Day #7: Norwegian Fjords

Whew, what a day! It started early in the morning when I woke up at 4:30am. I made a quick call home for my weekly Sunday (for them it was still Sunday!) phone visit before hopping on a tram downtown in order to catch a 6:35am train out the the fjord.

Just looking outside the train window, you could tell we were climbing ever higher by the change in scenery. It went from city sprawl, to pastoral countryside, to rocky ridges over the course of the enxt several hours. Right before we got to my station, we stopped at the highest point on the Oslo-Bergen line. That station was 1,222 meters (or a little over 4,000 feet) above seal level.

We arrived at my stop at Myrdal at 11:41, just in time for a quick bite to eat and a look through the gift shop. I had left my rain coat at home as the weather in Oslo did not look like rain at all, but 5 hours away in Myrdal, it had started to rain. In the giftshop, they had a rain coat for sale, so I quickly snapped it up. Considering it rained for the whole rest of my trip, that was the best 229 kroner I ever spent!

After a while, the smaller train to Flåm came. The town of Flåm is situated at the end of an arm of the fjord, so it is right at sea level. The upshot is that it is quite the quick descent down the mountain! The highlight was about halfway down when the engineer stopped the train to let us out to take pictures of an impressive waterfall.

After our hour long descent was over, we arrived in Flåm and so I hopped on the 1:20 boat to Gundvagen. From there, it was two straight hours of taking pictures in the fjord. I think I took over 200 pictures (not counting, of course, the 50 or so pictures I took for Asian tourists using their cameras)! The fjord was cloudy and it was lightly raining, but I think the weather did not spoil the day. Rather, the clouds lent an air of majesty and mystery to the fjords . . . but maybe that's just me.

Upon arrival in Gundavngen, I was supposed to catch a bus back to the rail line at Voss. But when we disembarked form the boat, there was no bus to be found. I started to get a little worried since I had little turnaround between getting to Voss and hopping on my train. After 15 anxious minutes, the bus finally arrived and, because there were so many people going to Voss, a shorter bus as well.

I opted for the smaller bus, which proved fortunate, as it took us up a side road over 12 different switchbacks for one final view of the fjord. Or, at least, what we could make out throught eh fog and the clouds! Thankfully, the bus dropped us off in Voss in enought ime to get on the train back to Oslo.

5 hours later, I arrived in Oslo and got on a tram back to the hostel, getting back just after 11pm. Needless to say, I went straight to bed after that day!