viewing pleasure

 

   

Norway? eh...

The trip was a success by any measure. Here are some highlights:
-Driving 1200km on the most incredible roads, with tunnels, hairpin turns, and one lane to share with oncoming traffic in most cases; This was driving at its most extreme. Emphasis is placed on the lack of any accidents/fender-benders/etc.We did get hit by a rock while driving over a mountain pass, but that is a different story. BTW, the rental car was a ford. A ford focus TDI to be exact, which you can't really complain about.
-Completing several hikes with serious vertical elements. Here in Norway they don't believe in the switchback concept for foot traffic. This was my most extreme hiking experience yet, starting at sea level and topping out near a glacier. Luckily Kristin has tons of experience on this front so she helped me out a bit.
-Lots of ferry rides, both with a car and without. You would never imagine so many cars/trucks/RVs could fit on one boat.
-An impulsive jump into an ice-cold fjord from an enormous platform just as the ferry you are supposed to be on is arriving to pick you up.
-Turning a 34 dollar tent, 8 dollars worth of tarps and cord, and two sturdy sticks into 7 nights of completely dry lodging in one of the world's most expensive countries. This is especially noteworthy considering it rained every single night we were there. Thank you boy scouts.
-Making friends with shy sheep, hungry rabbits, gregarious goats, Australian base-jumpers (look up "squirrel-suit jumping" on youtube), Dutch multi-sport campers (at 2 different sites, hundreds of kilometers apart), enormous black slugs, and one of Norway's top working border collies (who knows over 200 Norwegian words).
-Watching the world cup on a ship, in a bar, in a restaurant, and at a camp ground. Also, always being the only American in the room.
-Arriving in Norway with no plans other than to start driving and still finding some incredibly special places by maintaining a willingness to get off the beaten path.

this body of water also belongs to you.

alternative titles for this post:

All oceans are really just one ocean.

This ocean is also that ocean.

Every ocean is the same ocean.

This ocean is your ocean too.

This is also your ocean.

Body of water.

What I’ve been listening to:

The comforting sounds that accompany companionship

Wind in trees

My general mood:

Placated. Positively anxious about the near future.

Kristin arrived last week. We like to think that as adults we somehow won’t long for our companions in their absence in the same way that we did when we were younger. Of course this isn’t true; we feel everything now just as we did then. Perhaps the pain is dulled through experience, or perhaps we just trust each other more so the future seems more certain. Anyhow, it’s nice to have my best friend around again.

We spent the week in Denmark, taking a few days to unwind and a few days to travel locally. Kristin was antsy and ready to be on to the road pretty much since she arrived. She has a serious case of wanderlust, and while I share the same desire to see new places I guess I don’t mind slowing down a bit as well, just to see what real life might be like in another place. I think life would be good in Denmark. That is the conclusion I have drawn during my time here.

I spent the last few weeks making fantastic little experimental ceramic objects, but I haven’t taken any good photos yet. Can you wait for another week? I know I haven’t been very good at keeping up my end of the bargain in terms of this blog promise, and for that I am sorry.

We decided late in the game that a trip to Norway would be a bit more exciting than going to Berlin and Prague. I dropped the ball and didn’t do any planning, but Kristin carried me as she usually does and we now have a week of camping and hiking in Norway starting today. Actually, we start the camping part tomorrow; tonight we will be sleeping during the 20-hour ferry ride across the North Sea, from Hirtshals in Denmark to Bergen in Norway. One word: fjords.

An ocean on every horizon is overwhelming, but then after a while it isn’t. My family in the US is near the ocean, and on the right day we might be looking at the same body of water. If you stick your toe in over there and I stick mine in here we’ll be swimming in the same pool. At the moment where we feel most alone we suddenly find common ground. Life is so incredibly large and terrifying, but only in my head.