Backpacking in Norway
30-May-2014 - 06-June-2014
Sometimes I feel there are things I really want to do but hesitate to, because of some kind of fear or anxiety. In these situations, I end up putting myself in circumstances where I can't choose not to do it. There is no way out, and then I start planning on how I'm going to overcome the fear with planning and determination.
During my last 2 weeks in Sweden as an exchange student, I wanted to travel alone to Norway, with a backpack and a tent and some food. I was scared about doing this, specially because it was my first time to do something so spontaneous and wild. I knew I would regret if I didn't so I seized the day and booked my tickets to Bergen, a city on the western coast of Norway, and near the fjords of Norway.
Day 1: Bergen
Here I am, with a backpack all alone in a country I don't know much about. The first day: I arrived at Bergen and met someone who invited me to visit his home in Trondheim, Norway. His name was Andy, and he was 56 years old. He told me all he knew about Bergen and suggested that I make my way up north. And so I decided, that I would head north and my final destination would be Trondheim. I found Bergen as a city to be very pretty and a happening place with many pubs and night clubs.
As I was trying to get to know Bergen better, I made my way from the famous fish market to the Bryggen houses and then to Bergenhus. Bergenhus is a huge fortress/park and the view of the city from up at one of the ends of the fortress is marvelous. I knew where I wanted to camp that night, there were not many people around and I had a great view of the city. It wasn't very late then and I knew I had a place to spend the night, so I decided to be in the city a little longer. The people here seemed friendlier than their Scandinavian counterparts so it would not be unusual if someone just randomly struck up a conversation with you.
After I got tired, I returned to the Bergenhus gate, but, to my surprise, I found out it had closed. For the first time, I felt like I was being really stupid to do this. I had no place to spend the night, it was around midnight by then. I couldn't go far up to the mountains because they too were occupied by private properties. My last option: to sleep in a park, and that is what I did on the first night. I slept on a bench in a park known to be full of drug addicts. I was very scared and could hardly sleep. After a few hours, I felt too cold( it was almost 4O celsius) so I woke up when it was bright, at around 3.30 looking for other options. And I found the only place I could retire for the rest of the morning was McDonalds. It wasn't that bad because the person working that shift offered me water and coffee since he was from Afghanistan and I was reading a book written by an Afghan writer. Day 1 didn't really according to plan, but the first day was never supposed to.
Day 2: Bergen -> Norheimsund -> Jondal
After visiting the tourist information centre later that day, I decided my route for the next 2 days. I was going to go to the Hardangerfjord region first. So I took a bus to a place called Norheimsund; realized how difficult it was to hitchhike, after a few attempts. When I got there, I was blown away by the vastness of the fjords. It was as if you could sit by the water for hours and hours and still want to be there. I stayed there for long and I just could not believe how perfect the scenery was.
Suddenly, trying to get my way around didn't seem so difficult. I felt I could go anywhere I wanted. Since there was no real place to camp in or around Norheimsund, I decided to cross over to the other side of the river. I met a guy called Wasim on the way. He was friendly and told me about his life back in Tunisia and how he came to Norway to learn Norwegian. He also promised to show me around Jondal, the place I was going to. It was amazing to see how quickly I was making decisions, I know I would be rather indecisive otherwise, perhaps because I was making these decisions with my heart, not my mind. Wasim showed me a nice beach near his house and I really liked that place. This was my next campsite. And it was perfect, with a view of snow covered mountains and hills, and still water in front of me. At the beach, I met two Norwegian girls, who were also camping there with their kids. Cecilie was working in the shipping industry in Bergen and had an 8 year old daughter Sylvana. Sylvana seemed to be a very happy and enthusiastic girl. Rebecca was a massage therapist in Bergen and she had a 15 year old son who loved metal music. I got along well with her and I was discussing with them whether metal music was anything more than screaming. They were all very nice people, I stayed up drinking cider with them and talking about Foo Fighters, bouldering and snowboarding. The next morning, I was going to go to the Folgefonna glacier with Sylvana and Cecilie.
