lairdandjonelle

It’s over, but there was still much to see that we didn’t get to. Our last day in Oslo, we went to the folk museum — really good museum, but it is laid out over several acres and we were unhappily in the rain tromping around and my back/hip/leg were not happy. What we saw was very interesting, but there was lots more we didn’t see. We tried to get a taxi twice, but when we pressed the number for English, nothing happened, so we tried for an uber, but I think no one wanted to drive to the museum from city centre or wherever they were — so we would get the text that someone was coming, but then they just fell off the map, so after several attempts, we went back to trying for taxi. After 2 more failed attempts at getting one, I stopped a guy leaving the museum (the woman in the museum shop was not only not helpful, but was condescendingly not helpful! I take it back about Norwegians being so nice and helpful) and he got hold of the taxi and the English number worked for him. By this time, I was taking every failure personally that the IT Gods were purposefully and malignantly interfering with attempts at getting us back to our hotel.

Finally back to our hotel, final packing, bedtime at 8 so we could get up at 3. Oslo to Helsinki, Helsinki to Dallas, Dallas to ABQ, ABQ to home. Ahhhhh. The month had changed from when we went out, so at least there were some new movie choices. In both flights, I watched some very lovely small movies (meaning not blockbusters or action movies), but I don’t remember the titles by now.

Finnair is a nice airline if you’re going wherever they fly. It’s a partner with American, which we flew to Dallas and back. Qatar is still my favorite though, and Turkish air. I used to like South Africa air, but haven’t traveled on it since they almost went broke and it was too worrisome to try them — we flew Delta instead and what I loved most about it was that they cleaned and restocked the bathrooms during the night (it’s the not-so-small things, y’all!)

Thanks for reading our trip — hope you get to travel somewhere you’ve wanted to go soon and have a great time at it — Happy Trails, Jonelle & Laird

Let’s see — I just kind of accidentally fall into the pics, so who knows what will be.

Did you see the Hulder? This is long, but I took out at least a couple of hundred and didn’t even put in a couple hundred more — so y’all might be subjected to LOTS of pictures. But they don’t tell the true majesty of the landscape — our phones can’t do what Laird’s cameras did, but phone in the pocket is a lot easier to carry around. Most of these were from bus or train.. Oslo pics will just have to wait until we get home, I suspect. Norway was Brodo, Trondheim, Geiranger, Bergen and a couple of other places we stayed. Today was last tour day, goodbye dinner tonight; tomorrow is our last day in Norway, we fly on Monday and should be home Monday night.

So, let’s see if we can do this.

Well, hell, this is hard — I can’t get back to pics, so this may be the only one for now. And this is Norway — I was trying to put in Sweden, but other than the Sami, there isn’t anything striking about Sweden. I’ll try for those.

A couple of other pics, too. It was COLD the day we went to the Sami exhibit or whatever to call it. I’m with Lotte.

Here’s more pics from earlier in the trip

Sea troll

Sea troll is the first one of this series, I think — the one that looks like he’s in water anyway.

The newest museum in Bergen, the troll museum, was fantastic — everything you ever wanted to know about trolls, hulders, neisse and other critters in folklore. You learn that trolls are huge guys, with tails and 1-3 or 4 heads (think I already told you some of this) — they are definitely meat eaters, including sheep, cows and…humans. They particularly like young women, but that is a tale that can get ickky pretty quickly. They only come out at night because the sun makes them explode and turn into rock — so just think about what I had to say about all the rocks in Norway…. In one room, an oldfashioned living room with a TV from the early 50s, there is a troll outside the picture window looking for a way in — very noisy about his frustration. There are different types of Neisse (I think that is the spelling), there are house ones and barn ones and whatever else. They are very helpful to their owners who are kind to them and they look forward to their christmas present they get each year. One story has a very eager barn neisse that takes care of the horses, and does all the work of feeding, watering, unhitching them from the buggies back from trips to town and putting them up for the night. He was so good and so eager to please that come christmas time, the farmer got him a present of leather pants, which he gave him with much fanfare. The neisse was ecstatic with his new pants! He put them on and didn’t take them off. The farmer and his family went to church on christmas day and when they got back, the farmer just dropped the reins and everyone went into the house as usual. Much, much later, the farmer looked out and saw the horses still standing there in the dooryard, still hitched to the buggy. Out the farmer came, stomping angrily towards the barn, yelling for the neisse, who was standing in the door in lhis new leather pants, smiling up at the moon. “Why have you not put up the horses?! Cried the farmer. The neisse just stood there with his fingers in the belt loops of his new leather pants, smiling. “What”, he replied, “and ruin my new pants?”

