Norge, Jeg elsker deg
This may seem strange for me to say since we’ve only just met – but I’m in love. People told me that you could be dark and gloomy, but in the short time we had together I’ve only seen your bright, sunny disposition. The more we got to know you, the more you revealed of yourself, the more there was to love. The three weeks we spent together were magical…and not long enough. To quote the Bard, “Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good-night til it be morrow.” I get it. I didn’t want to leave. I’m already counting the days when I can return.
Sharon (November 2017): “Hey Dave, do you think you can get – or are you willing to take – three weeks off next summer?
Dave: Hmmmm. For what?
Sharon: Not saying quite yet….
Who wouldn’t say yes to that kind of offer? Sharon is not entirely sure where the idea came from, but a few weeks later she revealed that she’d been exploring the possibility of visiting Norway. Normally, given my somewhat limited vacation time, I’m reluctant to put all my free time “eggs” in one basket. But just Google Norway images! I mean it! Stop reading right now, minimize this screen and Google Norway and look at some of the pictures that come up. After drooling over my keyboard for just five minutes I was trying to come up with a plan to spend three months there.
The “We have to go!” decision was the easy part. The hard part was trying to figure out how to explore a lifetime’s worth of beautiful country in only three weeks. We started with a basic philosophical choice. Do we try to see a little bit of a lot, or a lot of a little? In other words, travel the length and breadth of the country and see as much (albeit superficially) as we possibly can? Or pick one region to explore in depth? That’s a tough choice to make. Every new Google search revealed a new, impossibly beautiful area that practically begged us to come and explore. Finally simple logistics helped us decide on a middle ground. Norway is simply too large. Imagine if California stretched from Mexico all the way to Canada…that’s basically the size of Norway. Neither of us wanted to spend multiple days simply traveling from point A to B to C, etc. In the end we based most of our travel in the northern part of the southern 1/3 of the country.
I’ll go into more detail in following posts, but anyone who has listened to us gush about Norway knows that we both absolutely fell in love with the country. Granted, we probably had the best three weeks of weather in Norway since the Vikings started collecting detailed climate information. And granted, we were just tourists traveling through, so our observations are, by necessity, somewhat superficial. But the bottom line is – we love Norway. We loved the people we met. We loved the culture. We both would love to go back. We both have said (not really in jest, or even half in jest) that if we didn’t have family here – we would seriously considering moving to Norway.
That’s all for now. Just wanted to throw a tease out there. I have several Norway installments planned. In part I’ve been waiting for my camera to join us back in the states. Near the end of our trip, I apparently put my camera on top of the car when we returned from a climb. I reached out to the kind folks at the Sota Saeter lodge near the trailhead, on the off chance that someone turned it in. I’m not sure what all took place, but a few days later Birgit emailed me to say that my camera had been found (slightly worse for wear and tear) ten miles down the road. Plans are currently underway for my memory stick to be sent. As soon as we get reunited, there will be stories and photos aplenty.
On pins and needles waiting for the first installment – looks beautiful.
Ouch! That sounds painful. I’ll try not to keep you waiting too long.