lairdandjonelle

OK, hands down, Norway is the most beautiful state or country we have ever seen — it is just magnificent! I have never seen mountains like this — from miles of forested mountains that were great to, right next to the last one, the blackest, sharpest, most jagged bare mountains that are what mountains looked like hundreds of thousands of years ago, before they were civilized with trees, with no greenery hiding the bare primitive bones of MOUNTAIN. Towering over the road, hundreds of waterfalls, fast flowing rivers and fjords upon fjords — simply breathtaking. Everyone, start looking for trips to Norway next year — hurry, before someone else discovers what could be, should be yours! We started out from Trondheim by train, at Domas (I think) we switched back to our coach, masterfully driven by Vitaly, and saw the imposing, beautiful, treeful nmountains with stunning valleys of GREEN grass, sheep and farmsteads — everything in immaculate order. How do they do that? How is every house (that is not a ruin of course and not lived in) and yard and farm so pristine??? And then, those mountains that you know are filled with trolls and maybe a giant man-eating spider, but certainly trolls, lots of trolls, maybe all the trolls in Norway, Sweden and five other countries. For miles, these mountains upon which no tree lives; though later, on one side of the road, those mountains, still majestically imposing but a tiny bit kinder, allowed some trees to grow, random small groves of evergreens and maybe birches, enough to serve as counterpart to that black jaggedness against the blue sky — oh, but that left side, strict in its black glory, treeless. Utterly treeless. The waterfalls flowing for thousands upon thousands of feet down to rivers and fjords. It all just took our breath away, awestruck silence when all the superlatives have been spoken and proven inadequate.

Everyone ran their phone batteries down taking so many pictures because there was not one place that was less photoworthy than another. Have I convinced you? Are you leaving this blog to hunt for airfare? There is nothing else I can tell you that matches those mountains. Hold on! We are coming back with photos that will never live up to those real life mountains and fjords, but might entice you.

We were on a very scary road, then a short ferry ride, and then, that earlier road looked like an eight-lane interstate to the road that we went down, thousands and thousands of feet, to Geiranger on a fjord whose name I don’t know. There were hairpin curves you would not believe — in a giant coach — yikes! I think the first road had 11 hairpin turns — they were as nothing in the face of the descent to our hotel!

I had a couple of local gin — very delish! — and tonic with dried lime slices; ohso, ohso good! Laird had beer. Dinner was good, a squash puree (they said curry, but I didn’t have any taste of that) with veggies and rice, quite good. Nice to have a vegetarian meal. Interesting that we saw tons of sheep, but we have not had any lamb or mutton, and I don’t even think I’ve seen any on menus. Maybe they just have them for the tourists to look at and exclaim over??

Tomorrow, we take a ferry to somewhere and do something — how’s that for an information-laden sentence???

Oh, my today’s story: on the train, which was on very rough track, I had gone to get Laird a cup of coffee (not doing that again!), came back, gave him the coffee and he got up to let me into my seat. As I was poised to move in, the train lurched and I flew backwards, landed smack, flat on my back. Of course, the first words out of my mouth were F a D (everyone who knows me can fill in the other letters; after all, there may be children present), I think at least twice. I just wanted to lie there for a bit to process what had happened, but, of course, everyone wanted to help me up. I seem to be unhurt, though my arm, which I think engaged with a train seat arm, stung and hurt for awhile and my back was not all that happy to be slammed to the floor, but other than abiding neck pain, everything shut up after awhile. But Deb, our tour manager, gave me some anti-inflammatory cream and I bought some paracetamol at a grocery store near our hotel when we got down the road from hell. So, I’m guessing I will live.

That’s pretty much it. I bought two tshirts so I don’t have to do laundry; Laird is doing his — hope it is better than the last place that had a laundry (actually a sister hotel of this one) — it took him hours and clothes were still not dry.

So, if I’ve gotten to the point of talking about laundry, you know it is time to stop this.

Laird is back! With wet laundry. Don’t ask.

Not granite. Most likely schist, with quartz running through it, or that’s what the guy on the bus said.

I misspelled Stiklestad.

