To give you an idea how far apart these cities and towns are, by train it takes 6.5 to 7 hours to go west from Oslo to Arna, and 4 hours to go south from Oslo to Göteborg.
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Where I've been..
Here's a map of Norway and Sweden, with the big green dots indicating where I have visited, and pink names being the names of those places.
Saturday, November 13, 2010
This and that... and a snowy trip to Sweden
I have a whole bunch of stuff to talk about, but there's really no link between any of it, besides having fun, exploring new places, and trying to learn a new language. Sooo, I guess I'll just start where I left off.
At the end of my last post, I was in Arendal, on the south coast of Norway, then for a week I was in Oslo, the capital. Oslo is the coolest city I've ever been in. It is super easy to get around, either by walking or taking one of the many methods of public transportation, including buses, trams, and the T-bane (subway). The city itself is in a fairly small area at the end of Oslofjorden, right on the water, so it takes no time at all to walk to the city center from anywhere. I walked through 2 parks on the 40 minute walk to downtown on one of my first days here, one of them being the location of the monarch's castle. (Quick note: the Queen's name is Sonja, no big deal :) )
In Oslo, I was staying with another of my dad's cousins, Kristin, and her family. Her husband, Simon, is English, and they speak a mix of Norwegian and English at home, sometimes literally switching languages in the middle of a sentence. This makes it a bit difficult for me to learn Norwegian, but I find I'm able to understand more and more of the Norwegian conversation every day. I don't really speak it that much, since it's not really necessary, but I can usually follow the general idea of most conversations, which I'm quite happy about :) (That was a bit vague: usually, general, most...)
On Monday, my last day in Oslo, I checked out the site of the 2011 Oslo Nordic World Ski Championships, to be held next February and March: Holmenkollen, and the Holmenkollen ski jump, which has hosted competitions since 1892. They are still doing a ton of construction in preparation for the championships, so it was hard to get close to it, but this will give you an idea of the size of the jump:
After visiting the ski jump, I wandered around the Vigeland Sculpture Park, a 5 minutes walk from where I'm staying. The park contains 212 bronze and granite sculptures created by Gustav Vigeland, who personally sculpted every figure out of clay.
On Tuesday, I went to Sweden. It turned out that my Eurail Norway Pass also includes access to a few Swedish cities near the border, so I went to one on the west coast of Sweden called Göteburg. It took me 4 hours to get there by train, and I arrived into a full on blizzard: snow blowing sideways in huge gusts of wind. That wasn't going to stop me from seeing the city though. I stopped at a tourist information booth on my way out of the station, and the very nice lady there told me what I should see in the one day I was spending there. I spent the next 4 hours or so walking around the main streets of Göteburg, with a bit of a break inside looking around the city museum. I barely noticed that I wasn't in Norway, as the language looks fairly similar, and, well, Sweden isn't overly different from Norway. The two things that I noticed about the city was the beautiful architecture of the old buildings lining the streets, and the dozens of cafés everywhere you look. These are the wooden houses of the Haga district of Göteborg, where the working class lived.
I spent the night at a youth hostel, then took the early morning train back to Norway, and up to Løten, near where I started my travels in Norway. I stayed on a potato farm there, with another of my dad's cousins, Bjarne, and his wife, Frøydis. Spent the first day relaxing and enjoying not sitting on a train for 7 hours straight. In the afternoon Frøydis took me to the Løten Lys, aka the Løten candle factory.
The next day though, I got to relive my long train day by traveling up to Røros, a small town 3 hours north of Løten. Røros is known for its copper mines and its authentic, one- and two- storey wooden houses, which give the town a medieval appearance and caused it to be added to the UNESCO World Heritage Site list in 1980.
I wandered around the streets for a couple hours, peeking in the stores, and checking out the museum, then took the train back to Løten. Now, I am in Hamar for my last weekend in Norway, staying with Olav and Bente, the people I stayed with when I first arrived here.
Today, Olav, Bente and I drove up to Lillehammer, the location of the 1994 Winter Olympics, to sight see. We walked along the famous Lillehammer pedestrian main street with tons of shops lining it, then went to the Norwegian Olympic Museum, which is the only museum in northern Europe where the entire history of the Olympic Games, from 776 BC to now, is told. I'm not really sure what they're going to do in 2012, because there wasn't anymore space...
