M15Sep08-10.30met,Sarpsborg lby,Dell,ViewSonic,Microsoft,Logitech,?
Hello kind reader,
Sorry for the slow answers to emails, the lack of comments on flickr, and the lack photos on flickr, blogger, and SPAMletters. I have had only minutes on the computer. I mean to do all these things sooner or later - later is more likely.
attached photos
1 Th21Aug Hardanger vidda seen from the road
2 W20Aug Mabø bridge, stone arch bridge seen from the old road up Mabø dal.
3 W27Aug Bad photo of Gol stavkirke to give a feel of what it's like
4 W27Aug Flash snap of south door of Gol stavkirke to show wood carving and smithy work of the 1200s
5 Su7Sep The new Operaen of Oslo, opened in April, seen from where the statue of Kirsten Flagstad stands
6 Su7Sep Kirsten Flagstad the great Norwegian Wagner opera singer of the 30s, who made a big splash at the Met in NewYork
7 A night flash of a stainless steel work of art in the Øystese sculpture park, outside Kabuso kunst huset
8 Advertising the bear park at Flå in Hallingdal
9 Sa13Sep The Oslo city hall from under the stern of the tall ship, "Christian Radich". Christian Radich was a timber merchant and shipowner, who paid for this tall ship in his will.
10 Sa13Sep Ljan bru, an early stone arch bridge, built around 1800, and still strong enough for today's traffic. The earliest record for a bridge here, is 1300, but there must have been traffic here long before that.
11 M15Sep River Glomma, looking North, showing flood levels.
12 M15Sep Sarpsborg library, designed by Ove Bang in the functionalism style
Tu19Aug08-13.00met,Eidfjord lby,hp,hp,hp,hp,?
Last night I skippered at the same spot by a stream near Ulsnes on RV7, between Kinsarvik and Brimnes, as I did on the way down to Odda. To get water I had to clamber along an embankment and walk over rocks. Not hard to do but I had the feeling that it would be unwise to make a wrong step.
M25Aug08-13.00met,Ål library,COMPAQ,COMPAQ,COMPAQ,Logitech,hp
Since the few words at Eidfjord, I have walked over Hardanger vidda. Going up Mabødal was magical. The new road through tunnels was opened in 1986. The old road built 1905- 1915 is now a walk and cycle road only. It climbs with hairpin bends by high cliffs and over old rock falls, up to Vøringfoss waterfall, which is said to be world famous, though I have never heard of it. At least 12 cubic metres go over this waterfall now, but in the spring snow melt it can go up to 250 cubic metres. Most of the water is now piped to a big water power station in Simadal.
Hardanger vidda is a table land at about 1200 metres. The peaks are about 1350 metres so they look like low hills from the road at 1250 metres. The temperature was 10 C which is not too bad, but there was a cold west wind, while Hardanger Jøkulen/glacier was about 15 km to the north. I found another layer of clothing was wise.
Ustedal which is the dale coming off the vidda is almost as steep as Mabødal going up. But it makes for easy walking!
W27Aug08-13.30met,Gol lby,IBM,Samsung,hp,hp,Konica
From Geilo to Flå, the RV7 goes through Hallingdal, a long wide dale that comes down from Hardanger vidda, 1200m to much lower - 200m? It makes for easy walking and a good rest from walking up through Mabødal and out of the Bjøreio dale.There were no trees on the vidda and there are many here.
Th28Aug08-14.50met,hp,eclipse,TCi,Microsoft,?
Today, walked from Gol to Nesbyen along RV7 and Hallingdal dale. There is a big river, Hallingdalselva/Hallingdal's river. The road is clear of traffic until it gets light, when there is quite a bit - nothing like London.
In Hallingdal, I have seen two stavkirker - stav means wooden column, mostly 3-4 metres, but up to 9 metres high. About a thousand were built between 1100 and 1300, and in the 1700s they started knocking them down, although they are lovely churches, imho. Now there are about 30 left. In Torpo, is the only original one in the valley. That has only the nave, the chancel having been knocked down before the rescuers could stop them. At Gol is a copy, the true one being at a museum at Bygdøy, near Oslo. - see snaps 3 and 4
A bat flew rings over my head catching flies I could not see. Were they following me down the road? I heard a barking fox the other morning. I saw a small thin grey dead shrew on the road, while the others have been rounder and browner. A young one or another species? Toadflax is blooming and rosebay willow herb is going to seed. Silver birch is losing its first leaves.
F5Sep08-15.00met,Sidewalk Express, Oslo Sentral Stasjon,
Yesterday I walked into Oslo from the NW. It rained a lot. I went to the skipper I had in 2004, under a motorway bridge near E18. It rained heavily for an hour but I was dry!
The skipper is near Middelalder parken/Middle ages park. There are three old buildings, walls only a metre high. Kongs gården was the palace/stronghold of about 1300, and was shrunk in 1890 by a locomotive workshop. The king's chapel next door was Maria kirke, one of the three big churches in Norway at that time, the other two being St Hallvards Domkirke, Oslo and Nidaros Domkirke in Trondheim. A little way off is Clements kirke, with two naves, which was the parish church of south Oslo. As a nice further touch, they have dug a small lake that follows the shore of 1300.
Families like this lake for sunbathing and grills, a big summer favourite in Norway. Engang grills/One-go grills have coke between a metal dish and a grill. The lighter goes in, you grill your sausages/pølser, hamburgers,steak and throw it away when the coke has burnt. I have seen this nowhere but Norway. The grills can be hot so there are special "wheelies" for them.
Su7Sep08-08.00met,Sidewalk Express, Sentral Stasjon, Oslo,?,?,Dell,Dell,?