Trolls: there are three kinds of trolls, all of them mean: mountain, with 1-3 heads; forest, with 1 head; and underworld, 1-3. None of them are like troll dolls. Not in any way, shape or form. None of them are cute or sweet. Remember, when you see one, RUN (though it probably won’t do you any good. They are mean, after all. And we know for a fact that they eat disobedient children — after all, it was told in many books. We have a picture of what we take as a forest troll; it only has one head and it certainly looks evil enough to scare little kids, not just into eating 1 maybe (OMG) 2 helpings of brussels sprouts or peas, but into their beds — or under them if they are smart. We will try to publish the pic as soon as Laird remembers how to do it.

We went through more and more spectacular landscape, left the north and coming south, were farms, cows, cabbages and whatever else. It felt like we were driving through the food basket of Norway. We had a lovely, scenic detour of about 1/2-1 hour with more stunning landscape, then connected back to the highway we wanted and on Into Trondheim, homeland and capital of the Vikings. On the Tronheim fjord. There is a river that meanders through the town past 1,000 years of history. — spelled Nideiva, no idea how it’s called.

Here’s the wonder of both Sweden and Norway: they have BRUTAL winters, but EVERYTHING is so clean and well-kept — beautiful traditional houses that look spotless, with spotless yards. In Norway (maybe Sweden, but no one told us of it) in the rural areas, in the evening, as dusk is soon upon them, they light the lamps in the windows, a tradition from Old Days when they were there to guide anyone lost in the snow. So still a symbol of hospitality. I only saw two out of thousands of houses that needed stucco or paint.

Went on Old Town tour this morning, or most of it, I hope, until I had outstood and outwalked my back and we ubered back to hotel. I then spend hours, after already spending hours last night, trying to get back into lairdandjonelle.com dashboard to write this. I got in and so we went off for very late lunch. Oh, my, it was fantastic. 3 courses, no choices (unless not eating something is your choice). I started with a Norwegian gin and tonic, delish! As to food, first came the most delicious bread, with butter that must have been whipped maybe with cream to utter smoothness and served with green herb oil on it — yes, homemade, of course. Whoever the chef is, he is a star. First course was salmon (of course), with creme fraiche (how the hell do you spell that word?!?), Icelandic wasabi and some delicate herb that I forgot to ask about. Third was pork belly in a curry sauce that wasn’t like anything I know of as curry – almost delicate, balanced so well with the fat of pork belly; and roasted potatoes, with a mustard mayo drizzle. For dessert a pana cotta, with spoonful of vanilla ice cream and stawberry puree. We have a reservation for tonight — though it is at 8:30, so I hope we will be awake.

Speaking of food — I have been so happy to see veggies for breakfast everywhere. What I call Turkish breakfast is, of course, served everywhere in Europe. The hotel breakfast buffet at the hotel we are staying at was magnificent spread over 5, 6 or maybe 7 stations. Starters: starfruit, watermelon (served on every buffet we’ve been at) and a melon that I’ve never seen before and, yes, salmon blinis with salmon caviar and little bowls of salmon with creme fraiche. Next, an overeasy egg and veggies and great bread (Norwegian bread, I’m telling you, yum!) and I think more salmon. Alas, so many things I passed up! Maybe I should have skipped the tour and just eaten at the buffet all morning — hard choice.

Swedish tradition: fika. It means “stop work and go have coffee/tea and cake”. Shawna, take note — every worker (and everyone else), has fika twice a day. Perhaps a new tradition should be started in LCS?

I actually think we go by rail tomorrow — isn’t that a novel idea for a rail tour?!? The scenic Rauma railway. But I don’t think we are on it for very long, just a couple of hours and then we are on the bus again to Geiranger, but think there is a short ferry crossing involved.

So that’s it for this installment. Next up is Bergen and then Oslo at the end.

We are in Norway, spent night before last in Bodo (with some diacritical mark somewhere), largest significant Norwegian city north of the Arctic circle. We went to the Salmon Centre to learn about salmon farming — quite interesting, though by this point in whole tour I was in deep abiding pain, so hard to really, really appreciate — so I have just made a habit of eating salmon at every meal. Laird and others went to the Jekt trade museum and I and a couple of other people waited on the bus. On to our hotel — pretty long day on bus. But not like the next day!