Well that is plenty long enough, and since Lauren has been heckling me to get a new post up: Lauren, here you go!
-Sonja
At the end of my last post, I was in Arendal, on the south coast of Norway, then for a week I was in Oslo, the capital. Oslo is the coolest city I've ever been in. It is super easy to get around, either by walking or taking one of the many methods of public transportation, including buses, trams, and the T-bane (subway). The city itself is in a fairly small area at the end of Oslofjorden, right on the water, so it takes no time at all to walk to the city center from anywhere. I walked through 2 parks on the 40 minute walk to downtown on one of my first days here, one of them being the location of the monarch's castle. (Quick note: the Queen's name is Sonja, no big deal :) )
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| Home of the King and Queen of Norway |
In Oslo, I was staying with another of my dad's cousins, Kristin, and her family. Her husband, Simon, is English, and they speak a mix of Norwegian and English at home, sometimes literally switching languages in the middle of a sentence. This makes it a bit difficult for me to learn Norwegian, but I find I'm able to understand more and more of the Norwegian conversation every day. I don't really speak it that much, since it's not really necessary, but I can usually follow the general idea of most conversations, which I'm quite happy about :) (That was a bit vague: usually, general, most...)
 |
| Looking out towards the islands from the boardwalk along Oslo's waterfront |
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| Represent. |
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| Holmenkollen ski jump. Capacity: 50 000 people. |
After visiting the ski jump, I wandered around the Vigeland Sculpture Park, a 5 minutes walk from where I'm staying. The park contains 212 bronze and granite sculptures created by Gustav Vigeland, who personally sculpted every figure out of clay.
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| One of the more popular sculptures, the 'Angry Boy' |
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| The Monolith: this took 3 stone carvers 14 years to accomplish. 14 meters high, and covered in 121 human figures. |
On Tuesday, I went to Sweden. It turned out that my Eurail Norway Pass also includes access to a few Swedish cities near the border, so I went to one on the west coast of Sweden called Göteburg. It took me 4 hours to get there by train, and I arrived into a full on blizzard: snow blowing sideways in huge gusts of wind. That wasn't going to stop me from seeing the city though. I stopped at a tourist information booth on my way out of the station, and the very nice lady there told me what I should see in the one day I was spending there. I spent the next 4 hours or so walking around the main streets of Göteburg, with a bit of a break inside looking around the city museum. I barely noticed that I wasn't in Norway, as the language looks fairly similar, and, well, Sweden isn't overly different from Norway. The two things that I noticed about the city was the beautiful architecture of the old buildings lining the streets, and the dozens of cafés everywhere you look. These are the wooden houses of the Haga district of Göteborg, where the working class lived.
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| Haga is renowned for its picturesque wooden houses, 19th century-atmosphere and cafes |
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| Many buildings in the old part of the city were built along canals |
I spent the night at a youth hostel, then took the early morning train back to Norway, and up to Løten, near where I started my travels in Norway. I stayed on a potato farm there, with another of my dad's cousins, Bjarne, and his wife, Frøydis. Spent the first day relaxing and enjoying not sitting on a train for 7 hours straight. In the afternoon Frøydis took me to the Løten Lys, aka the Løten candle factory.
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| Real? Or made of wax? |
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| Yum |
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| So pretty |
The next day though, I got to relive my long train day by traveling up to Røros, a small town 3 hours north of Løten. Røros is known for its copper mines and its authentic, one- and two- storey wooden houses, which give the town a medieval appearance and caused it to be added to the UNESCO World Heritage Site list in 1980.
 |
| A street in Røros |
I wandered around the streets for a couple hours, peeking in the stores, and checking out the museum, then took the train back to Løten. Now, I am in Hamar for my last weekend in Norway, staying with Olav and Bente, the people I stayed with when I first arrived here.
