Category: Travel

Two weeks is a long time to be away from home (“Tell that to the dog!” said Wanda the Wonder-mutt who spent our vacation in boarding… “Unfair!”), and while we weren’t totally champing at the bit to get back to Oregon, we were definitely looking forward to couch-time with Wanda and other homey delights. But, the journey back can and should be as interesting as the rest of the trip!

I’m sure you’re wondering, “Holy crap, how long were you guys gone for?” As mentioned at the outset, it was about a two week trip, and recounting it even in the format of a blog post has turned out to be a bit of a task. Traditionally folks often kept a “travel diary,” but with tech being tech, I’d been relying on smartphone camera roll-assisted wetware as my notes. So thanks for reading this far, and we definitely are well past the midway point.

It’s a bit over 300 miles from Bergen to Oslo. We’d originally considered renting a car and driving, but the winding roads through the mountains and the high cost of a one-way rental nudged us into buying train tickets. “Surely that’s gotta be easier than driving ourselves, and we’ll be seeing more scenery than if we were flying!” we said to ourselves.

When we mentioned to our friends that we were headed to Norway, the consensus response was that it’s “really expensive over there.” One friend in particular advised us to “avoid the $8 Bud Light!” (multiple levels of wisdom contained therewithin).

Over the past near-fortnight, we journeyed to Norway with brief stays in the UK on the way to and from. We landed in Heathrow Airport, and instead of taking the usual Heathrow Express, we took the London Underground (a.k.a. the Tube or the subway) which turned out to be longer and a more crowded ride (it was rush hour after all), but definitely less expensive.

We spent last weekend taking in the sights and sounds (and flavors) of Bainbridge Island, which is a lengthy stone’s throw west of Seattle. The weather on Friday was sunny and very much spring-like, but Saturday and Sunday had rain, wind, and chill (and was glorious).