Geiranger, Norway - Day 11 “The Fish Whisperer”
Good morning! I finally got up at 2:30am to take a photo. It looked like a lovely sunset/sunrise. I think I’ve forgotten what darkness looks like (I kinda like that!) You’ll know it when you see it in today’s pics. I couldn’t get the sliding door open so the Viking logo is in it. :)
I forgot to mention yesterday about the house colors. Most houses were red years ago because that was the cheapest color of paint. So there are lots of red homes and barns staying with that traditional color. But now people usually point their homes yellow and their barns red. I so love places with such character. Also, most homes have flag poles. If all was well when they were home, the flag was up. If the flag was down, it meant they were away from home. If they raised a black flag, it meant they were in trouble and needed some help! Who needs a smart phone???
My official morning started just after 6am as I ate some Nutella toast and had some coffee. We were just pulling into Geiranger (pronounced lots of different ways around here but the most common seemed like “GUYR-anger”. I got some nice morning shots, but today is our first cloudy day...a few promising peeks of blue skies popped in and out. Guy was still in bed as I was the only one fishing today. When we went to book the excursion it was already sold out. But he put us on a waitlist. So sure enough he got a notification that it was open and he booked me, but I got the last spot. Guy isn’t much of a fisherman, but he would have loved the adventure and boat ride. So he kindly let me venture off alone this morning. Lucky for me, I met another single gal, Kit, from Arizona who was also leaving her better half behind, so her and I hit it off quite nicely. She is a travel agent and probably close to 70. She has never caught a fish in her entire life.
So after we took the little tender boat from the cruise ship to the shore, the “Fab 5” as Guy called us, met up with Karsten, our local guide and boat driver. First of all, there was no bathroom on this little boat. I kinda had to go, but knew I could hold it. But I had to have a mental talk with myself and was good after that. We also had to put on outerwear. I’m not sure exactly what to call it, but it was heavy...almost like a ski suit. And of course a life vest. Which was very small and not cumbersome at all. We boarded the boat and went slowly past the cruise ships, then he cut loose and I had to hang on to my hat. So let me back up for a second. As we were getting on, the three guys just kinda looked at Kit and I...like they wanted to pat us on the head or something. Or like...stand back broads...we’ll show you how to fish! And the guy from California (which happened to be the guy from the other night who was going to stay up to watch the Blues play) told me he started out with an 18 foot boat, then 20, then 30 then 40! He said he has fished his entire life. Let’s call him “Gunter” (he was originally from Poland I think) So Gunter sat by me, turned his baseball hat around (he is probably 70 as well) and was like WOOOO! when Karsten took off.
We went by some old farms waaaaay up in the hills, where people truly used to live. They had to CLIMB then WALK to their farms. One location had a wire from the top to the bottom where they’d hoist food and other goods up. I mean wow, this was some rugged living. But of course this was 1900. Still. We are talking like 350 meters up. So anyway, we fished one area and caught nothing, so we strolled by the 7 sisters waterfall and the one directly across from it that was absolutely pouring down the mountain. We got so close to it I could have touched it, but kept my hands inside the boat. Good thing we had our outer suits on! After that we moved on to a new location and I dropped my lure and let it sink all the way to the bottom until I had slack in my line (hey, this ain’t my first rodeo y’all...my dad and grandpas taught me well). So as soon as I started to reel it in, I told Karsten “I’m caught on the bottom” because they guy next to me had just gotten stuck. So as he came over he took the reel and said, “No, you’ve got a fish!” So he gave it back and that little pollock gave me quite a fight. Karsten brought it in (he didn’t want anyone to reach over the boat...that was in our safety talk). He promptly handed it to me and took my picture. Of course Kit is in the back of the boat going “GO GIRL”. So envision a scene from Grumpy Old Men. They weren’t too happy. So the guy next to me caught one, then Kit caught one, then I caught another one (baby pollock) and that was about it. We fished around for another 15 minutes or so and Karsten said we had about 5 more minutes and he was hoping someone would catch another one, because we had just boated past two very large Sea Eagles and he said yesterday they came down and took one of their fish! So, being the good fisherman that I was, I landed the only cod of the day and it was moderate size. He thumped it in its head and tossed it out into the water for the Eagle. Of course Kit is going “You caught ANOTHER one? You are amazing!”. **envision scene two from Grumpy Old Men. Well “Gunter” said “Well, it’s because she had the YELLOW lure”. Excuse me? My dad told me you had to hold your mouth just right to catch fish. CLEARLY he was not holding his correctly! AND his buddy that caught one had a blue lure! So there! I did say, “Um...it was SKILL”...but Gunter, with his selective hearing, didn’t acknowledge my comment. Anyway, back to the eagle. He kinda stood up and he was clearly looking at it, but Karsten said they are so timid they might not scoop down and get it because of the boat. We went back over to my fish that had floated next to some seaweed-ish stuff and he was going to toss it away from the floating grass thinking that might be the problem, but when we got there, I guess Mr. Cod had regained consciousness and had swam away. So that ended our boating adventure and we headed back for town. There was no way I could have a bad day at this point.