Oh, but the hulders. They sing like Loralei, enticing people who are never seen again. We actually saw a hulder on the train trip to Voss — first the beautiful singing and then the hulder dancing behind the boulders, long blonde hair and red cape streaming in the breeze, with the haunting music enthalling us. We could not look away. Luckily, the train kept on and no one tried to jump off. In the troll musuem, one story has it that the hulders are the children of Lilith — if you don’t know the ancient story of Lilith, get my book, Cruisin’ Passion Boulevard (on Amazon) and read A Hell of a Woman (shameless plug, I know). But here in the north, the tale is different, much influenced by christianity so that her children were hulders and very evil — they had not been evil in the earlier northern stories. Interesting, huh?

So now we are going to try to post pictures. Wish us luck.

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.

Let’s see — where were we and where did we go? I feel like one of the many, many sheep we see in the fields — waiting for the dog to come to tell me where to go next: you, go there now! With or without luggage depending on time of day. It is hard not having a memory. Our fabulous tour manager, Deb, is a wonder — we were very lucky to get her; this is her first trip on this tour, but she does astounding in=depth research on everything. She says she probably won’t sign up for it again. — she’s looking at Asia next.

On Sunday night we finally saw the northern lights — not the most spectacular, but still, we saw them and were thrilled. We got a whatsap from Deb and sprang from our beds, put on shoes and coats and hied it outdoors. We were with a group of Taiwanese and their excited chatter sounded like being in a very close but full aviary.

Monday, we took the ferry, about an hour, to Hellesvlt and then on the bus for more slack-jawed awe as we traveled (a long way) through mountains and up another hairpinny road to skywalk — it was bitterly cold as we exited the bus, felt like 40 below with the meanest wind trying to blow us off the platform! We worried about a little dog whose owner kept dragging it nearer the edge, which it, smartly, did not want to get anywhere near. If she had lost hold of the leash, I am sure the wind would have picked it up and hurled it into space. Going down, another time that was not a picnic. There were lots of places like that all over the place. Luckily, well sorta, was going back down into Geiranger we took a slightly less heart attack road than the original one.

We were really lucky to go to skywalk — it had been closed the day before because of snow and turned out it was closed the day after we were there for whatever reason. It was breathtaking — kind of grand canyon awe, but wider.

I feel like I am on beauty overload — there really is nothing that is less staggeringly beautiful than what came before or will come after — true, every turn of the tires. Laird used up his phone battery on pics then took mine — we’ll probably never be able to identify where any of them are from, and they can’t capture what it really feels like to be in all that beauty.

Trauma bonding has become our group’s catch word. From not getting the trains we were promised to two of us old ladies falling (I was pushed! I blame in on the train, not my ineptitude!).

After 2 nights in Geiranger (ghear-anger, sort of), we got on the bus to Flam (accent mark, of course, the little empty circle above the a). Stopped at 12th century Kaupanger Stave Church — gorgeous, and our guide, whose name was Judith, pronounced Yudith, sang for us; she was quite wonderful, even though I couldn’t really hear what she had to say, or sing, either. Then on to a christmas shop. The shop owner was very funny and sure loved to laugh. I still want a reindeer rug, but no one will ship to the US. We took another ferry to Flam and had a nice hotel.

I do think we might have lucked out with not having several of the trains we were supposed to take because I think we saw lots more of Norway, and Sweden, than we would have otherwise seen. But today, we took two trains after going for a two-hour cruise on two fjords — more spectacularness, of course. Back to Flam and then trains that were supposed to be to Bergen, but weren’t because of some landslide or something. Back on the bus at Voss (kinda wonder why the train if the bus had to meet us in Voss, but oh well) and we went through 33 tunnels to get to Bergen. Yesterday, we went through the Laerdal tunnel, which is the longest road tunnel in the world and 24.5 kilometers — 15 miles for us Americans. Took 21 minutes. Before that, we had like an 11 kilometer tunnel as the “pretunnel”. In the Laerdal, to keep drivers awake and attentive, they vary the intensity of the lights and in the middle, there are lights washing the sides of the tunnel that look like the northern lights.