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| View of the fjords at Norheimsund |
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| Hiking at Jondal |
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| Crossing the river, I slipped! |
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| Jondal mountains |
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| Campsite 1 at Jondal beach |
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| Campsite 1 at Jondal beach |
Day 3: Folgefonna -> Norheimsund -> Granvin -> Voss
I woke up early to go to the glacier with Cecilie and Sylvana. While they went snowboarding at the top of the mountain, I found a nice place to take a nap on top of a snow-covered mountain. Surprisingly, it was not cold at all, we were dressed in t-shirts and shorts.
One of the people driving snowmobiles asked me if I wanted to go to the top of the glacier ,I said yes and he took me there. I was so happy, I was screaming at the top of the glacier! After getting back and saying goodbye to them, I was on my to Voss. I was hitchhiking to Voss, and I was frustrated and immensely tired. However, after around 5km of walking through tunnels, a car did stop only to drop me 3km away. This way, somehow, I managed to reach Voss. Voss is a city which lies next to Naerefjord, the narrowest fjord in Norway. This place is also popular for extreme sports like paragliding, MBK, kayaking. I liked Voss and I found a great place to camp here too. As I was walking by the sea, a person asked me if I was lost or looking for something. We started talking and then he suggested me cities I should be visiting in Norway. Kenneth was 31 years old and seemed to be a very helpful and friendly guy. After I told him I wanted to camp on top of the huge mountain just in the backdrop of the city, he suggested to drive me half way up there. And so he did, but what lied ahead of me was a big challenging hike. I got to the beginning of the hike and realized it was 5km long up a very steep slope.It was the longest, hardest and most exhausting time/hike of my life. I almost fell and it was a bit dangerous. But all throughout, I knew it would be worth it, and also that I had no other place to go. It was getting darker, and I still had not got to the top. It took me 2 hours of hiking up to get there. But it was really worth every step. I found an abandoned ski resort at the top and spent the night there with this view.
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| At Folgefonna glacier |
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| Folgefonna glacier - Where I slept |
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| Skiing and snowboarding at Folgefonna |
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| The Hike - Getting steeper! |
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| And darker! |
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| The abandoned ski resort |
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| View from the top of the mountain |
Day 4: Voss and Kayaking
I was hoping to take the gondola back down from the top of the mountain but there were none until 15 days later. So I hiked down, Kenneth had mentioned that climbing down is the harder part because one tends to think that its easier and you are not as careful with their steps. I was so hungry after getting to the bottom, my throat was dry, and I was still exhausted, I felt like I was going to faint, I ran straight to get food, and that day I had 6 bananas in one go.
I took a kayaking course today and my guide was a Brazilian guy called Marceo. Before starting, he asked me if I wanted to take it easy and kayak in the ocean or go white water rafting in the river. Since I was looking for adventures, I went for the second one. At first, the river seemed intimidating, the flow of the water was very fast. My kayaking costume was really cool, I had really tight rubber clothes, with a skirt to not let the water enter the kayak. It didn't seem so hard when we got in the river, until my kayak flipped. We were in the high current part of the river when I lost control and my kayak flipped. I kept my calm and managed to get out of the kayak under water. I was trying to go for the kayak and save it from flowing with the river, when Marceo asked me to leave the boat and swim to the shore. But it was too late, I could hardly swim in that high current. I was panicking but it was probably nothing new for Marceo, he came to save me and I got to the shore by hanging on to his kayak. He then went to save my kayak and managed to do it with utmost ease. That wasn't surprising as he had had 24 years of experience in kayaking and had kayaked in New Zealand, Nepal, Africa and Brazil. We went in again and this time, nothing went wrong. I was in control and I felt amazing. Blue water, mountains, the sun, and freedom..I felt very powerful and strong. I thanked Marceo and he promised to tell me if he ever came to kayak in the Himalayas. Later that evening, I met with Kenneth again at an African music event in the city. He is passionate about skiing and kayaking, and that is why, he works in Bergen and lives in Voss, to be closer to his passions. He said he could give anything up for skiing, and that is one thing that always makes him happy. It was amazing how he described how passionate he was.
I was going to camp near the river tonight. I wasn't feeling very good: lonely and scared. Seeing other people with their family and friends made me miss my own. But then I thought that they are the reason I should keep going. I thought about how Faris and Alicia wish the best for me, and want to keep me going. I slept happily.