I have been wandering round Oslo. This morning before dawn I walked on the great new Operaen at Bjørvika, Opera house where you can walk on the marble flagstones that make up the roof. I first walked round on the ground, outside where there is the ticket office, cafe, restaurant, and best of all, all the sewing building of sets and backstage work. The roof is a long not too steep slope to height of about 50 metres, from where you can look over the city and fjord of Oslo.
There is a lot of red clover, in flower and going to seed, but hardly any white clover. I saw two slugs eating a mushroom. Now is the tme for mushrooms which are of all kinds and everywhere. I am still finding the odd raspberry or strawberry but July is their month. Frogs I see, sometimes alive hopping away from me, and sometimes dead in the road. Most are big 10 cm., but some small, two cm. My guess is two species.
M8Sep08-12.30met,Deichmanske lby,Oslo,Dell,Dell,Dell,?
I'm in the Deichmanske library, the main library in Oslo, and I've got an hour. The last time I was here, four years ago, in 2004, there was a mad scramble with the locals on all the computers before us outsiders even knew what was happening. This is better!
Walking along Hallingdal down from Hardinger vidda towards Oslo, the road at the top was on the right bank. At night I could see the trains on the left bank, lit up passenger trains, or the headlights of the engines of the goods trains. It's an odd thing that the road and train swap banks on bridges within 50 yards of each other, between Gol and Nesbyen. I think they must have chosen to put the train on the other bank from the road. The Hallingdals elva/river meanders from glacier cliff to glacier cliff, so neither bank is good.
Tu9Sep08-10.40met,Diechmanske lby,Oslo,emac
Bergen was Bjørgvin in the Middle Ages. Bjørg meant peak, and vin was fen or marsh. So it means marsh among the mountains. Bjørgvin is still used for the Lutheran Bishop of Bjørgvin.
There has been a little rain over the last few days, so I have been quite glad to be under a bridge. It`s a little easier if you don`t have to worry about rain in the night.
W10Sep08-10.40met,Deichmanske lby,Oslo,Dell,Dell,Dell,emachines,?
This morning I saw some stars for the first time for a while, thanks to the rain. The dog star, Sirius, Canis Major, was a little above the trees in the east. Clouds soon blew in again.
I have found more Middle Ages buildings/ruins. St Hallvard Domkirke was the bishops main church. The Holy Cross was small and the parish church for north Oslo. There is also the ruin of the Dominican monastery. The north wing is now the ground floor of the Bishop's palace. The bishop had his own palace in the Middle Ages. All this is on the other side of Oslo gate/street which shows the power struggle of those days, 1200s, between the king and the church.
St Hallvard is the patron saint of Oslo and can be found on Wikipedia, who know much more than I do. He defended a defenceless woman and was killed, with the woman, by arrows. His body was weighted down by a mill stone and dropped in a fjord but floated up again. I believe this miracle made him a saint.
Sa13Sep08-10.20met,Spydeberg lby,IBM,Samsung,IBM,IBM,?
This morning I've walked from Enebakk on RV120 to Spydeberg on E18. Spyd means spear in Norske, and a spear is the mark of Spydeberg. Spyd also means javelin, and the javelin gold medal at Beijing and Athens, was won by a Norwegian hero, Andreas Thorkildsen.
I have been to Oslo 4 times now, walking in clockwise, from the SW, NW, N, and S. From the SW and Drammen, 2002, I found that Oslo is a long thin town, about 30 km along Oslo fjord. The only through road was the motorway E18, which I cannot walk. So I chickened out, and got the train from Asker to Oslo Sentral Stasjon. From the NW this year 2008, Hønefoss, I found I could skirt round the N through Bærums Verk along RV!68 and have a short walk to the city centre. I still got lost though!. From the N from Jessheim 2004, along the line of E6, being more or less at right angles to the shore, it's a shortish walk to the centre. From the S and Halden 2004, only 10 km of the shore is built up, so that's an easy walk. But I cheated by being given a lift in a van which was making a delivery. Walking out is not so bad as I have a map from the TIC.
Bærums Verk was an iron work from 1610. Their mark is a furnace of those times, flask shaped filled with layers of charcoal and bog iron ore inside. Today it has become an artists' colony, and is a big sculpture park. It is also a shopping centre with supermarket
and bank and tourists are made welcome.
M15Sep08-10.30met,Sarpsborg lby,Dell,ViewSonic,Microsoft,Logitech,?
I was given a lift this morning to Sarpsborg by Marie-Claire from France, who has lived 20 years in Norway. She is studying "Activities", which means I think, moving to help illness and lifestyle. Sarpsborg is a big town, but quite new. The church is big and brick. The library was put up in 1939 in the functionalism style, but not opened till 1941 "due to war and lack of materials" - a good excuse.
Days near Oslo are getting shorter by 5-6 minutes a day. But at Harstad farther North it's 10 minutes a day. I saw a badger from a few feet away, but he was following a trail and did not see me. A first for me - I saw a small 2 cm. slug eating one of those holes in apples, its head hidden inside. Today the full moon set after sunrise, which was handy for me as there were no street lights where I was kipping. While the moon set before sunrise, I had street lights - jammy so-and-so. There are quite a few vetches and vetchlings by the road.
I crossed the river Glomma on Saturday. It is the biggest 720 cu.m/s, and the longest 611 km, in Norway. It runs down the east side of Norway and drains the mountains on both sides of the border with Sweden. It also has three of the biggest hydro-electric power stations in Norway, at about 300 MW 2x, and the biggest at about 400 MW. A battle was fought here in April 1940, to try to turn back the Germans.
Best wishes to all, Robert