So much for taking a rail trip! One rail was closed because of sinkhole, one was closed because of landslide and the other (the one I really wanted to go on), the Arctic Express, was closed for coming winter. I swear, the last thing I saw from tour company had the sentence “We will go on the Arctic Express.” One of the museums on our schedule had a sign on the door, CLOSED UNTIL JUNE 2026. Luckily, someone did come and open it for us. So much has already closed in both countries. We were on the bus for over 11 hours yesterday and trying to find “comfort stops” was a bit dicey a couple of times because of such closures. (TRAVEL TIP: do not go to northern countries after August). The tour had not expected to be all by coach (the only train we’ve been on is the one from Stockholm to Ostersund), so our tour manager, Deb (English), spent a lot of time trying to find open places.

But, finally, we got to our hotel in Stiklestad — if by train, we would have gone to Verdal and short bus transfer to Stiklestad hotel. YAY, finally, a hotel room that actually has room! It feels so luxurious not to keep bumping into wall-mounted TVs because of the tight fit between beds and them! Haven’t looked, but I should have bruises on my shoulders from the number of times I did that. Partly a problem of too little space, but also my nontrainability must be taken into account, I guess. Laird will be going on a tour this morning before we leave, but I just can’t make it. He will take pictures and tell me about it and I will be crushed that I didn’t see whatever there is to see.

So, Sweden was pretty, but Norway is gorgeous! Very dramatic, huge granite (we think — they could have countertops for the world if so) outcroppings and mountains, lots of tunnels through many of them, green, green, green — astounding shades of green. Grass is the most beautiful bright, bright green — we definitely do not have that color (or that grass) in NM! And Water! Jeez, it appears that everything in Sweden and Norway is on some kind of water, river or lake; we New Mexicans have never seen so much water — and a thousand or two waterfalls and cascades. Put Norway on your travel list if you are looking for beauty — we’ll tell you more about cities when we get to Trondheim and Oslo where we will have more than a couple of hours to spend in them.

The things I’m most cranked about: we did not get to see, and pet, reindeer because they were out looking for sex; and I could find NOTHING Sami (I’m using the i so you don’t think I’m typing same as same old) to buy, like clothes — I wanted to get Daniel and me some Sami something, but there was NOTHING. Norway has the largest population of Sami and we saw nothing of, about or done by them. Someone needs to have a talk with both countries’ tourism folks. Really, dreadful souvenirs. I would happily volunteer.

At our Stiklestad hotel there is an Outsider art show that is fantastic. I wanted so much to buy a couple of pieces, but what I took for prices were actually the artists’ birth years. And they are not for sale. Well, shit damn. So will try for a poster; even though I like it, it’s a sad substitute for the two pieces I wanted. What a bummer, the first thing I found that I really wanted. God, I hate being twarted!

Off to see about poster. Wish me luck.

Hello from the very cold north. We left Stockholm 3 days ago by train, all day to get to Oostersund, dinner, which I am sure was delicious but by now I don’t remember. Yesterday we started traveling by coach, the highlight being going to a Sami homestead on a lake — BTW, everything is on one or more lakes in Sweden; even living on the gulf of Mexico, I don’t feel like I’ve seen more water than there is in Sweden! Our guide, Lotta, is a small woman, definitely under 5′ and she had on green wellies that would fit a child. But she was funny and fun — assured us that they drove cars, lived in a house, used computers, slept in beds, etc. and then told us what life had been like when white Christians came to save the Sami — I saw on signs that they spell it Same, not Sami — it was the same story as for all Indigenous people. We have some Australians and one guy was saying that was how it was there and I said it was the same in US, even to the boarding schools and the beatings for speaking their language. Luckily, their language survived and is spoken today, even by school children. Lotta gave us the bad news that the reindeer weren’t around; it’s rutting season so they are off in the woods doing reindeer things. She and her husband have built several types of dwellings used by the Same by the river and gave us herbal tea that she assured would make us healthy and dried (but soft) reindeer and tiny little strips of dried (also sorta soft) pike — all was quite yummy. She took us into one dwelling that looked much like a hogan and told us about how life was lived in there. Her husband, whom she never named I don’t think, told us about herding. They have 2 alotments, one for winter and one for summer, only now they take the herd between them in trucks instead of herding them. After that we left and I can’t remember if we did anything else or just came to our next hotel, which we’ve been in for 2 days. While other folks were trying to squeeze into the elevator, Laird and I sat and had drinks — he a goldberry sour and I a forest gin — really good northern Swedish gin, really good tonic and whatever else, served with rosemary sprig and cucumber slices and peppercorns (I could do without the peppercorns, they just get stuck in the straw). We finally found our room; it took awhile because it is numbered 235 it’s on the elevator’s first floor (the European first floor — I thought only the British did that).