Guy was waiting for me on the dock as we pulled up and he was smiling at my big red outfit, so he took my picture. As he stood there, Kit had to tell him all about how I was the champion! Still, the female excitement was not going over well with the guys. They had very little to say. Two of the three of them didn’t catch a thing. I can’t wait to tell my dad, and my grandpas would have been proud.
Guy and I caught the tender back to the ship and had a nice lunch (salad for me, cheeseburger for him) and we cleaned up to head back to the town and catch our 2pm excursion. Guy chose bus number 32 and he did an excellent job because our bus driver looked very competent and our guide was actually from Geiranger! BONUS! Let me tell you, the information you get from a local is night and day compared to the kids they hire to do the talks on the bus. Her name was Camilla and she was awesome! I’d have her about 35 and very fit. Kinda more on the hippie side and very outdoorsy. She was lovely and told the best stories and gave the BEST talk. I can’t even put into words how twisty-turny these roads were. Not just curves, but straight up switchbacks where buses had to wait for each other. And of course there are three cruise ships in port today. So these nutty roads were jammed. Basically we went from sea level to 1000 feet on these roads. I knew what kind of day it was going to be...so I gave up my window seat to Guy so I can just look down when I needed to. This way he could enjoy the scenery for once, because 1. he’s not afraid of looking over a cliff, and 2. he always gives me the window seat. Always.
Some facts from Camilla: The road we were on was built in 1880. That’s crazy because the road is crazy. Anyway, this road is always closed from Oct-May and it takes one month for them to clear it after it has stopped snowing. Sometimes they have used dynamite to blow it off. Right now they have 24 hours of daylight (she can sleep without darkening her room) and in the winter they only have 6 hours of daylight. The little town only has 320 residences and last year they had almost ONE MILLION visitors!!! They have no bears or wild animals and really the only predator that could hurt people are when the orca swim into the fjord (this coming from Karsten this morning) but he said unless you do something really stupid, they aren’t aggressive. Therefore camping is really popular here and hiking of course. Lots of trails, but very steep. She said she hiked a mountain (she showed us which one...very impressive) and her friend she went up with BASE jumped from the top and she had to hike all the way back down by herself! Wow! Anyway, back to other cool facts...1869 was the first year a cruise ship stopped at Geiranger. Today 227 cruise ships come every year during the summer that carry 700,000 of those nearly 1 million visitors. They rely on tourism and appreciate them (us), but when September comes, they are usually ready for a break. She said by the time the long, dark winter passes, they are ready for the tourists again because they all know each other and each other’s business...so that gets old as well. She said there are 30 different nationalities that work with them each tourist season and she has made friends from all over the world. She said she gets up every morning and drinks her coffee looking at the mountain, realizing how lucky she is. (Except for when tourists peek into their windows or are standing in their gardens...I guess they don’t think it is someone’s actual private property). The grass growing process on the roof tops has been improved in recent years because they have started putting plastic down first. With that, it can go 20-25 years.
One last fact about their children. They have a kindergarten and grade school. Sometimes the class will have 10 kinds in it, sometimes there are no kids. The government lets them be for now because there isn’t a better alternative or a close enough town they can get to in the winter time. However, they are building a tunnel nearby and in 2020 she fears they may not have a school anymore. Currently, when they get to high school, they have to move to another town to finish up their schooling. She also talked about a farm that has been there since the 1300s. It’s now a preserved area, but is meticulously maintained to keep a piece of the past. She said when you walk in the kitchen it’s like going back in time. She also said that some of the farmers that lived on cliffs would tie their children to trees with long ropes so they could frolic around the yard and not fall to their deaths.
