Planica

After visiting the Holmenkollen ski jump in Oslo I was determined to look at the Slovenian ski jump at Planica again to compare the two. I had been to Planica several times, the last time a few years ago in winter time to watch a competition (it was winter and cold and I only went because Marko was invited and we had tickets). Otherwise I used to go there in summer a few times as a child. I recall that there were wooden steps that lead all the way up and that it was very scary just to look down where the ski jumpers are supposed to jump.


I examined the ski jump just after my trip to Jalovec, after all the starting point for that hike is the parking lot across from the ski jumps. The steps that lead up are now made of steel and there is no sign of the wooden steps that I remember from my childhood years. There is also a ski lift that carries ski jumpers so they don’t have to walk up there but it seems it only operates in winter. I wonder why they don’t operate the ski lift year round and charge admission to tourists to make some extra income, just like they do at the Holmenkollen where they charge admission for riding the elevator. For now, walking up there is free with a warning that people do so at their own risk.


The steps lead only up to the table where the ski jumpers take off into the air. The rest of the way to the top where they start accelerating for takeoff is closed for visitors. But even looking down from the table is totally scary, the landing area is so far away and behind the slope that it isn’t even completely visible and I can only imagine that from the top where the ski jumpers take off it is so much scarier. I have new respect for the ski jumpers who dare to take off from there.


The one thing that really surprised me is that the table is so low, it seems almost like just a large step. I guess in winter when it is all covered in snow it gives a different impression because I always thought that the jumpers fly so very high up in the sky. I realize now that comparison of Holmenkollen and Planica is not relevant since Planica is a much larger ski jump, to be precise it is not really a ski jump but a ski fly. Vikersund in Norway would be a comparable construction but unfortunately I didn't get a chance to see it.

Jalovec

It was another of my home alone weekends and obviously I went hiking. Fortunately for me, Marko’s flight for a business trip was so early on Saturday morning that I was able to drop him off at the airport and park my car at my starting point and be ready to start hiking at 6:10 in the morning when it was just barely starting to dawn. So I had the whole day ahead of me and that is why I picked Jalovec, the 4th highest mountain in Slovenia at 2645m. Getting to the summit and back is just feasible in one day.

It was such a beautiful day and as I climbed higher up the rock wall I realized that it has been a long, long time since I last went somewhere that high. I also realized that I have to upgrade my equipment as nowadays it is almost mandatory to wear a helmet to protect the head from possible falling rocks. Years ago we never bothered with such stuff but this time I was almost the only person without a helmet. I saw only two other people without helmets and another two people with bicycle helmets which I am not sure is the best protection against falling rocks.

Some people also wore alpine harnesses which could be used to attach themselves to the fixed steel cables that run up the mountain. But they were not very useful on Jalovec because most of the route has only steel stakes but no cables so there is nothing to which one could attach the harness. There is only the steep cliff and those stakes to offer some safety. Climbing up there is definitely much scarier than a roller coaster ride. I don't have any photographs from those parts of the climb, I needed all my hands and feet on the wall.

It took me just over 10 hours to get back to my car, tired but exhilarated. This is the way to the summit:

Denmark

We had to spend one last night in our tent because it is such a long ride back home that we couldn't do it in one run. We decided to have a quick look around Denmark. We had both been to Copenhagen before but haven’t seen anything else in the country. After a quick stop in Jelling with Denmark's oldest church we decided to go to Silkeborg. There is an interesting museum that has a mummified body of a man from about 300 BC. A museum curator was there at the time and he told us the story of the Tollund Man as the body is called.

It was a well preserved body that was discovered around 1950 and it was first assumed that it was the body of a current murder victim since it still had a rope around its neck from which it was probably hanged. So the discoverers of the body called the police and fortunately the police officer was also an amateur archeologist who immediately realized that the body was ancient. So they packed the body and sent it off to the University research center. But the people at the University thought it was probably a prank and didn’t bother to open the case for at least two weeks during which time the body started decomposing. When they finally examined it they realized what a significant find it was. They were able to examine the contents of the stomach so it is known what the victim ate prior to his death: porridge from various grains and seeds. The people of Silkeborg celebrate the find each year with a festival where they serve this porridge. They feel very proud that such an important find came from their town. And no, I didn’t take any photos of the Tollund Man, it was too creepy.