Today, Olav, Bente and I drove up to Lillehammer, the location of the 1994 Winter Olympics, to sight see. We walked along the famous Lillehammer pedestrian main street with tons of shops lining it, then went to the Norwegian Olympic Museum, which is the only museum in northern Europe where the entire history of the Olympic Games, from 776 BC to now, is told. I'm not really sure what they're going to do in 2012, because there wasn't anymore space...
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| This wasn't in the museum, but in the arena above the museum. In the opening ceremonies of the Lillehammer Olympics, this giant egg opened up and released hundreds of balloon doves into the sky. |
Well that is plenty long enough, and since Lauren has been heckling me to get a new post up: Lauren, here you go!
The next time I write here, I will mostly likely be in Switzerland! My flight is set for Monday.
Can't wait! :)
-Sonja
Friday, October 29, 2010
Velkommen!
First blog post! I've been meaning to get a blog started ever since I got to Norway, which was more than 2 weeks ago. This blog will just be a way to keep family and friends up to date on my travels without having to email everyone. This way, you can shut off my ramblings anytime you like :)
A little background: rather than head straight to university, I decided to take a year off to work and travel. After working all summer and part of the fall, I hopped the Atlantic and landed in Norway in mid October. My dad's mother is Norwegian, and as such I have a ton of cousins, second cousins and other somehow-related relatives here. For about 5 weeks, I'm going to spend a bit of time in 4 different locations in this country, visiting mostly family as well as Lauren DeGroot, a friend from Nelson, who is in Norway for a year on a rotary exchange.
I started off my travels in Hamar, a town of about 20,000 people just north of Oslo, the capital of Norway. My dad's cousin Olav and his wife Bente live there, and that is who I stayed with for just over a week. They were extremely hospitable, welcoming me into their home and showing me around the town. Cue picture:
The weather was absolutely gorgeous when I was there, albeit cold. I spent the first few days sleeping in till 11 or 12 (jet lag) and after that I would either walk downtown or go for a run in one of the nearby parks. It was a pretty great lifestyle : sleep in, eat, explore the town, eat, relax, sleep, and repeat.
Lauren came by train to visit me in Hamar 6 days after I got there. Twas quite fun missioning around, just like old times, except in a different country. After about 4 days in Hamar we took the train back to Arna, where she is staying. Arna is on the west coast of Norway, near Bergen, one of the big cities.
We spent our time hiking, eating, running, and just having fun. Some evenings, Lauren and I would team up and play Scrabble (in Norwegian, of course) with her host mother Helene and host grandma Evelyn. We somehow managed to win one of the games (all props go to Lauren, I did basically nothing to contribute).
I went to Lauren's French class with her one day. It was a pretty neat experience, since they were learning French, a language I know, from Norwegian, a language I don't know, with a bit of English thrown in for my and Lauren's benefit (mostly mine...).
After spending 4 days in Arna, I took the train to Arendal, which is on the southern coast of Norway. I didn't really come at the right time of year, unfortunately: Arendal is a summer town, right on the ocean, but I'm sure there's still lots to see.
Here, I am staying with my dad's cousin and her family. They have a beautiful, 100-year-old house, high enough up on the hillside that I can see the ocean from my bedroom window. Hege, my dad's cousin, is a 4th grade school teacher, and today I went with her for her last class of the day, which just so happened to be English. She has a great bunch of kids, and what I found very interesting is that 50% of them are not from Norway. There were kids from Congo, Somalia, Brazil, Poland, Chile, Australia, Vietnam, and other countries that I can't remember. They're all super nice, and polite, and surprisingly accomplished in English for 9-year-olds.
Yesterday Hege took me down to their cottage, which is right on the ocean, about 20 minutes from their house. I was very happy to see that it still looked how I remembered it to look from when I was here with my family 9 years ago. They have a beautiful spot in a little bay, and seeing it again brought back fond memories of catching crabs, swimming, fishing, and spending time with my extended family in Norway.
I have about 2 weeks left of my travels here, but after touring around Norway, I am (hopefully) heading down to Switzerland to do an internship that involves chasing lynx through the Swiss Alps... not actually, but that's how I like to describe it. I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to be doing there, so I will let you know when I get there.