Amongst all this fabulous information, we stopped at two really spectacular overlooks and had photo ops at each location. We also went to a lake at the top of our 1000 mile climb and we got some great photos there and Guy played in the snow. With a cappuccino and hot chocolate in hand, we boarded the bus for the twisty ride down. I still stayed in the middle of the bus and doodled on the paper that I was taking notes on. In today’s pictures you’ll see my graphic rendering of a tour gone bad. I thought it was funny. Guy was not really laughing and stared quietly...but then he said “You should have people flying out of the bus”. :) That made us laugh. In the final piece you’ll see I acted upon his request.
We walked around the shops in the town and poked our heads in the grocery store and chocolate shop. My only purchase was dental floss because I ran out (and Norwegian floss is pretty good!) Back to the tender (jammed with people heading in) we made our way back to the ship where I promptly took a fabulously hot shower and got ready for dinner. We ate in the restaurant at our favorite table #101 and Shidhart was prompt and took very good care of us...even bring out things we didn’t order because he wanted us to try it. He’s the best. Guy and I both had cauliflower soup with king crab legs (Guy was hoping for actual legs, but it was just shredded on top). Next we had reindeer steak in a berry sauce. It was tasty. As an additional side he brought out the pasta with red sauce. It was good and we didn’t have any trouble making it disappear. For dessert I had ordered the apple strudel and Guy had the local strawberry cake, but he brought us BOTH apple strudel, the chocolate mousse dessert AND the strawberry cake. We made all gone.
I came back to the room to start the blog while Guy went to hear a talk on Norway and what it was like during WWII. He said it was good, but a know-it-all lady kept interjecting. That makes it really tough on the presenter. So he had to skip some stuff because of her hand flailing in the air constantly. :) Still, it was informative and he was glad he went.
As we sail to our next location, the scenery outside is much different than in past days. It is now hazy with low clouds hanging in front of the beautiful mountains. Even still, it is quite beautiful.
I forgot to mention yesterday about the house colors. Most houses were red years ago because that was the cheapest color of paint. So there are lots of red homes and barns staying with that traditional color. But now people usually point their homes yellow and their barns red. I so love places with such character. Also, most homes have flag poles. If all was well when they were home, the flag was up. If the flag was down, it meant they were away from home. If they raised a black flag, it meant they were in trouble and needed some help! Who needs a smart phone???
My official morning started just after 6am as I ate some Nutella toast and had some coffee. We were just pulling into Geiranger (pronounced lots of different ways around here but the most common seemed like “GUYR-anger”. I got some nice morning shots, but today is our first cloudy day...a few promising peeks of blue skies popped in and out. Guy was still in bed as I was the only one fishing today. When we went to book the excursion it was already sold out. But he put us on a waitlist. So sure enough he got a notification that it was open and he booked me, but I got the last spot. Guy isn’t much of a fisherman, but he would have loved the adventure and boat ride. So he kindly let me venture off alone this morning. Lucky for me, I met another single gal, Kit, from Arizona who was also leaving her better half behind, so her and I hit it off quite nicely. She is a travel agent and probably close to 70. She has never caught a fish in her entire life.
So after we took the little tender boat from the cruise ship to the shore, the “Fab 5” as Guy called us, met up with Karsten, our local guide and boat driver. First of all, there was no bathroom on this little boat. I kinda had to go, but knew I could hold it. But I had to have a mental talk with myself and was good after that. We also had to put on outerwear. I’m not sure exactly what to call it, but it was heavy...almost like a ski suit. And of course a life vest. Which was very small and not cumbersome at all. We boarded the boat and went slowly past the cruise ships, then he cut loose and I had to hang on to my hat. So let me back up for a second. As we were getting on, the three guys just kinda looked at Kit and I...like they wanted to pat us on the head or something. Or like...stand back broads...we’ll show you how to fish! And the guy from California (which happened to be the guy from the other night who was going to stay up to watch the Blues play) told me he started out with an 18 foot boat, then 20, then 30 then 40! He said he has fished his entire life. Let’s call him “Gunter” (he was originally from Poland I think) So Gunter sat by me, turned his baseball hat around (he is probably 70 as well) and was like WOOOO! when Karsten took off.
