Bergen & the Hardangerfjord: Purely Research

    I had waited months with bated anticipation to visit Greece and now it was over. Just like that. But I wasn't about to sit around and let the post-trip blues kick in. Actually, I had a flight booked the following day to Bergen, Norway. Yes. In less then 24 hours, I traveled from the southern tip of Europe, to some of its northern most edges. Did my body appreciate the drastic change from balmy, 90 degree weather, to rain and 30 degree forecasts? No, I can't say that it did. Did my back appreciate the switch from fluffed hotel pillows and soft silk sheets to having a lumpy jacket under my head while I tried to find the best way to lay without a twig sticking in my back? Not in the least. Did my stomach enjoy the change from three course meals to sticky oatmeal in a tin cup? Mmmm, not exactly. Did my fresh tan like being smothered under five layers of thermal clothes? Of course not. But was I delighted? Entirely.

   Now, if you somehow don't know already, I wrote a 172 page manuscript that takes place in the Norwegian fjords. Other than Greece, I have never wanted to go somewhere so badly in my life. My interest in Norway and Norwegian history started at a very young age when I read a book about Leif Erikson, a man I fell in love with at the ripe age of six. Strike one. The love for Norway was further strengthened by a rather cheesy book series called "Viking Quest" which followed the dreamy main character, Mikkel. Strike two. Then, Norway fell out of the limelight for a time until I took my first intro to archaeology class. I read an article about how they were finding skis preserved in the glacial ice in Norway and I was fascinated. Strike three. My professor suggested that I do my final project on the subject. So, combining my long-lived love for skiing with my love for archaeology, I created a project which highlighted the archaeological history of skis, the oldest man-made tool in the world. About a year later, I read this incredible little book by the late Gary Paulson called North Wind that took place in the fjords, and I was struck with inspiration. 

   I had been workshopping a Norwegian character for awhile, but that book sealed the deal, and I began writing. Over the next two years, while surviving my first harsh North Dakotan winter, I spun a tale about a boy named Kelby Sutherland, who along with his faithful sled dogs, survives a journey through one of Norway's cold mountain passes called Lendbreen. This book became my whole world during a time when I had moved away from home and had found myself somewhat alone. I saw many of my own struggles reflected in young Sutherland as he and I were both navigating the shift from an easy childhood to becoming adults who were just trying to survive in new foreign worlds.

   When I decided to go to Europe, I really wanted to try and go to Norway, but so many things seemed to stand in my way. The first one was the season. I was in Europe in the fall, winter, and spring. If I went to Norway, I wanted to do it right. I didn't want to stay in hotels and airbnb's. I wanted to do it the way Sutherland had done it; I wanted to backpack. My goal was to try and see the things he may have seen, smell the air he may have smelt, taste it, hear the birds and winds he would have heard. I wanted to do research. I wanted to see if I had gotten it right and mostly, I wanted to be able to go back to my book and add the personal touches that would make it feel real; like the texture of certain plants, or the calls of birds I've never actually heard in the USA. Norway is not a particularly warm place, so if I wanted an enjoyable backpacking trip, I would have to go in summer. 

   If I wanted to backpack, that meant I needed a backpack, a stove, knives, a suitcase, generally lots of equipment. Oh, and I would need a buddy. So, I would have to find someone I thought was up to it. Not just someone I knew could do it, someone I knew would want to do it, and someone I would trust to do it with me. 

   When my parents came in March, I had basically given up on Norway. Logistically, it just felt too difficult. Maybe that was an adventure for an Afton with more resources and more experience. But for some reason, I just couldn't let it go. How did I know that I would get this opportunity again? Maybe, I didn't have all the resources and experience I needed, but maybe I didn't need to go all the way just yet. Maybe, I could at least dip my feet in, just to say I had done it. 

   I'll be entirely honest, I don't really remember how everything unfolded. I just remember that I approached my friend Kendra who is an avid skier and outdoorsman from Montana and asked her what she thought of going on a backpacking trip in Norway with me. She was on board, and the next thing I knew we had booked flights, we were planning meals, and I was going around campus collecting gear from anyone who could spare it. Kendra was great through this whole process. Since I was away in Greece for the two weeks leading up to our trip, she handled a lot of the prep, and I'm really grateful for her help. She also knew more about backpacking than I did, so was able to make some really good judgment calls. 

   We decided to keep our itinerary loose because we didn't really know what weather would permit. It was still early summer and Norway wasn't exactly tropical yet. Norway has an open land policy, which means you can camp anywhere you want, so we scouted out some good hikes and decided we could sleep on the trail or at campgrounds depending on what made the most sense. 