In Bergen, Laird and I walked down to a shopping center to buy replacement suitcases for me — both of mine had screwed up handles. The new ones are a godawful mint green, but they were cheaper than others and on sale to boot (though still an unwanted expense). I will just have to suck it up and not mind that anyone looking at them will be thinking “god, all that woman’s taste is in her mouth!” And other derogatory musings. My only defense is that the other color was very Barbie pink. We brought them back to hotel and went out again for a very lovely dinner with another passenger, from Scotland. I had venison with chanterelles and brussels sprouts, with roasted potatoes, and Laird had monkfish in lobster sauce with something green. Oh, and I had two orders of oysters in a most amazing sauce, green and delicious. Alas, an order is 2 oysters — isn’t that just ridiculous?!? I gave Laird 1. We shared coconut mousse and homemade raspberry-like dessert — I’m a coconut slut and this was delish! Local pink gin and tonic. Now, time for bed. Tomorrow a tour of Old Town and the Hanseatic League warehouses, etc.

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!

We’re back home and (mostly) rested up. Laird is preparing photos — I will try to limit the number we post — and I want to talk about our last, greatest meal at Ballymaloe House, a country manor and estate, now an inn and the restaurant, and farm, that inspired Ireland’s food renaissance. First we went to tour the Jameson distillery, actually very interesting and I got a bung for a souvenir. But we are definitely not Irish whiskey folks — though our free Jameson’s, ginger ale and lemon was mighty fine (not that I see a lot of point to buying very expensive whiskey and mixing it). But, oh, my, Ballymaloe — google it — a 5-star YUM! for a 5-course dinner: first course, I had chilled Lebanese cucumber soup and Laird had Galia melon, pomegranate, grape and lemon verbena cocktail and a garden leaf salad; for second course, Ballymaloe hors d’ oeuvres, we were taken into another room with a two-tiered table set with a feast of choices, and I don’t remember what we had, but let’s just say that our little plates were full with trying almost everything on offer! These courses were served with the most delicious white wine in memory — and I am not usually a white wine woman. For entree, Laird had pan-seared west Cork scallops, fennel puree, red pepper, caper & chervil salsa and runner beans. I had Ballycotton John Dory (a fish), grenoble butter, spinach and romano beans. I should have stuck with the white, as proper, but I wanted to taste the red and it was magnificent. This course was served with Kingston’s organic potatoes with savory butter for the table. Next was the cheese course — Irish cheeses served with Membrillo and Ballymaloe cheese biscuits. And then came the Ballymaloe sweet trolley. Just as it says, a wheeled cart filled with desserts, mostly chocolate, which was lucky for me because I was stuffed and I can pass up chocolate. Laird cannot. Everything was beautifully prepared and presented and came with exquisite mouth pleasure. This whole trip was eating amazing food and meeting some of the people who produce Ireland’s food. I’m telling you, you really need to look at going on one (or more) of Kris’ culinary tours! She finds the very best of whatever it is on offer. And, yay, I have reconsidered and think I might have a poem from the trip! We’ll post pics soon — thanks for joining our adventure

We’re all dressed up, ready for high tea, Jameson’s and Ballymaloe. This means that I have worn almost all the clothes I packed and hauled around Ireland — YAY! I keep swearing I will pack less, and, actually, I think I did, but there is still a vast amount of room for travel improvement. Oh to be one of those people who pack everything in a carryon! Two posts below.

Next day (Wed 9/13) , we had our last great breakfast — Kris, wonderful chef and travel planner extraordinaire, made us gorgeous b’fasts every morning and what she called “snacks” and I called dinner every evening (with fantastic wine, of course). One last huge, heartfelt hug with my friend Judyth, our poetry guru, before she left to taxi to airport. We all dragged our suitcases outside and Dave, our lovely driver, loaded them and us and we waved a sad goodbye to the Manor. And to the sunny weather we had mostly been having. After dropping off folks at train station, our smaller band of five looked ahead to more of the Burren and Cork. The farm I told you about above, is a 500 acre beef farm that has three archaeological national monuments. Cathal and Rona were lovely people — like all the folks we interacted with — excited to tell us about their farm and what they do and how they do it. We rode around to a couple of spots, one of the monuments, which they use for weddings sometimes — but, the rain dampened our desire for tramping around. On the road again, we toured a woolen mill (really a weaving shop), VERY interesting, and stopped at a chocolate factory, but that day was a chocolate packaging day so we didn’t get a tour, though we did get some chocolate. We arrived in Cork after a very long trip and later than expected — rain and time-on-van did not encourage the use of “free evening” time. Ramona, Marti, Laird and I just went into the bar for light dinner (mussels and soup for me, and Irish gin, of course. Laird ordered the mushroom croquettes, but had to relinquish the last plate of them to Marti and ordered somewhat indifferent “prawns””) and hit the lovely beds.