We went by some old farms waaaaay up in the hills, where people truly used to live. They had to CLIMB then WALK to their farms. One location had a wire from the top to the bottom where they’d hoist food and other goods up. I mean wow, this was some rugged living. But of course this was 1900. Still. We are talking like 350 meters up. So anyway, we fished one area and caught nothing, so we strolled by the 7 sisters waterfall and the one directly across from it that was absolutely pouring down the mountain. We got so close to it I could have touched it, but kept my hands inside the boat. Good thing we had our outer suits on! After that we moved on to a new location and I dropped my lure and let it sink all the way to the bottom until I had slack in my line (hey, this ain’t my first rodeo y’all...my dad and grandpas taught me well). So as soon as I started to reel it in, I told Karsten “I’m caught on the bottom” because they guy next to me had just gotten stuck. So as he came over he took the reel and said, “No, you’ve got a fish!” So he gave it back and that little pollock gave me quite a fight. Karsten brought it in (he didn’t want anyone to reach over the boat...that was in our safety talk). He promptly handed it to me and took my picture. Of course Kit is in the back of the boat going “GO GIRL”. So envision a scene from Grumpy Old Men. They weren’t too happy. So the guy next to me caught one, then Kit caught one, then I caught another one (baby pollock) and that was about it. We fished around for another 15 minutes or so and Karsten said we had about 5 more minutes and he was hoping someone would catch another one, because we had just boated past two very large Sea Eagles and he said yesterday they came down and took one of their fish! So, being the good fisherman that I was, I landed the only cod of the day and it was moderate size. He thumped it in its head and tossed it out into the water for the Eagle. Of course Kit is going “You caught ANOTHER one? You are amazing!”. **envision scene two from Grumpy Old Men. Well “Gunter” said “Well, it’s because she had the YELLOW lure”. Excuse me? My dad told me you had to hold your mouth just right to catch fish. CLEARLY he was not holding his correctly! AND his buddy that caught one had a blue lure! So there! I did say, “Um...it was SKILL”...but Gunter, with his selective hearing, didn’t acknowledge my comment. Anyway, back to the eagle. He kinda stood up and he was clearly looking at it, but Karsten said they are so timid they might not scoop down and get it because of the boat. We went back over to my fish that had floated next to some seaweed-ish stuff and he was going to toss it away from the floating grass thinking that might be the problem, but when we got there, I guess Mr. Cod had regained consciousness and had swam away. So that ended our boating adventure and we headed back for town. There was no way I could have a bad day at this point.
Guy was waiting for me on the dock as we pulled up and he was smiling at my big red outfit, so he took my picture. As he stood there, Kit had to tell him all about how I was the champion! Still, the female excitement was not going over well with the guys. They had very little to say. Two of the three of them didn’t catch a thing. I can’t wait to tell my dad, and my grandpas would have been proud.
Guy and I caught the tender back to the ship and had a nice lunch (salad for me, cheeseburger for him) and we cleaned up to head back to the town and catch our 2pm excursion. Guy chose bus number 32 and he did an excellent job because our bus driver looked very competent and our guide was actually from Geiranger! BONUS! Let me tell you, the information you get from a local is night and day compared to the kids they hire to do the talks on the bus. Her name was Camilla and she was awesome! I’d have her about 35 and very fit. Kinda more on the hippie side and very outdoorsy. She was lovely and told the best stories and gave the BEST talk. I can’t even put into words how twisty-turny these roads were. Not just curves, but straight up switchbacks where buses had to wait for each other. And of course there are three cruise ships in port today. So these nutty roads were jammed. Basically we went from sea level to 1000 feet on these roads. I knew what kind of day it was going to be...so I gave up my window seat to Guy so I can just look down when I needed to. This way he could enjoy the scenery for once, because 1. he’s not afraid of looking over a cliff, and 2. he always gives me the window seat. Always.
