I’d been more or less on the move for about a solid 36 hours. I left Copenhagen by bus to the tiny northern town of Hirtshals. From there, I caught an overnight ferry (that I had not splurged on for a bed – so I ‘slept in a narrow, rather hard chair. From Hirtshals, I eventually arrived in Bergen. After only one night in the town (mostly due to budget concerns and the fact that Norway put a rather large dent in my ’35€ a day’ budget), I joined up with the Norway in a Nutshell tour (if you’re in the area, do it!), with a scenic train to Voss, then a hair-raising, twisty bus ride to Gudvagen, and finally, a ferry ride through the narrow naeroyfjord and the massive aurlandsfjord. Finally, the ferry ended at a tiny town nestled at the end of a fjord-offshoot called Flam.
I decided to break up the trip here and splurge on the cheapest accommodation I could find in town; a 55€ bed in a 4-cabin beside a beautiful fresh stream.
(Cheese tasting in Undredal, and a fjord safari shoreline)
I spent the day on a speed boat, touring the nearby fjords, sampling goat cheese in a town with a 3-1 goat-to-people ratio, and meandering through the town. Around dinner time, I went back to the cabin to see if my roommates had arrived. I’d been told at reception that I would be sharing the room with three others.
I opened the door to find 5 Australians huddled onto one of the narrow bunk beds. One had a small rainbow Ukelele and they were passing around the largest bottle of beer I’d seen yet. Nightmare? Probably in most situations, yes. But they drew me into the group and we spent the next several hours alternating between making dinner out of our various stores (no grocery stores were to be found. We had stumbled on a small ‘honour system’ fridge stocked with cheese, sausage and milk, and we combined this with a variety of days old bread, Vegemite (ugh…never again…sorry Australians!), Nutella and of course, copious amounts of beer.), playing cards, making music, and making more friends.
Around midnight, the sky finally getting too dark to play cards, we decided to turn in. Before we went inside, two of the guys decided it would be fun to take a quick dip in the fjord. Blame group dynamics, peer pressured, alcohol-induced frivolity…but pretty soon the idea caught on. It was decided that the fjord was too far to go; being late at night, but that we were beside a lovely stream, and really, that was essentially the same thing.
And then the words that changed this from a regular story, to one bearing multiple repeats.
“Hey! Let’s make this something to remember. We’ve got to do this the old fashion way. Clothes off, make a run for it, and then back here. Last one back takes a shot of aquavit”. (A disturbingly popular, yet indescribly…unique tasting liqueur).
And we were off. 10 crazy tourists running from a cabin, trying desperately not to slip on rocks/grass/hills, then jumping and splashing into a freezing stream of a Norwegian fjord (meanwhile trying desperately not to scream/make too much noise and awaken the sleepy town), and then making a mad dash back to the cabin.
Several minutes later, we’d warmed up and half of the cabin returned to their own, leaving me with my three roommates.
Early the next morning, I continued on my travels, taking the famous Flam railway into Oslo.
While Norway was incredibly beautiful, it is probably the random night I spent at the end of the fjord that brings back the fondest memories I have of the country.
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