And that more or less completes the story of this year's vacation. We drove a total of just over 7.000 kilometers in just over two weeks. If I were to do this trip over again, I would definitely go with a campervan. Which I might rent in Scandinavia and fly there to avoid having to drive across the hundreds of kilometers of never ending Germany and some Austria and Denmark in between. I wouldn’t take sunscreen and a swimsuit with me because I wouldn’t need it. Or I might have gone in July which is supposed to be the summer month in Scandinavia. I did enjoy the beautiful countryside, the people were extremely friendly and we didn't go bankrupt despite the fact that Oslo is supposed to be the world’s second most expensive city (second only to Tokyo) and Stavanger the world’s fourth most expensive (with Nagoya in between). A good thing we only went for coffee in Stavanger. And we absolutely splurged in Oslo where we had a hamburger and bad Norwegian beer.

Next year, we go somewhere warm!

Stockholm

We arrived at the Stockholm campground in early afternoon, just after it stopped raining and just before it started raining again. During the dry spell we managed to set up our tent and have something to eat. We went into the city in the evening, taking the Metro and heading straight to Gamla stan, the old town. After strolling around for a while we settled in a pub that displayed hundreds of different kinds of beer, many of them on tap. We asked the bartender for some Swedish beer but he just frowned and told us that all he had was a lager and an ale from a microbrewery. That’s it? In a pub with hundreds of beers they don’t have any good local beers to offer tourists? But we already knew that, Scandinavia is not known for beers or wines.


We spent the next two days sightseeing, mostly museums. The first on the list was the Vasa museum with the Swedish version of the Titanic. The Vasa ship sank when it first sailed out to sea and remained at the bottom of the sea until 1961 when it was raised, restored and moved to a museum. I was quite impressed with the museum as it displayed so much more than just the ship. A section of the museum is a reconstruction of one of the ship’s decks since the ship itself is off limits to tourists. Another section presents the results of a research project to determine what colors were painted on the decorations on the ship. And my favorite part is a section with bones of the ship’s crew and passengers, complete with facial reconstructions and whatever facts the researchers were able to gather from examining the bones. Obviously watching the TV series Bones had a huge impact on me; previously I would definitely have run away from human remains, but now I was curious to see what Bones would see.


Another interesting sight in Stockholm is the Ericsson Globe. It is just a sports arena, but with a circular dome and a funicular that runs up to the top on the outside of the globe. While nothing special really, they make a big show of how it was manufactured and it looks quite cool and futuristic so I had to go on a ride up there. It made me wonder why other sports stadiums don’t come up with the idea to generate additional income by making tourists pay so they can go up to the roof?


There was also a cute music museum with lots of musical instruments and instructional videos on how to use them so visitors could play them. I was thrilled that among the various styles of music that were on display, ABBA had its own category, with a display of the drums and keyboard that was allegedly used by the band.

After two days of wandering around the city we were tired and it was time to turn back for the long drive back home. On our way back we stopped at a roadside stop for lunch where I picked up a flyer advertising a moose safari. That was something that I would have liked to see but unfortunately it was too far away from where we were and we probably wouldn’t make it there before closing. I was sorry to have missed an opportunity to see a live moose, but who knows, perhaps next time?

Lysefjorden

This was the day we were supposed to go hiking. By now I probably don’t have to mention specifically that it was raining again. Packing up our tent in the rain became routine. We were hoping that – like the day before – the rain would stop and we would at least have a nice afternoon for activities. So we headed towards Lysefjorden, a popular tourist destination where we wanted to hike high above the fjord to the Pulpit rock, a scenic point with a view across the fjord. We took a ferry this time since there is no way to travel among the fjords except to either take a ferry across or a very long detour by road.


When we arrived at the foot of the hike it was still raining and there were no signs that the rain might stop soon. We realized that there were many people around us hiking and they didn’t seem bothered by the rain. So we figured we might as well do the same, put on our rain jackets and just go. It did actually stop raining soon after we set off and stayed that way for most of our hike. The view from the Pulpit rock was magnificent and the trip was well worth it. There is a mountain hut at the foot of the hike where we warmed up afterwards.

Our camp that night was the best ever (minus the cold and the wind and the rain, of course). It had free internet and a large cafeteria where we spent the evening drinking beers and checking our emails, nicely warm and dry. The next day we packed up our tent again in the rain and headed back towards Sweden. Our original plan was to stay another day to climb the Kjerag boulder, but that would have been a day trip and we didn’t want to hang around and wait for the weather to clear.


