodle. |
Anyway, it was an awesome week, and while not for backpackers, Norway is just brilliant and I can't recommend it highly enough. I've got to say a massive thanks to TC and his family and friends. They did so much for me it was insane, and I can't wait to return the favour someday in Aus.
So I guess that's everything for the moment. I've got 4 more hours on this bus and if current trends continue, that means 2 more run throughs of Adam Sandler's masterpiece 'Jack and Jill' which has been dubbed in Norwegian with one guy voicing every single character...to think all that fine female impersonating could be undone by these uncultured nords! Philistines!
Will probably write next from London after a whirlwind ride through Copenhagen, Amsterdam and Paris.
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