   So, after getting back from Greece, I immediately began packing for Norway. The next day, we were on our way. Our trip was off to a great start with us missing our first train, having to get a ride to the next train stop, and running to catch that train in the nick of time. But everything worked out and we made it on our plane. We were headed to the coastal city of Bergen. Between us, we had two backpacks, and a suitcase full of food and any other equipment we couldn't carry on. 

   It was cloudy, so I couldn't make out much as we made our final descent, just clusters of forested islands and a rugged coastline. After taking the train into town, we dropped our luggage off at our airbnb that we had for the night, and decided to poke around the small city. We still needed to buy maps and camp fuel. Bergen was a small maritime city. It was clean and well manicured and a gem to explore. I have very few pictures from Norway because I lost everything I didn't send to my family on my trip home, but Kendra sent me like 300 photos as well. I will include some of those. 

TROLL

Had to get a photo with the viking and his vindingrs. If you know, you know. 

This is a photo from outside my window at eleven o'clock at night.

      The next day, we ate breakfast, dropped our suitcase off at salvation army, and walked to the bus station. We proceeded to spend the next few hours driving across the fjords to get to a little town called Odda at the end of Hardangerfjord. There is a world famous twelve mile trail here called Trolltunga (The Troll's Tongue) that we wanted to hike. I was rapt the entire bus ride. Kendra slept, but I didn't take my eyes off the window. I was actually seeing the places I had spent countless hours researching, a place that was so familiar to me I knew its seasonal sunset and sunrise times, its weather patterns, its geological anatomy, everything! (I'm serious guys. When we were trying to get the right map, I knew more about the geography of Norway then the man selling them.) The experience was much like the one I had had at Delphi, yet entirely different too. In a way, I already had memories and stories in Norway. I wasn't just creating new stories, I was reliving them too. Everything I saw made me think of something in my book or something I could add. 

   One of the most peculiar things about driving through the fjords was how disorienting they were.  There came a point when we were driving, where there were no more trees, so I knew we were quite high. There were small ponds and waterfalls, and it was the kind of place you would find a moose. But a few minutes later, we had arrived at this huge lake that stretched for miles, but yet I thought we were still really high up. A closer look at the edge of the lake revealed tidal marks and I realized that somehow, we'd managed to find our way back to the ocean. It was hard to know when you were looking at a mountain lake or at the ocean in Norway. Actually, the little town of Odda sat snuggly on the only flat strip of land in the valley, bordered on one end by a lake, and on the other by the sea, with a raging river rushing between the two. 

The ferry crossing over what I thought was a lake. 

The little town of Odda. Don't let her fool you, just out of 
the view of the camera is a giant mining factory that extends over the water.
I guess that had its own charm too. 

Here we are setting are tent up under the awning so that it doesn't get wet inside.

The view from our campsite. This one was actually a lake. 

It was almost midnight when I took this photo. 

   We had found a glacier we wanted to hike to the next day, and so we hopped on a bus and took our first adventure. The information on the hike was a little bit misleading. The main trail only led to a glacial lake. To get to the actual glacier, you had to hike in one day and hike out the next. We did hike to a second lake, but voted against going further because we didn't want to miss our bus back to camp. 

Breakfast on a dock overlooking the Hardangerfjord

Everything just looked like it was from a fairytale. 

An old hut near the second lake. That is the ocean in the background. 

Sheep! I even saw some lambs.

Basically every Norwegian owns a cabin somewhere that
can't be accessed by road. They use them as retreats. 

A view of a waterfall spilling into the first lake we hiked to. 

   Lake number two was above the tree line and much more remote. We ended up eating our lunch here, but I'll be completely honest, this spot kind of creeped me out. I think I was a little bit in my head with the whole fairytale thing at this point. When we settled down to eat, we chose to sit with our backs facing a massive boulder field. A couple times, I heard the stones shifting and kept thinking something was behind us. I realized, that if I had lived before the age of science, I too could have believed that there were giant creatures who raged at the tops of mountains and turned to stone when the sun hit their skin. Like the Blackforest in Germany, Norway helped me understand how folklore and mythology find footing. 

   When we got back down to the little cluster of buildings where the bus had dropped us off, we had a thirty minute wait still. Thirty minutes turned into about two hours because our bus never came. We headed back to the little dock where we had ate breakfast and swung our feet over the edge and just watched. We watched as two fisherman glided by in their skiff, we watched as an old man came to fish on the dock next to us, literally lifting his line over our heads as he trolled the dock, watched a group of friends do cold plunges from the sauna next to us, and we watched as dark clouds tumbled over the sea and turned the turquoise water a dark green. Since we were sleeping in a tent and had little way to dry off , we finally moved from the little dock and looked for a public building as the rain began to patter against the splintered wood. We stumbled across a little inn and the owner was kind enough to let us sit inside while we waited for the bus. 

