I have experienced Bergen again and it remains one of my favorite cities. I had a very uneventful flight over which is definitely a good thing. On the bright side, the young lady who sat next to me on the way over was also going to Vladivostok and taking the train across Siberia. It was like the first time I met someone else who wanted to do this.
The first day I just walked around town, especially in a nice residential section. I am intrigued afresh with the cute quaint houses each time I come. The stately wooden houses. The pastel colors. The absolute barrage of flowers climbing from every window box. The winding cobblestone streets. The stairs connecting the streets catered especially to the pedestrian population.
I stayed with my friends Numi and Sara who have a stately apartment on Nygårdsgaten. It’s a roomy place with a nice porch on the back to sit on and just down the street from the grocery store Rema1000 which I visited immediately. I love shopping at foreign grocery stores! On an interesting side note, Numi mentioned that a man with an ax broke into a convenience store next door while we were walking home.
The highlight was a hike that we did across the mountains. We hiked from Ulriken to Fløyen. Standing down in the city and looking at the peaks, it doesn’t look that terrible far. But it’s about 10 miles along the path and some of this is climbing up and down rock walls. Not to mention walking Ulriken and back down Fløyen.
It was a wonderful hike and miles of it was along semi flat plateaus with brilliant, soft, green grass and sheep scampering about. First you walk in the complete opposite direction that you really want to head and loop back around several other mountains. Along the way you see lots of deep blue lakes that look so inviting. But they are freezing cold! We packed sandwiches, coffee and water and had the most pleasant of times. I felt so incredibly fortunate to have a warm <<sunny>> day! On average it rains 231 days a year in Bergen.
As we approached Fløyen the sun was starting to go down. I found a beautiful spot on a cliff and stayed to watch the sun slide down while the others went on. I watched one of the most breathtaking sunsets of my life before darkness fell.
I packed up my gear and headed down the mountain, as I realized that it was getting dark, and I did not know the way back, nor did I know how far it was. That was also the moment I realized I forgot my head lamp and then I heard a wild animal scream. More adventure! All is well that ends well. Other than a 90 minute walk in the darkness and being stalked at length by a stranger, nothing happened. After about a mile of being followed in the darkness I stepped off to the side and pretended to be busy looking at the forest [in the darkness] while he stood 50 feet behind me. After a while he came forward and confessed he didn’t know the way to the city and had planned to follow me.
Another highlight was the evening I went fishing with Numi. He is a tall lanky guy who thrives in the outdoors. He has trekked all over Iceland and is a real outdoorsman. But there were no salmon infested-grizzly stalked rivers in Bergen so we went to the large pond in the city park and fished for trout. It was different. The tram ran past about 20 yards away. City busses churned up and down the streets. Curious passers-by discreetly stared. The fishing was great. The catching wasn’t quite as good.
And then there was National Waffle Day. To celebrate I went to Bergens über cool hipster Bar Barista Kafe and had their amazing waffles that were stuffed with brown cheese. Brown cheese is a delicacy in itself, and when stuffed into waffles it turns into a fiercely scrumptious food.
All good things come to an end though. I boarded the train for Oslo and headed on. The train ride between these is amazing. Miles and miles of tunnels. Glaciers. Raging mountain streams. Cascading waterfalls. And hundreds of stereotypical little red wooden houses. Ah, but it does one good to drink all this in.
jasonontheedge 