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Ready for kayaking! |
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| In Voss - Naerefjord |
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| My friend welcoming me to Voss and Norway! |
Day 5: Voss -> Myrdal -> Flam
I spent an hour trying to pack the tent in my bag but I wasn't successful, god! My backpack was very heavy and it was difficult to carry it around. My shoes were falling apart from the bottom. I haven't showered in many days now. If you wonder where I use the toilet, I would look for public toilets at train stations, restaurants and use them even if I didn't want to, to get everything out of the system before it becomes hard to handle ;) I was confused this morning, not knowing where to go next, I had heard of a train which goes from a village in the mountains called Myrdal to a city called Flam. This is one of the steepest trains in the world. I decided to go there. The journey was very nice, the view outside was too perfect. From the window of the train, I saw a huge waterfall and I knew I wanted to go there later today. I reached Flam and I felt like I was in Barcelona at first haha, Flam was a place packed with tourists and most of them were Spanish. A huge cruise was taking more than 200 Spanish tourists all around Norway.
My backpack became a burden now, things kept falling out, and I wanted to throw stuff out. And so, while hiking I felt like I was carrying another person on my back!
I hiked up another waterfall, which was really lovely. On my way to the other waterfall I saw on the train, I met a group of Swedish guys who drove me there. I realized that everybody loves backpacking tourists. I found the waterfall and decided to camp right in front of it. I have unlimited supply of fresh water and some leftover food. I felt very good here and due to the sound of the waterfall, I had the best sleep in a long long time.
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| Myrdal - The mountain village |
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| The view from Flamsbana railway |
Photographs from Flam
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| Camping under Rjoandefossen waterfall |
Day 6: Flam -> Sogndal
Most people I met in Flam were old people. It was funny though, they all started looking the same to me, because everyone behaved the same way. I imagine that most of these people spend their lives making a lot of money to stay in these expensive hotels, eat at nice restaurants and now their only goal is to travel the world. I don't like this plan though, what if you wait all your life to get old so you can travel but you happen to die before you even become that old. And when you're old, you can't even do most of the things young people can. It would be harder to meet new people, and for sure, you wouldn't take risks at all. I woke up this morning and remembered where I was, under a huge waterfall. I recalled that, on average, I was walking between 10 to 15 km everyday. I was exhausted again, there was no more food left and I was far away from the city. My legs hurt because of the way I had to carry my backpack.
I went from Flam to Sogndal today, a much quieter city. I met people during my journey, Andy from Scotland and Andrea from Slovakia. We talked about Andrea's experiences working at a hotel in Iceland and then coming to Flam and Andy's journey through Asia.
I spent all evening sitting by the fjord, reading, talking to myself with the most beautiful view. I camped in a huge green field next to the water surrounded by the mountains. Dammit, I just realized that it has started raining, glad I have this tent with me. And I missed something from today, while I was sitting by the water this evening, a girl was kayaking near the shore. She came towards me, and we shook hands while she was on the kayak, it was funny. Her name was Anna and she is a teacher. She was beautiful, and equally down-to-earth. I realized that when she was so modest about how she kayaked.
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| At Sogndal |
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| Bridge going to Sogndal |
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| Camp at Sogndal |
Day 7: Sogndal -> Gudvangen -> Bergen
I forgot to mention that the field I was camping on last night was actually a sheep herding ground, and there was sheep poop everywhere. Felt like it had strategically been placed everywhere so nobody can camp there!
So this morning when I woke up, I was scared as an animal was trying to knock my tent down. There were many more sheep, I tried to shoo them but later, when they seemed angry, I just ran.
As I was sitting by the sea last night, I felt like I didn't want anything more, no money, power, fame.I would just be satisfied with being here and somehow getting to see my friends and family again.
I also thought that Norway is the best place to be for a thinker or an artist. The natural beauty of Norway has the strength to inspire many artists in today's time, and create something similar to the artworks during the Renaissance period. People here have been very kind to me, if I forget my hitchhiking experiences. As I am on my way back to Bergen today, I think I will remember Norway as the place that would be most alike to heaven if it exists! My time here has been short, too short for a place like this. And although I couldn't make it to Trondheim to meet Andy, I saw places and had experiences that gave me a short but powerful glimpse into the beauty of Norway. I'm glad I did this!
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| They seemed angry! |
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| Good life :) |
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| I survived Norge! |