   As I'm sitting here typing this all out, I'm realizing how real and quaint everything sounds, and truly it was. This part of Norway was far removed from the hustle and bustle of the other European cities I had visited. It was a refreshing change. 

We rewarded ourselves with Ice cream when we got back to camp.
Not a great way to warm up but ah well. This was our Sabbath treat. 

   Another side note, we got really confused about Sabbath in Norway and spent a lot of time discussing how one should keep the Sabbath if the sun isn't setting. Where we were, the sun would go down around one or two, although it never got super dark. However, farther north, the sun doesn't set at all in summer and never comes up in winter... This led us to the discussion of how muslims are expected to keep Ramadan if they live in places like Norway or Greenland. Let me know what you guys think. 

   That night, we were faced with a challenging decision. We wanted to hike to Trolltunga but the weather report was really bad. It was showing rain and high winds. Everything on the website said that hikers shouldn't attempt to hike with bad weather because its too dangerous. The website also said that the trail was for expert hikers only and anyone else needed to get a guide. There were multiple warnings about being properly equipped and prepared, etc. Realistically, we know that we fell into the category of "expert hikers." It was obvious that the website was trying to scare away the tourists who would naively try to attempt the hike with a single fiji water and a pair crocs. You know the type. However, we also recognized that we were in a different country, and we didn't want to do anything rash. I knew my mom wouldn't appreciate it if I died a few days before my flight home. 

   The problem was, we didn't really want to hire a guide on Sabbath if we didn't have to. I was opposed to the proposition. Something in my gut told me that we wouldn't need a guide, and that we could trust our own abilities and our level of preparedness. But I also understood that it was better safe than sorry. Kendra really wanted the guide and this wasn't just my hike either. I agreed that it was the safer thing to get a guide and so we booked one. 

   The following day, we met our guide and about ten other hikes and headed to the trailhead. The two guides we had were very nice. They were the kind of people who guide in summer and become ski instructors in winter and live wherever the wind takes them so me and Kendra related to them. I even got to talk to the girl about some of our favorite Norwegian folktales, which was fun. However, about half-a-mile in we realized that his group was moving incredibly slow and we were trapped between people unable to explore and go at our own pace. The weather looked wonderful so, after a short conversation, we asked our guide if it was okay for us to leave the group.

   The guide agreed, but told us we couldn't get our money back. We understood, but for us, the experience was more important than the money. So, we skipped off and honestly we had the best time exploring together. This trail was incredible, as it followed the rocky flats of the mountaintops that border the fjords. The rocks and snow made it a playground. A playground with incredible views.  

  As you can see, I was really excited about this inclusion. You can see where the stone shifted because the inclusion is no longer aligned. I know I gave up on my volcanology dream, but I still love geology. The rock in this area was actually really beautiful. It had a lot of inclusions and a lot of luster. I wondered about the luster for awhile until I started noticing that all of the water that ran off the rocks was orange, and the inclusions I was noticing were also orange and lustery. I realized that this whole mountain was full of iron ore and that that was probably what they were mining and refining in Odda. 

Love the sunglasses in this one. 

Our view. This one is a lake, in case you weren't sure. 

Look at that beautiful alluvial fan!

Lets be honest, I was probably admiring the alluvial fan in this photo. 

Our trusty camp stove. 

   Finally, we reached the Troll's Tongue, a giant rock that juts out over the lake. The line to go out onto the rock was massive and we had to wait for about an hour. We waited so long that our tour group caught up with us. This was actually a blessing, because part of the guide package was professional photos on the Troll's Tongue. So we got a little of our money's worth after all. 

These were our photos.

And this is the picture the guide took. He repelled down to a 
lower ledge, which gave a much better angle. However, the colors
aren't as bright, so I'm glad for both pictures!

I was sitting eating my lunch and spotted this little 
rock ptarmigan a few feet away. My parents have been trying to see one 
of these for years now. 

   Another huge blessing that day was that, because we had hired a guide, we were allowed to take the shuttle to the bus stop. We arrived seconds before the shuttle was leaving and they let us on after we told them we were with the guided group. Although we would have been able to catch the next shuttle down the mountain, the last bus to Odda was leaving and our shuttle driver was able to have them wait until we got on board. If we hadn't been allowed to take the shuttle, it would have been a two mile walk down the road to the bus stop and we would have missed our bus back to Odda. 

   After the fact, I realized that my gut feeling about getting a guide was correct. As always, God would have taken care of the situation and rewarded our faith. But at the same time, I think we made a safe, and logical decision when we got a guide. Through all of this, I learned that God doesn't just work for us, He works with us. Even though we had doubts and decided to get a guide, God still made the situation work for our good!

