Train to Oslo

We’re on the train to Oslo. Yep, we’re chugging along through the mountains after spending a night in Epcot Center Norway-land, officially known as Flam. It was quite a scene down there at the bottom of the mountain and at the end of the Sognefjord. Flam is a hub for tour buses, trains, smaller ferry boats and gigantic cruise ships. There were people everywhere. On one hand Flam is this incredibly beautiful place, with its fjordside harbor surrounded by snow capped mountains and rushing waterfalls cascading down the green hillsides. But on the other hand it’s a zoo, crawling with tour groups and international tourists lugging what looks to be their entire homes on wheels behind them. If you look for it you can find small pockets of quiet beauty in Flam, but a large part of the main port area is quite crazy.

Fortunately, we spent the night in one of the quieter parts of the village. We stayed in a youth hostel, camping, cabins place and enjoyed our tiny cabin. Electricity but no running water – a shower building just down the path. We had two bunk beds – kids on top, Tricia and I on the bottom. We got a little loopy in the night with Casey and I dancing to some traditional Norwegian folk music he found on Spotify. Good old fashioned family bonding.

Prior to our short time in Flam, we spent a couple more days in our favorite little town of Solvorn. On our second full day there we rented bikes from our hotel and took the ferry across the fjord to another village called Ornes or Urnes. I got to chat with a local English teacher and some of his 8-year-old students who were on a field trip from their tiny school in Solvorn. It was super fun. From there we biked along the fjord on what’s known as “The Romantic Road.” It’s this narrow little road with very little traffic. It’s barely a touch wider than most of the bike paths we’re used to back in Minnesota. The road had lots of twists and turns and a few ups and downs – some of the ups required me to get out and walk my bike up the hill. It was an incredibly gorgeous and fun ride, a real highlight of the trip. The fjord remained to one side of us throughout the ride while the hills and the occasional stream and waterfall remained on the other.

It was a beautiful sunny, warm day so when we encountered a self-serve local juice stand we had to stop. Berry and apple orchards are everywhere around this area. Those fruits grow well here apparently because of the temperate climate and the fact that they get 20 hours of sun each day in the summer. We found out that temperatures at the base of the fjords are many degrees warmer in the winter than the areas just a few hundred feet up the mountains.

Our bike ride eventually took us about eight miles from Ornes to fossen waterfall, the second tallest waterfall in Norway. Of course it was beautiful. It was also very quiet and peaceful. We encountered only a few people. We stayed for awhile and broke out a lunch. We think we have captured our 2018 Christmas card picture to boot. I really didn’t want to leave.

After our return trip, we climbed up the hill from Ornes to the village stave church, the oldest stave church in Norway dating back to the 1100s, the time when Christianity began to take hold in Norway. Stave churches in Norway are post and beam wooden structures, the building techniques similar to how the Vikings built their large wooded ships. It was super cool to step inside such history.

It was 6:30 by the time our day-trip ended and we were back in Solvorn. We did some laundry and drove up to a gas station restaurant for some dinner. It wasn’t a great dinner but we didn’t really want to drive very far and were happy with the burgers and fries they had on their menu. Back at the hotel we hung our laundry out to dry and relaxed for the rest of the night. Again, due to the long days, a person is able to accomplish so much. It wasn’t until about 11:00 that I took down the clothes, and it wasn’t even beginning to get dark.

We just loved the Eplet Hotel. Our room was tiny, but we had a balcony looking over the beautiful town. Also, they had a big living room on the main level where we spent most of our time. That room also had a deck with the same view. This is where we often had our picnics. It was a very hard place to say “goodbye” to yesterday.

Our journey after the Eplet yesterday took us through Sogndal where we stopped for a quick coffee, then on to Leikanger where we returned our rental car. A man at the rental car garage was kind enough to take us to the ferry terminal a few miles down the road. From there we waited a bit then jumped on a ferry for Flam. It was 2:00 by the team we reached our destination.

So, today we’ll end our day in Oslo and spend another night there tomorrow. It’s then Sunday when Tricia will head home and the three of us will board a plane for Moscow. We’re happy to be going back to a big, bustling city. Hopefully our last two days in Norway will be two more to remember.