Up and at’em next morning to drive to Kinsale, the gourmet (gormand?) capital of Ireland (Cork is known as the culinary capital of Ireland) First stop, a fairly well-maintained ruin of Fort George (most walls remain, but no roofs except for exhibition building and a couple others), a 17th century star-shaped military fort on the headland into the Kinsale harbor — Fort James is on the other side. It was built on the ruins of earlier fortifications and was one of the largest military forts in the country, built in 1677-1682. Our driver said something about the Jacobite rebellion (mostly Scotland, but Ireland supported and sent fighters to France, which also supported (how not, given France’s inclination against England?)). It also played a role in  the Williamite War in 1690 and the Irish Civil War of 1922-23. Charles Fort remained garrisoned by the British army until 1922. Gorgeous location!

Ohhh, Kinsale, what a beautiful town, narrow windy streets. Sometime in recent memory, the city wanted to spruce up things so it gave away paint to shop and home owners, so buildingscapes are very colorful. We met with Valerie, our guide for a walking tour; first stop, to get an Irish coffee. We stopped at a yummy bakery and had samples of their breads and then went to Fishy Fishy, famous Kinsale restaurant, which might have been started by the chef who started the whole food scene circa 1999. Seafood platters for everyone! Sea vegetable salad (or I think it was; it might just have been land salad), the yummiest fish pie (I wanted more of that!), indifferent sushi (Japanese would have been appalled by the gummy rice), salmon (always good in Ireland, I believe) an oyster and somethings I don’t remember. Luckily, the van was near at hand and we loaded up and started back to Cork. But one more stop, a mead distillery. That was very interesting and nothing like what I drank once a fair while ago that was sold as mead. We had a honey tasting and then went through the steps of making mead and ended with a mead tasting. I have the card of a distributor that ships to US, so I might get some. We tasted four, two reds and two whites — their color comes from the oak wine casks they are finished in (merlot for reds and sauterne for white). We tasted Kinsale Wild Red, our favorite; Hazy Summer, also a red; Atlantic dry and Irish Wildflower, the whites. The problem with mead is that it doesn’t last long; once opened, it goes off a bit after a few days — he said like wine, but I cork and keep red wine for much longer than he talked about, so I don’t know. Obviously, it’s a bit expensive because they have to buy honey (all from Spain except Irish wildflower (my choice of whites, I think), which comes from Ireland and is made in very small batches) — and, for me, it would never take the place of wine or gin, so I’d have a couple of small glasses, share with whoever was around at the time and that would be all I’d be interested in. But, still, I might order some because he was a lovely man. He and his wife lived in ABQ for awhile; he didn’t say why — one of his daughters was born there.

Raining too much and too much walking so we all agreed to skip walking around the ruins of Tiimoleague Abbey — and, really, once you see Kylemore Abbey, why tromp wetly around another?

Laird will tell you about the walking tour of Cork — I stayed back because my body is pretty wrecked and I have started dreading the loooong bus ride to Dublin and the plane ride back to Dallas and home. But soon, we’re going to high tea and then to Jameson distillery and our last, our farewell Ireland, dinner at Ballymaloe, the farm and restaurant that inspired Ireland’s food renaissance. I’ll write about when we get back home.

Laird: I very much enjoyed the perspective and enthusiasm of Kerry, our walking tour guide. She is a visual artist who takes gigs as a tour guide. We did meet up with a dustbin removal worker (we know these fellows in the states as a garbageman) who identified himself as a visual artist specializing in building and landscape views of Cork and quickly shared his facebook page. I think I might like to look at some of his stuff. My photos are quite disappointing for two reasons: flat, gray skies so no shadows or highlights; and an incredible profusion of cars, people and overhead wires. I may have some pics I can work with in software. If so, I’ll mount them on this blog.

Overall impression is that Ireland is well on its way to transform the economy and will soar up the per-cap income comparisons. There is a very apparent entrepreneurial energy everywhere you look. Many of the people we have met have transitioned from employee status to entrepreneur. We may be cherry-picking, but I think this perception is real.

