Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
24 July 2009
Our introduction to Norway was a quiet one, approaching the capital ,Oslo from Sweden, you would expect a motorway, but Norways roads are nowhere near as good as Swedens, and are also very expensive, we kept running into Toll stations surrounded by cameras, and just driving through.
Oslo is surrounded by camera tolls that automatically send an account directly to the address that your car is registered at, so I think there will be a fist full of accounts arriving at my Uncles place in Scotland.
We camped at Bogstad, on the outskirts of Oslo, and the next day rather than use public transport, we drove into the city centre, as it was a Sunday and it was raining hard !!
A great day for Museums, so we picked the two most interesting and headed for them. First up was the Viking ship Museum, where three Viking ships that were dug out of burial mounds are beautifully preserved.
In Viking days , people of standing were buried with a ship, and all sorts of provisions for the next life, including, food, treasures, dogs,. sleds, and even horses.
Most of the valuable treasure had been looted, but the boats and the bodies of the dead were incredibly well preserved.
The other Museum for the day, was the Kontiki Museum, show casing the life and explorations of the remarkable Thor Heyerdahl.
After leaving Norway as a young man , he and his partner settled on a remote pacific island, where they lived a self sufficient life for a time before returning to the real world to undertake some of the most amazing sailing journeys undertaken.
Building his rafts in the original style out of balsa wood and then reeds, he proved that people could have traded and colonised both Asia from the middle east, and Polynesia from South America.
He also did considerable work on Easter Island, studying the history of that civilisation, and the riddle of the giant Maui statues.
The weather cleared up in the afternoon and we spent the time exploring the Fort and the waterfront and also took in the changing of the guard at the Royal Palace.
This was quite entertaining as the guard arrived by bus instead of marching , but they all stood to attention inside the bus and then marched off, shaking the bus from side to side, before reforming and marching up to the palace.
The next morning we were up early and away on our long drive to Lensvik, near Trondheim, on the way we passed through the Ski Resort of Lillehammer scene of the 1994 olympics.
We also climbed to the top of a very high plateau, and saw a huge array of different mosses, and beautiful little houses with grass roofs, but alas we saw none of the Musk Ox that live in these parts, these Bison like animals were introduced from Greenland many years ago, and have thrived in the remote areas.
Finally after a long day of driving at under 80kmh( the speed limit in Norway), and passing many permanent speed cameras, we wound our way into the small rural town of Lensvik, which was to be our home for the next two weeks.
I am lucky enough to have my favourite cousin , Kay ,living on a farm in Lensvik. She came here from Scotland thirty years ago and married a great Norwegian guy called Lars Arne,, and together they have farmed here ever since and have brought up two wonderful kids Kenneth and Juliet.
Luckily Kenneth was home for the summer holidays from his Vet studies in Budapest, and Juliet arrived back from her posting with the Norwegian Embassy in Iran a few days later.
We were treated to a very warm Norwegian welcome and it was great to be able to sit down and hear all about life in rural Norway, compare farming practices and discuss the differences between our two countries.
New Zealand and Norway have a lot of similarities, in that they are independent (Norway is one of the few countries not to join the EU), they are of similar size, and population, and both have vast coastlines and great natural beauty.
But in other ways they are worlds apart, Norway has one of the highest standings of living in the world thanks mainly to its huge Oil Reserves, and the government is very protectionist, paying out huge subsidies to its Farmers, and involving itself in everyday life from toll roads to incentives for people to study and live in the more northern regions of the country.
The government also has strict control over alcohol use, sports clubs are not allowed to be associated with alcohol, and although some Super Markets sell Beer, if you want to buy Wine you must go to the Special State Wine shops, called “The Monopoly”.
After our two weeks in Lensvik, we would have a much better understanding of what Norway was really like!
- comments