Bergen was swell, now for Oslo

The bus driver, Vitaly, told us that it rains every other day in Bergen. So, it rained on walking tour day. Not RAIN, just that annoying kind that you can’t really see and you keep telling yourself you aren’t getting wet. We were. Bergen is beautiful (of course, how not???) and the walking/busing tour was interesting. Our hotel was near the harbor and old town — though apparently old town for residents is much further away. I don’t understand any of that, but what we saw would have been even older if it hadn’t been for all the fires that happened in a town of wooden houses. The 1834 fire burned over 400 residences. Some neighborhoods were still old by US standards. Here’s something we learned: the rich people back then painted their houses white because it was the most expensive paint. The poor people painted their houses red because that was the cheapest paint. The rest of them painted them all the other colors, mustard yellow being a favorite. I love the architecture in Bergen — in most of Norway; it was less interesting the closer we got to Oslo, but by the time we got here, it was pitch black dark so can’t tell what it looks like here. We learned other stuff, but that’s all I can remember right now after a 2-hour bus ride back to Voss and then a 7-hour train ride to Oslo. Like almost all historic areas, there are lots of warren-like narrow streets and alleys and houses cheek by jowl or higgledy-piggledy. Very picturesque, but it would be living with five neighbors staring into your bedroom from five different directions.

Remember the Hanseatic League from history? It was in Bergen. 400 years, German traders. They had their own enclave, all men, no women. Make that all young men, no women. The red light district was born. Here’s a weird thing: in the winter, they could not have fires and they couldn’t cook where they lived, so they had to go some distance away to cook food and get warm. Why the hell they didn’t just move to where they could do those things was not explained. Or maybe it was, the guide was not always easy to hear or understand. Somebody google it and report back. They lived in an autonomous neighborhood, had their own church that only they went to and had quite a lot of political clout. Some of the cannons on the wall around the harbor did not point out to sea, but toward the hanseatic neighborhood.

After most of the tour, we decided to go to the fish market for lunch — OMG, it was so good! We both had fish soup — cod and salmon, carrots and leeks, creamy, with drizzle of chervil-tarragon oil (oh, THAT was so good!) — more delicate than our chowders. Laird had a mushroom and cheese open-faced sandwich (really, in a fish market?), but I had: whale carpaccio and shellfish symphony, langoustines, king crab, stone crab, shrimp and mussels. I was in seafood heaven! Yes, I shared some. We both had a recommended white that was pretty good. Needless to say, we did not have dinner.

That’s all I can remember now. Time for bed — amazing how much fatigue riding a train for 7 hours can be, particularly when it is a local that stops about every 20-30 minutes in every little community along the way. 16 stops on a 400Km route. The landscape continued to amaze. I believe that Norway beats even Ireland for number/amount/weight of: Rocks. Little rocks, big rocks. Boulders. Gigantic boulders. Mountains of just bare rock. The country doesn’t have much flat land — most of the room is taken up by rocks. If ever you want to see how growing and shrinking glaciers (estimate 20 to 40 cycles) carve gneiss country rock, come to Norway.