Today we went to the arctic circle, jumped, well hopped, over a bit of red rope and got our certificates. We did see a small reindeer group on the side of the road going and I later saw a young buck on our side of the bus. Then we went to Jokkmook (sp?) to a really good museum about the Sampi (another spelling) — they did a really great job, but too many explanations had other languages, but not English. Lunch in the museum cafe was excellent. Then we came back and I wrote this down. Oh, and we saw more reindeer on the way back. I really want a reindeer hide, but, alas, they are heavy. Maybe I’ll figure out a solution — or maybe not.

Tonight we are having dinner in what they call a teepee, but I’m sure that’s not really its name. So time to get ready. We are hoping to see northern lights tonight, if we can stay awake. It is damn cold here. Like really cold.

Dinner was great, salmon mousse, Swedish meatballs, roasted potatoes, lingonberries, cabbage salad, pickled cucumbers — and I skipped dessert to have a third salmon mousse.

Chances of seeing northern lights have plummeted — 95% if we were still above the arctic circle, but we aren’t; now saying it’s like a 3% likelihood here. Too cloudy where we are. Bummer!

Hello from the very cold north. We left Stockholm 3 days ago by train, all day to get to Oostersund, dinner, which I am sure was delicious but by now I don’t remember. Yesterday we started traveling by coach, the highlight being going to a Sami homestead on a lake — BTW, everything is on one or more lakes in Sweden; even living on the gulf of Mexico, I don’t feel like I’ve seen more water than there is in Sweden! Our guide, Lotta, is a small woman, definitely under 5′ and she had on green wellies that would fit a child. But she was funny and fun — assured us that they drove cars, lived in a house, used computers, slept in beds, etc. and then told us what life had been like when white Christians came to save the Sami — I saw on signs that they spell it Same, not Sami — it was the same story as for all Indigenous people. We have some Australians and one guy was saying that was how it was there and I said it was the same in US, even to the boarding schools and the beatings for speaking their language. Luckily, their language survived and is spoken today, even by school children. Lotta gave us the bad news that the reindeer weren’t around; it’s rutting season so they are off in the woods doing reindeer things. She and her husband have built several types of dwellings used by the Same by the river and gave us herbal tea that she assured would make us healthy and dried (but soft) reindeer and tiny little strips of dried (also sorta soft) pike — all was quite yummy. She took us into one dwelling that looked much like a hogan and told us about how life was lived in there. Her husband, whom she never named I don’t think, told us about herding. They have 2 alotments, one for winter and one for summer, only now they take the herd between them in trucks instead of herding them. After that we left and I can’t remember if we did anything else or just came to our next hotel, which we’ve been in for 2 days. While other folks were trying to squeeze into the elevator, Laird and I sat and had drinks — he a goldberry sour and I a forest gin — really good northern Swedish gin, really good tonic and whatever else, served with rosemary sprig and cucumber slices and peppercorns (I could do without the peppercorns, they just get stuck in the straw). We finally found our room; it took awhile because it is numbered 235 it’s on the elevator’s first floor (the European first floor — I thought only the British did that).

Today we went to the arctic circle, jumped, well hopped, over a bit of red rope and got our certificates. We did see a small reindeer group on the side of the road going and I later saw a young buck on our side of the bus. Then we went to some town, the name of which escapes me, to a really good museum about the Sampi (another spelling) — they did a really great job, but too many explanations had other languages, but not English. Lunch in the museum cafe was excellent. Then we came back and I wrote this down. Oh, and we saw more reindeer on the way back. I really want a reindeer hide, but, alas, they are heavy. Maybe I’ll figure out a solution — or maybe not.