It was a good choice to drive on that day as it wouldn’t stop raining so riding in the car all day was efficient use of our time. We drove east on a road across the Hardangervidda mountain plateau which was a very scenic route.

Another interesting aspect of Scandinavia that we discovered during our trip was that their most common food is – believe it or not – hamburgers! In addition to McDonalds and Burger Kings everywhere they have no-name fast food places that serve hot dogs and hamburgers. These fast food places, located at gas stations, were more or less our only choice of food while driving across Norway and Sweden so I believe I have never eaten so many hamburgers per week in my life.

The fjords

After Oslo, we headed west, towards the fjords. With all the cold and the rain we tried to make reservations for some accommodation that would offer more shelter than a tent but after a few telephone calls I gave up realizing that everything seemed to be sold out and we should have made reservations a long time ago. Or gone with a campervan.


So we drove westward along the coast, again it took us most of the day to cover a distance of about 500 kilometers as there are no highways, there are speed limits, speed cameras, road works and all sorts of obstacles on the way so there is no way to get quickly from one place to another in Scandinavia. It seems they either don’t travel much by car or the population density is so low that building decent roads is not cost effective or they probably take a ferry or fly when they need to cover larger distances.


We arrived in Sandnes, a small town near the seacoast in the evening and checked into a campground. By now I was almost oblivious to the cold, damp, windy, rainy weather and just faced my destiny and hoped to survive. We were fortunate that this particular campground had a communal kitchen/dining room where we could cook our dinner and eat it in a sheltered place. The next morning it rained again, so what else is new? The forecast was that the weather would be clear in the afternoon so we spent the morning sitting around the dining room, making tea, spiking it up with authentic Norwegian vodka and waiting for the rain to stop so we could go bicycle riding to the city of Stavanger, about 17 kilometers away.


When the rain stopped the day turned almost sunny, although there was still a cold, cold, cold wind blowing. In addition to that, I managed to fall off my bicycle, skinning my left elbow and bruising all over, but I was relieved that nothing was broken and I was able to continue riding.


We had coffee in one of the restaurants near the harbor in Stavanger and I felt much better when I noticed that they had outdoor electric heating units that were switched on so we could sit outside and take in the sights while keeping warm at the same time. (Note: in case someone doesn’t believe me how cold it was, why would they use electric heating in August?)

Oslo

We arrived at the Oslo campground in late afternoon. It had just stopped raining so we could put up our tent. The one good thing about the windy weather in Scandinavia is that the ground dries soon after the rain because the wind acts just like a blow-drier. Marko and I went for a run and we planned to cook something for dinner in the evening and buy beer at the camp shop. But we discovered that they don’t sell alcohol after 8:00 PM in Norway so we were out of luck as far as beer was concerned. They sell beer and cider in supermarkets while wine and hard liquor can only be purchased from specialized shops. This reminded me of South Africa, except there only wine is sold in supermarkets.


Oslo is a fairly small city, just twice the size of Ljubljana. We could take in most of it by walking. A few sights were farther out so we did ride on a boat to see some restored Viking ships (yes, more Viking ships!). They also have a Metro train which we rode to the Holmenkollen ski jump. It is situated on a hill high above the Oslo fjord, visible from everywhere, and interestingly they built the Metro to reach all the way up there.


Having only seen the Slovenian ski jump at Planica in my life, I assumed that all ski jumps were built into natural mountains. So when I saw the Holmenkollen, which is a steel construction sticking high up into the sky, I was amazed. We went up to the top where the ski jumpers take off so I was able to see the same view that they see just before they jump: the entire city with the fjord below. Looking across at other hills in the vicinity, what do they have there? More ski jumps! It is as if every hill has a ski jump and no wonder the Norwegians are among the top ski jumpers in the world.


Interestingly enough, I believe that soccer is their second strongest sport, at least it seemed that way because we saw soccer fields and soccer matches almost everywhere we went. The kindergartens have miniature soccer fields and school age children who were on their summer vacations seemed to be in soccer camps. While the current Norwegian soccer team isn’t highly successful (they didn’t qualify for the last 3 world soccer championships) I am waiting to see what will happen in a few years when the younger generation grows up.


Another sight a tourist couldn’t possibly miss in Oslo is everything related to the Nobel prize, so we visited the town hall where the peace prize is presented each year and there is also a related museum. The museum mostly focuses on Fridtjof Nansen, a Norwegian who received the Nobel peace prize for his work with refugees.