Me: I am inserting an advertisement here: Go google deliciousexpeditions.com — this is Kris Rudolph’s website and she does AMAZING, AMAZING culinary tours, some of which she combines with Judyth Hill’s poetry workshops (google eatwritetravel.com). This is the third one I’ve done, two in Slovenia and one here in Ireland — and I have also done a couple in Taos that are writing retreats with Judyth, with activities planned by Kris on off-writing times. I so very badly want to go to France, Basque country, Venice and Croatia with Kris! You cannot go wrong with any of the tours Kris does — and if you are or want to be a writer, you can’t go wrong with workshops or retreats with Judyth. Absolutely the best, both of them!

Have I told you about the Burren? Our next couple of days was all about the Burren. Limestone, limestone, limestone — no longer just a million rocks in every field turned into thousands of walls, but a million rocks PLUS. The Burren is a karst/glaciokarst landscape on the west coast of Ireland, part of the Wild Atlantic Way. The major habitats in the Burren are limestone pavements, orchid-rich calcareous grasslands, limestone heaths, scrub and woodlands, wet grasslands, turloughs (seasonal lakes), calcareous springs and fens. The limestone pavement is cut through everywhere with what I think our guide told us were “crikes”. And there are glacial erratics scattered all about. It has both artic-alpine and mediterrean plants, including gentian, lots of orchid types, maidenhead ferns. The whole area is a national park, with private farms (the few that still exist) in it. Farming plays a vital role in maintaining the Burren and without farmers the Burren as the Irish know it would cease to exist. Grazing cattle on the winterages ensures that the species-rich grass is grazed down to give the unique range of flora the opportunity to bloom each year. The EU tried buying up all the farmland and disallowed cattle on the winterages, which almost destroyed the Burren. At last, they came to their senses and reversed the grazing rule. But they still want to buy up all the farms in the area. We went to a cattle farm that father and now son have refused to sell. The first farmers on the Burren were early Neolithic (stone age, around 6,000 years ago)– they know they were there, but not much about how or what they did regarding farming — seems to have been small scale and transient; sporadic clearances, followed by abandonment and subsequent regeneration of woody vegetation. The cliffs of Moher are part of the Burren.

Our first excursion to the Burren was to watch sheep dogs work. They are trained to the whistle, but I noticed that the man also seemed to use hand signals. They all know their unique whistle names. I have a weird sensory thing, basically auditory hallucinations, so to me, some of the whistling translated into words — particularly when the same sounds were being repeated. There were three dogs showing off and one older dog who wanted to participate but was too slow to herd, but she watched with keen interest. One dog, about three, is still in training — she was so funny. She would frequently stop and turn to look at the man, like “what did you say?” He called her lazy, said she tried to get away with not doing the proper methods. He was having none of it and would make her do the maneuver correctly. Word to the wise: if you’re lazy, do it right the first time so you don’t have to work harder by having to repeat the exercise.

We all loved that and could have stood there watching them for longer than the demonstration. I was really sorry we didn’t get to pet them. Laird and I feel dog-deprived and want to pet everyone we see (well, not those little “Old Lady dogs” that are ubiquitous whether traveling or staying home).

Next, we went on the limestone pavement to the portal dolmen of Poulnabrone, a tomb built sometime between 4,200 BC and 2,900 BC. They are standing stones with a huge, heavy capstone — a marvel that, in a way far back time before heavy machinery, or even the wheel?, humans were smart enough to be able to erect such large boulders into place. Alas, we couldn’t go in or even get very close to it (it was roped off — probably a good thing considering how whacko stupid tourists are being these days, with carving their names in ancient edifices, bathing in centuries old fountains and breaking penises off statues.)

On to cliffs of Moher — it is as breathtaking as you imagine, though I think the view would be even more spectacular on the water.

On to somewhere for lunch; the restaurant was called Linnanes. Right on the bay, we ate prawns, scallops, crab, mussels and I’m sure I’ve forgotten something that was on the trays. Each tray had one oyster, but I was luckily gifted the one on the tray in front of me — it was the best I had in Ireland! Supposedly, according to the itinerary there were amazing desserts, but I don’t have any memory of sweets. Back home to Lisdonaugh Manor, our last night, which meant facing the horror of packing.