Some facts from Camilla: The road we were on was built in 1880. That’s crazy because the road is crazy. Anyway, this road is always closed from Oct-May and it takes one month for them to clear it after it has stopped snowing. Sometimes they have used dynamite to blow it off. Right now they have 24 hours of daylight (she can sleep without darkening her room) and in the winter they only have 6 hours of daylight. The little town only has 320 residences and last year they had almost ONE MILLION visitors!!! They have no bears or wild animals and really the only predator that could hurt people are when the orca swim into the fjord (this coming from Karsten this morning) but he said unless you do something really stupid, they aren’t aggressive. Therefore camping is really popular here and hiking of course. Lots of trails, but very steep. She said she hiked a mountain (she showed us which one...very impressive) and her friend she went up with BASE jumped from the top and she had to hike all the way back down by herself! Wow! Anyway, back to other cool facts...1869 was the first year a cruise ship stopped at Geiranger. Today 227 cruise ships come every year during the summer that carry 700,000 of those nearly 1 million visitors. They rely on tourism and appreciate them (us), but when September comes, they are usually ready for a break. She said by the time the long, dark winter passes, they are ready for the tourists again because they all know each other and each other’s business...so that gets old as well. She said there are 30 different nationalities that work with them each tourist season and she has made friends from all over the world. She said she gets up every morning and drinks her coffee looking at the mountain, realizing how lucky she is. (Except for when tourists peek into their windows or are standing in their gardens...I guess they don’t think it is someone’s actual private property). The grass growing process on the roof tops has been improved in recent years because they have started putting plastic down first. With that, it can go 20-25 years.
One last fact about their children. They have a kindergarten and grade school. Sometimes the class will have 10 kinds in it, sometimes there are no kids. The government lets them be for now because there isn’t a better alternative or a close enough town they can get to in the winter time. However, they are building a tunnel nearby and in 2020 she fears they may not have a school anymore. Currently, when they get to high school, they have to move to another town to finish up their schooling. She also talked about a farm that has been there since the 1300s. It’s now a preserved area, but is meticulously maintained to keep a piece of the past. She said when you walk in the kitchen it’s like going back in time. She also said that some of the farmers that lived on cliffs would tie their children to trees with long ropes so they could frolic around the yard and not fall to their deaths.
Amongst all this fabulous information, we stopped at two really spectacular overlooks and had photo ops at each location. We also went to a lake at the top of our 1000 mile climb and we got some great photos there and Guy played in the snow. With a cappuccino and hot chocolate in hand, we boarded the bus for the twisty ride down. I still stayed in the middle of the bus and doodled on the paper that I was taking notes on. In today’s pictures you’ll see my graphic rendering of a tour gone bad. I thought it was funny. Guy was not really laughing and stared quietly...but then he said “You should have people flying out of the bus”. :) That made us laugh. In the final piece you’ll see I acted upon his request.
We walked around the shops in the town and poked our heads in the grocery store and chocolate shop. My only purchase was dental floss because I ran out (and Norwegian floss is pretty good!) Back to the tender (jammed with people heading in) we made our way back to the ship where I promptly took a fabulously hot shower and got ready for dinner. We ate in the restaurant at our favorite table #101 and Shidhart was prompt and took very good care of us...even bring out things we didn’t order because he wanted us to try it. He’s the best. Guy and I both had cauliflower soup with king crab legs (Guy was hoping for actual legs, but it was just shredded on top). Next we had reindeer steak in a berry sauce. It was tasty. As an additional side he brought out the pasta with red sauce. It was good and we didn’t have any trouble making it disappear. For dessert I had ordered the apple strudel and Guy had the local strawberry cake, but he brought us BOTH apple strudel, the chocolate mousse dessert AND the strawberry cake. We made all gone.
I came back to the room to start the blog while Guy went to hear a talk on Norway and what it was like during WWII. He said it was good, but a know-it-all lady kept interjecting. That makes it really tough on the presenter. So he had to skip some stuff because of her hand flailing in the air constantly. :) Still, it was informative and he was glad he went.
As we sail to our next location, the scenery outside is much different than in past days. It is now hazy with low clouds hanging in front of the beautiful mountains. Even still, it is quite beautiful.
Oh em geeee... a fishing victory, a bus that stayed on the roads, stories about SCHOOLS, AND you got to try more reindeer steak!!! This may be the best of all the days so far....
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