Reflecting on the Holiday

So we come to the last blog post of the holiday. I wonder what image best sums up an amazing three weeks away. 

I think it is the awe of seeing the West Wall of Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim.

Even now the details of the various images on the West Wall surprise and thrill me.

Highlights

 

As I look back there are a few things which stand out, but in mentioning them I realise there are loads that I could include which space would not allow. 

After the impressiveness of Trondheim, the one that comes first to mind is arriving in Olden and seeing Drew in his 'home' element

with the rushing water at the centre of the valley

and getting that sense that in this town everything is very Drewish, even down to the sparkling water.

Then there was walking on the top of the Opera House in Oslo, which even know seems like a crazy idea, but was great fun.

Also Drew meeting a friendly troll (and a whole woodland of them) in Bergen.

In terms of achieving a long term aim, crossing into the Artic Circle for the first time in our lives has to be at the top of them.

Seeing a Church rolling from one place to another in Kiruna is also a memory you couldn't plan for, but thoroughly enjoyed at the time. It still seems unbelievable that you can load a church onto a trailer and move it, ever so slowly for two miles.

Finally, the pleasure of feeling we were coming 'home' as we arrived at the Thon Partner Hotel Kungsborn hotel right next to Central Station in Stockholm.

To Note

It was also impressive to note Drew's courage in overcoming his fear of heights (or as says: of drops) in the funicular in Bergan, in the cable car in Loen, 

on the bridge and the cable car in Tromsø 

Unexpected delights

There were also the unexpected delights which brought brightness to the whole holiday. One that comes to mind is the two ferry journeys that the bus took between Bergen and Olden - who knew a standard service bus would use a small ferry boat to cross the Fjords and what a delight each of those little unexpected journeys would be for us.

The delight of seeing a Cruise Ship leaving Olden as we arrived. It turns out, I found out later, that a former student of mine, Stephanie Richards, who studied with Linda (one of our regular blog commenters) on the Moodle in Schools project, taught by Professor Norah Jones, Catherine Naamani and I, was on that ship; with them being forced to make an unplanned stop in Olden due to the Storm Floris which was battering the UK and Norway at the time. That was a relief for Drew too, as he now knows why this, unscheduled ship was in the Fjord on that day. 

The comfort of the trains both the Oslo to Bergen and the Trondheim to Bodø ones was another real pleasure of the trip.

A special mention also has to go to Thon Hotels, who in no small part made the holiday, by providing great quality accommodation, in excellent locations with brilliant breakfasts. The hotels became a key part of our successful enjoyment of the trip and getting to sit next to the founder (at least of his statue) was also great fun.

Though the window in Room 502 of the Radisson Blu in Tromsø has to win the prize of the best view from an hotel in the holiday, by day

or by twilight

though the balcony of the Olden Fjord Hotel gave it a good run for its money. 

Memorable Meal

While all four of the Michelin starred restaurants were excellent, for me it is Fagn, in Trondheim, that stands out as the most memorable as the Head Chef took the effort to engage with us and explain what had inspired him in his cooking, that with the quality of the whole service, makes it the great foody find of the holiday for me.

That being said only one of the meals we had disappointed, the lack of heat in the Vietnamese meal at Lille Saigon was a disappointment, 

but one out of twenty two is a remarkable record. [Co-pilot's note: I must, dear readers, give an honourable mention to the delights of Bastard Burger - I know some people don't like burgers on principle, but it was a damn good tasty bit of dinner.]

Travel 

In the 22 days of the holiday we travelled a total of 2,500 miles (excluding flights). It was 1,354 miles by train, 867 miles by coach/bus, 188 miles by ferry and 20 miles on the underground.

In addition we walked 144 miles, an average of 5.75 miles a day which is equivalent to 12,450 steps per day, well above the somewhat random target of 10k a day.  Our longest walk day was 13 miles or 28,000 steps on the Sunday in Oslo. Our shortest walk day was .83 of a mile i.e. 1,800 steps, this was the day we travelled from Olden to Trondheim and, after two long bus rides, walked one block to the amazing meal at Fagn. 

Thankfully, our walking helped balance with our food consumption. I left Wales at 12 stone 10 lbs (80.74 kg) and returned at 13 stone 6 lbs (85.28 kg) - I reckon it would have been a lot more than that without the walking. 

Issues

We had a remarkably easy holiday in terms of what went wrong. Most years there have been somethings which have not worked - this year was so much easier than some of the past ones. Everything seemed to work as well, indeed better, than we might have expected in advance. 

The only challenges: 

(a) the inability to get photos off the camara 

(b) the absence of a functioning launderette in Trondheim.

were both annoyances rather than major problems and were solved in one day in Trondheim. Though I suspect I'd have finished the blog a day or two earlier if I hadn't had that big catch-up with photos, it didn't spoil any aspect of the holiday.

Overall it has been fabulous.

Thanks

Thanks to all of you who have made this journey with us, with comments on the blog, on Flickr and on Facebook/BlueSky - they have been a great help and encouragement both for informing the journey and for correcting my mistyping/misspelling. I suspect there are many more spelling errors to catch, so if you see any please let me know.

So, until next year, when we seem to be heading towards Portugal following Richard Sharpe in Wellington's Peninsular Campaign, farewell and see you soon.