Well, we’re not in Dublin anymore. Since I’m so late writing this, we’ve seen three or four or five castles, starting with Drimmagh castle, a 13th century Norman castle still in Dublin, I believe. Actually, quite interesting and our guide was lovely. Then we traveled and traveled. We’re in a Mercedes small bus, basically big enough for all of us to have our own row. In Kildare, we went to St. Brigid’s Cathedral, which is on the site of the Celtic Christian abbey founded by her in the 5th century. Beautiful and interesting, but the story of Brigit to Brigid is the story of Catholicism taking over the Goddess — I have a particular dislike of St. Patrick, because his story is the story of the church destroying the Goddess (his driving the snakes out of Ireland). After a fabulous lunch of myriad Irish dishes, we drove to Kilronan castle where we stayed overnight. Google it — the height of luxury, just yummy; gorgeous grounds, beautiful rooms, great dinner. I sure wish I had booked a spa treatment!

Up Saturday morning and back in the van for county Galway. Went to an oyster farm on Clew Bay, and then, oh, the eating of oysters! And the cakes and scones and more oysters. . . and about 45 minutes after that feast, we went to lunch. Of course we ate more! No one is surprised about that are you??? Then a tour of Velvet Cloud sheep farm, with — what else — more food! We tasted their sheep cheese and yogurt (the BEST yogurt!). My highlight was feeding the sheep — they were quite shy, but came running when our host poured some pellets on the ground; he gave me some in my hands and after a lot of hesitation, a couple of brave ones ate out of my hand, so softly delicate their mouths. More riding around Ireland (no direct route to destination because of various road closures) and we arrived late to Lisdonaugh Manor, where we’re staying for four nights. We have the whole manor house to ourselves and it is lovely, lovely. 9 bedrooms, drawing room, library, great kitchen, downstairs “den” — very swell! And now I have to go to class.

Our first evening at the manor, three women friends of Kris’ came from Cork to stay overnight. OMG, they were funny — I haven’t laughed so hard in awhile, tears-streaming-down-the-face laughter. And they know every Broadway song and practically any other genre of song — wow! What a fantastic night that was! Louise did a performance for us as a nun that was hysterical.

On Sunday, we went to an abalone farm to learn about them, but most especially, about seaweed and its deliciousness. Salad, something else, and seaweed spaghetti. And a seaweed cookie, too. The dishes were so delicious — the most amazing, though, that they really need to figure out how to make commercially was sea lettuce chips (basically tempura’d). Oh my god, so addictive — we demolished a big basket in no time at all and kept hinting for more, but to no avail. Then off to Kylemore Abbey, a Victorian castle that is now home to chocolate-making nuns — full habited Benedictines, though it was Sunday so we didn’t see any of them, alas. We also didn’t have time to tour their gardens and greenhouses. They make the sexiest chocolates! one with gin and something, one with an Irish cream liqueur that they make (better than Bailey’s!). The house was wonderful — originally 70 rooms, 30 of them bedrooms (my kind of house!), after the original owners, a duke and American heiress duchess bought it, then the nuns came from Belgium at the beginning of WW1 and bought it, took out a mortgage — I forgot to ask how much they paid or what the monthly payments were. They started a girl’s school and they were not the cliched Horrible Nuns; isn’t that great? Fire in the 1950s, so they closed the school. Currently there are 14 nuns, but Benedictines travel around a lot, so they get nuns from other houses for awhile. They are a semi-contemplative order, but they do talk. As I understand it. P.S., all these places, you should google them! It is the most beautiful place imaginable — the castle, the setting. . . makes me want to be a nun. But, their motto is work and pray — not really my thing, I think. This night, we had a Seamus, a storyteller, to entertain us. He was quite good, but his voice was soft, so I missed a whole lot of the stories.

Dublin was HOT, the west was cooler, but still sunny and warm. Today, it rained. Really rained, not that “Irish mist” kind of rain. And turned kinda chilly. We went to yet another castle, this one 16th century, and visited Brigit’s Celtic Garden, laid out on the Celtic calendar — even in the rain, it was lovely and fragrant (Ramona told me that part; I lost my sense of smell in menopause). On to Galway City for, yes, another meal: lunch. As usual, family style with several courses — chicken, salmon, beef, potatoes (of course potatoes, three or four different ways) and a frangipani pistachio tart with the most amazing whipped cream I’ve ever had. We walked around, but gloom and rain didn’t really inspire Laird and me to do much, so we whiled away time in a pub before the van came to pick us up. Home for class and dinner (Kris keeps saying it’s just snacks) of salad, cheeses, olives, crackers, salmon, yogurt, salami, bread and delicious wine. Some of us hung around and talked about ghosts, ouija boards and other paranormal stuff, because why not scare ourselves in an Irish Georgian country manor house??? No writing, but a fun time anyway.