Most buildings in the little hamlet were lined along the shore, with a few nestled farther up the mountain. Many were painted a tidy white and roofed and what looked like gray slate, including the pretty church watching over the village. The slopes faded from the middle green hues of deciduous trees to darker conifers above, capped with treeless areas of stone and scree and snowy ridgelines.
Excerpt from Fiddling with Fate by Kathleen Ernst
A day of beauty, a day of surprises, a day of eating, a day filled with fond memories, a day to remember.
We sadly left the Hardanger Fjord and moved south and eastward to our eventual destination of Oslo. Along the way, we saw the beauty change from the calm water and springtime apple blossom of Hardanger to the steep, snowy peaks of Hardangervidda to the laden tree covered mountains of south central Norway. We saw new things like the shelter tunnels keeping the rocks and snow free from the roads, the grass-roofed bus stops, the road signs in the mountain passage with dots signifying left side of the road and stripes signifying the right side of the road. We learned of the large tunnel turbines that take the smoke and CO2 out of the tunnel and the springtime flowers of hviteveiss (white road) and blåveiss (blue road). All wildflowers in Norway can be picked except for the blåveiss.
Our first stop was at Låtefossen, which is a magnificent waterfall next to the road. While just seeing it a few weeks ago, it was a totally different experience today. First, the sun was behind the falls so it made photo-taking a tad more difficult. Second, was the water spray. Evidently a lot of snow has melted in this last week, and the falls was much more powerful and it created a water spray. Third, was hearing all the oohs and aahs of the participants. That was the BEST part! :)
Our guide surprised us by calling ahead to a restaurant up at the mountain pass to let them know of our arrival. There we found warm cinnamon, sugar, and cardamon boller (plural for bolle.) A bolle is a type of sweet roll. While prior to this trip, I’ve never tasted one, but have had several now on this trip. Today’s was the VERY best!
Onward we went towards the Dalen Hotel. The road needed to get there was the same road that Rebecca and I were supposed to have used to get to a folk museum earlier in the month. Lucky for the group, and for our bus driver, the road just opened yesterday. The hotel is one of the historic hotels in Norway and is considered haunted. The story goes that a young woman named Elizabeth Greenfield stayed there for several months, but had a still born child while there. The hotel staff found the child several days after Elizabeth departed. She was arrested and charged with murder but took her own life before the trial could begin. Today we saw the table that is set for her in the hotel’s restaurant. Our lunch was in an elegant room, and the staff all wore white gloves. When taking the plate, I said to one of the servers, “Takk for maten,” which means “thanks for the food” in Norwegian. The server said, “What?” I repeated more slowly, thinking I had said something wrong. Lo and behold, the woman was from Romania and didn’t speak Norwegian at all!
To get to the hotel we were staying for the night, sweet Per took a road that he had preferred not to take - one that had a steep elevation to it. But it would save an hour’s worth of travel time. While not fun for him, it certainly was for us for many on the bus saw a moose. Some saw two of them. It was quite an exciting time on the bus!
This was our last night that our guide and bus driver would be with us after dinner, so we had a little program for them. Many participants said some words, wrote a poem or a limerick. It was a touching time as we have all gotten quite close in a short amount of time. I saw more than one set of wet eyes in the group!
Tomorrow we arrive in Oslo and say good bye to Per and Kees. Then we’ll have a little time on our own before we fly home on Thursday.