Tonight we are having dinner in what they call a teepee, but I’m sure that’s not really its name. So time to get ready. We are hoping to see northern lights tonight, if we can stay awake. It is damn cold here. Like really cold.

So, I wrote last night — TWICE! — and could not face a third time. And somehow, my screen turned into split screen and I have no idea how to get it off. Does anyone reading this have an apple ipad? If so, please tell me how to get rid of split screen!!

Yesterday, we did the hop-on hop-off and today we did our tour’s tour of much of what we saw yesterday, so we have a prettty fair idea of the most popular parts of Stockholm — and at least our guide (a live person) today talked to us about things where they were — hop-on/off was very badly off-register. It was in Lisbon, too — think the company should figure out a way to fix that; there are always going to road work and traffic delays in cities, so they should have switches for the drivers to turn on or off the tour info, or something. Kinda wonder: how much good does it tell people up top to not stand up because of trolly wires or tunnels when bus hasn’t gotten to them yet?

Last night we met our group, 2 couples from Denver, some from midwest, 1 woman from Punta Gorda, Fla, 1 woman from Scotland whose luggage has not caught up with her yet, and 2 or 3 couples from Australia — I think we’re 22 or 24, all seem quite nice. The Denver folks and at least one Australian couple have been to Santa Fe, seduced by its beauty.

Stockholm, as you would imagine or have seen in real life or pictures, is a gorgeous city — it seems so liveable. . . .well except for how expensive it is. Food (restaurant or pub, which are the only places we’ve been) seems to be about what we in Santa Fe would pay — the first night expensive (after all, it was French), yesterday’s lunch in a pub was “normal”, or at least not shocking (and I think less about cost on vacation vs. home), but it felt normal SF). But I think rent is astronomical, if you can find someplace in the city and not in a suburb. Suburbs may be less, but get the feeling that housing is just damn expensive in the whole metro area.

We are on the train to somewhere tomorrow. But now, we are going for lunch and maybe shopping — have not reconnoitered shop prices yet; if it’s like rent, you Santa Fe folks may not be getting presents, not even another bag that you have no idea what to do with.

Well, that was pretty brutal! I had 4 hours of sleep on Tuesday, got up at 5:30 on Wed, made Laird get up at 6:00 and we STILL were rushing to get to the airport, even though we had packed day before. What IS that?!? We got into Stockholm this afternoon (Thurs) and to hotel — airport is about 35 or so miles from Stockholm, better than ABQ, tho that was no comfort. I don’t sleep on planes and my pain level was blowing thru the top of the scale, so snafus at almost every point of trip was fraught with things trying my patience, of which, as you all know, I have little in the first place. Took a short nap and then we went for dinner at a French restaurant in their central train station, across from hotel, though we first tried for a seafood restaurant, but no one came to seat us so we left and found Luzette. Food was delicious: oysters (3 of Laird’s 1/2 doz), pate maison (8 different kinds of pork — whatever those are), poached char with french white sauce whose name escapes me, or at least the spelling does, and trout roe scattered throughout — don’t you love that bite of, in this case, river , not sea, when you bite into them? With veggie medley to add to sauce and a dessert that I gave to Laird. He had a pasta with various mushrooms, which he enjoyed. 1 G&T and a sparkling pink grapefruit for each — artisanal, the label said. That’s everywhere on everything it seems. Is that true or is it just saying “we don’t sell a lot”? Our hotel is nice, one of a huge Swedish chain but it is where the tour meets up so convenient. However, they have lots of elevators but not all to all the floors AND you have to use your keycard if you’re in one that goes to your floor, which no one told us about. We still don’t know why the elevator that took us to our rooms, which does not require the use of keycards, took us to our room but wouldn’t take us back down to lobby. So many reasons to be a luddite.

Tomorrow hop-on hop-off before tour meets in late afternoon. Time for bed.

On Wednesday, Sept 17, we fly off to Helsinki, onward to Stockholm and hook up with others for a rail tour up Sweden, above the artic circle and down Norway to Oslo — 17 day tour, 1 extra day on either end and then home, where I am hoping the special session that began on Oct 1 will have been finished when I go back to work. Feel free to tag along!