   That night, we had to decide how we were going to spend the next couple of days. Kendra wanted to try and make it all the way to the glacier we had tried to get to the other day. I didn't really feel comfortable with that proposition though, because our weather wasn't great and I had concerns about spending a night on the top of the mountain. The sleepingbag I had been lent was not the warmest. Additionally, the backpack I had borrowed was faultier than we had both realized, and did not provide the support I needed to hike that long with it. Eventually, we decided against this, and with the major hikes in the area exhausted, decided to head back to Bergen to explore some of the museums in the city and maybe do a day trip out to another hiking location. This was another situation where I think God worked in our favor. 

   We found a person who rented their property out to campers and decided to make our base camp there. It was on a small island about twenty minutes outside of Bergen. That evening we bought some ingredients from our host and made bread over the fire, enjoyed our meal, and went to bed. Unbeknownst to me, Kendra woke up in the middle of the night with a fever and vomiting. Imagine if we had decided to hike back to the glacier! The next day she was really sick. We decided to do something easy and just went into town to go to a maritime museum and shop and on the bus, I could hardly get her to wake up. I'm really glad we weren't stranded in the wilderness while all that was going on. We took it easy for the remainder of our time in Norway. I think we were both a little disappointed we didn't get to do more, but thankful we hadn't found ourselves in a pickle.

The person selling the whale meet scowled at me when he saw 
he way my lip quivered when I saw this. My Freshman year of college, 
I wrote a fifteen page essay on why Norway needs to stop hunting whales 

   Our little island was adorable, and I had a lot of fun exploring while Kendra rested in the tent. 

   Our host told us about this little cove that could be reached by squeezing through a cleft in the rock, so I poked my nose around the forest until I found it. I swear this was the place where Hiccup finds Toothless in How to Train Your Dragon. If you know, you know. It was the most magical little oasis. I don't have the best photos of it digitally. My phone camera is not that good anyways, and I expected my phone to be dead most of the time, so I had packed a disposable camera. Many of my pictures were taken on that. I love those photos so much because they are messy and a little washed out and somehow they hold the feeling of the place more then the digital photos do. 

The entrance

The cove

   The entire bottom of the cove was covered in brittle stars! The next day, I took Kendra back to the cove before we left and we caught a few of them. But I also managed to find the one sea star in the bunch. I love sea stars so much, and this was a great way to end the trip. (I also saw a puffer fish). 

  

   Before finally heading out, we made one last stop to see a stave church. Another small thing checked off my bucket list. 

   Then we spent the next few hours trying to find all of our knives. I lost one of mine (it had somehow managed to slide inside a plastic wrap of tissues) and we didn't know which backpack it was in. We basically had to play roulette when deciding which bag to check. We got it right though. And that was my first trip to Norway. I must go back! There was so much I didn't get to do and see. Like, for example, I didn't get to go to the place where my book actually takes place because it is too remote and we didn't have enough time to travel there and back. However, I'm so glad I decided to test the waters. This trip took a lot of courage. Backpacking in a foreign country was a little out of my wheel house, but it was one of the trips with the most adventures and I think I picked the perfect partner to do it with me. I had such a great time with Kendra and her even-keel, rational nature kept me grounded in the stressful moments. 

   Now, as far as my research goes, I lost most of the technical stuff when I lost my phone. I had been identifying plants and birds and all that information was stored in my photos. That was very disappointing for me, but I did keep a physical journal of what it felt like to be there and I have so many memories and feelings I can incorporate into my book now to make it feel more authentic. 

   One of the most astonishing parts about being there was realizing how much of my book I got right. When I was comparing the things I saw with what I had put in my book, I found that my previous descriptions were accurate depictions of what I was experiencing in real time. One of the things I was most worried about in my book was if it was realistic for my character to get lost on the mountain flats. Were they big enough, or would he crest the mountain and immediately descend into the next valley? Could he really get lost on a mountain top?  However, when I hiked Trolltunga, I realized that these mountains tops go on for miles and there is nothing but rocks and shale and nothing one can possibly orient themselves with. With a little bit of fog and snow, I could have easily wandered that mountaintop for days. 

   Unintentionally, Kendra and I had also followed the pattern of my characters journey. Each hike we did encapsulated a portion of his journey. In our first hike, we started in the fjord and followed the river up to a glacial lake. This was Sutherland's journey from Skjolden to the "singing lake" (Chapters 1-14). Our next hike up to the lonely lake with the small abandoned shacks could have represented the time he spent in the abandoned summer farm, Neto (Chp 15-22). Our last hike across the rocky tundra to Trolltunga, was the last stretch of his journey across Lendbreen Pass (Chp. 23-32). I'm grateful that my journey went a little better than his though. I kept all of my fingers, and the worst harm that Norway did to me was give me a mild case of athletes foot. 

  I think I've already carried on for too long with this post, so I'll leave it here. As always, this was an incredible experience, with amazing memories, exciting discoveries, and many lessons learned.