The reason for the 'hopefully' there is that I still haven't received my visa to work in Switzerland for 6 months... I'm hoping to hear from them in the next few weeks, but no guarantees.
Alrighty then, I believe that is a long enough first post. Don't be expecting regular blog posts, as I am of the lazy type and probably won't bother to write another one for a while.
Well, enjoy!
-Sonja
A little background: rather than head straight to university, I decided to take a year off to work and travel. After working all summer and part of the fall, I hopped the Atlantic and landed in Norway in mid October. My dad's mother is Norwegian, and as such I have a ton of cousins, second cousins and other somehow-related relatives here. For about 5 weeks, I'm going to spend a bit of time in 4 different locations in this country, visiting mostly family as well as Lauren DeGroot, a friend from Nelson, who is in Norway for a year on a rotary exchange.
I started off my travels in Hamar, a town of about 20,000 people just north of Oslo, the capital of Norway. My dad's cousin Olav and his wife Bente live there, and that is who I stayed with for just over a week. They were extremely hospitable, welcoming me into their home and showing me around the town. Cue picture:
 |
| Looking out at Lake Mjøsa, Norway's biggest lake |
The weather was absolutely gorgeous when I was there, albeit cold. I spent the first few days sleeping in till 11 or 12 (jet lag) and after that I would either walk downtown or go for a run in one of the nearby parks. It was a pretty great lifestyle : sleep in, eat, explore the town, eat, relax, sleep, and repeat.
Lauren came by train to visit me in Hamar 6 days after I got there. Twas quite fun missioning around, just like old times, except in a different country. After about 4 days in Hamar we took the train back to Arna, where she is staying. Arna is on the west coast of Norway, near Bergen, one of the big cities.
 |
| Looking down on Arna from Arna Nipa, the mountain above the town. Kind of similar to Nelson, no? |
We spent our time hiking, eating, running, and just having fun. Some evenings, Lauren and I would team up and play Scrabble (in Norwegian, of course) with her host mother Helene and host grandma Evelyn. We somehow managed to win one of the games (all props go to Lauren, I did basically nothing to contribute).
 |
| We hiked up to a small hut, Redningshytta, where they served hot drinks and pannekaker (crepes in Canada) |
I went to Lauren's French class with her one day. It was a pretty neat experience, since they were learning French, a language I know, from Norwegian, a language I don't know, with a bit of English thrown in for my and Lauren's benefit (mostly mine...).
After spending 4 days in Arna, I took the train to Arendal, which is on the southern coast of Norway. I didn't really come at the right time of year, unfortunately: Arendal is a summer town, right on the ocean, but I'm sure there's still lots to see.
 |
| Arendal |
Here, I am staying with my dad's cousin and her family. They have a beautiful, 100-year-old house, high enough up on the hillside that I can see the ocean from my bedroom window. Hege, my dad's cousin, is a 4th grade school teacher, and today I went with her for her last class of the day, which just so happened to be English. She has a great bunch of kids, and what I found very interesting is that 50% of them are not from Norway. There were kids from Congo, Somalia, Brazil, Poland, Chile, Australia, Vietnam, and other countries that I can't remember. They're all super nice, and polite, and surprisingly accomplished in English for 9-year-olds.
Yesterday Hege took me down to their cottage, which is right on the ocean, about 20 minutes from their house. I was very happy to see that it still looked how I remembered it to look from when I was here with my family 9 years ago. They have a beautiful spot in a little bay, and seeing it again brought back fond memories of catching crabs, swimming, fishing, and spending time with my extended family in Norway.
 |
| The view from the cottage |
I have about 2 weeks left of my travels here, but after touring around Norway, I am (hopefully) heading down to Switzerland to do an internship that involves chasing lynx through the Swiss Alps... not actually, but that's how I like to describe it. I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to be doing there, so I will let you know when I get there.
The reason for the 'hopefully' there is that I still haven't received my visa to work in Switzerland for 6 months... I'm hoping to hear from them in the next few weeks, but no guarantees.
Alrighty then, I believe that is a long enough first post. Don't be expecting regular blog posts, as I am of the lazy type and probably won't bother to write another one for a while.
Well, enjoy!
-Sonja
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