A MEMORABLE NORWEGIAN SOJOURN : SECTIONS 1 & 2 - THE JOURNEYS TO OSLO & ALESUND

ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I acknowledge my gratitude and  thanks  to Google, Wikipedia , the various blog spots,  magazine articles and travel guides for the inputs provided by them all the four countries of Scandinavia- Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland . The information provided by them has vastly helped me to connect to connect my photographs with the history linked to these places.

               Though I visited all the four Scandinavian Countries almost 5 years back, in October 2010, I could sit down with determination only in 2015 to compile this blog.  Better late than never!  Five years could be a  period long enough for many of the old landmarks to yield place to newer ones. So in that sense my blog may already have become outdated in some places . It could require an updating with new photographs. If it does, then I shall certainly do the needful-- --provided I happen to revisit these countries (by the Grace of God, certainly !)   Travel often makes you acknowledge humbly the role of the 'Invisible Hand'. This  term extends beyond just the economic forces that  many economists are often inclined to refer to !

          Through this blog post, I thank my various friends and relatives   for their overwhelming  warmth and hospitality during all the occasions when they hosted me at their homes . I also thank them for by sparing their valuable time for me and escorting me around in new places, helping me to accomplish  sight seeing in otherwise remote and difficult places. I also thank my various co-travellers from different parts of the world for their enjoyable company,wit, humour and camaraderie during our journeys together. They made each of my  sojourns very memorable ,without an exception.

      I request viewers to please excuse me for the poor photography. Scandinavia was the first time when I handled a compact digital camera for an  intensive use. I was not familiar with the subtle nuances of photography in changing conditions of light and weather. Also our  sightseeing bus did not stop at many a place to enable us to take better shots under static conditions (without the interference from rain-splattered or dusty windows).

           Sadly,  time, tide and sightseeing buses / trains wait for none!

  A MEMORABLE NORWEGIAN SOJOURN : SECTIONS 1 & 2  THE JOURNEYS TO OSLO & ALESUND 

Section 1-   The onward journey to Alesund , Norway

Had it not been for the generous invitation of my former school classmate, Sundari, ,  Norway would have figured very low on my priority list for sightseeing. Though Scandinavia is blessed with abundant unspoiled natural beauty, the high cost of living there coupled with the cold weather conditions act as deterrents to many Indians in firming up their travels plans to this region. In 2009 Oslo was ranked as the most expensive city in the world. (Maybe we need to take travel tips from Oslo’s 21,000 strong Pakistani community which has been comfortably ensconced there since long.)  Apart from being grateful to Sundari for chalking out meticulously a low budget travel plan for my co-traveler, Jagannath and me, I should also thank her employer for posting her to the quaint and quiet fishing town of Alesund in the Sunnemore district of Western Norway.   Otherwise my Scandinavian sojourn would have assumed the rushed pace of a regular chartered tour, leaving me little time for stopping to ‘smell the flowers’ or listen to the ‘sounds of silence’ in the  breathtakingly beautiful Norwegian woods.

We stepped into Scandinavia on a clear September afternoon after the Finn -Air flight from Delhi   landed at the roomy and elegantly simple Vaanta Airport of Helsinki. It took   about seven hours of non-stop flying to cover this distance of 5228 kilometres. After the customs check, we had enough time for window shopping before boarding the next SAS flight to Oslo. We noticed that most of the other Indian transit travelers were bound to destinations in Southern Europe and very few to Norway. The polite Finnish officer at the immigration desk was ice-cool while quizzing a young immigrant lady from rural Punjab about the purpose of her visit to Barcelona. The lady communicated only through blank looks and sheepish smiles as she could neither understand nor speak English. I was surprised that her papers were cleared by him without much fuss. Fortune favours the foolhardy and footloose!

An aerial view of the city of Helsinki City (Finland) just before landing

                             Inside Vaanta Airport, Helsinki

 The flight to Oslo took an hour and a quarter to cover a distance of 715 kilometres. Oslo’s Gardermoen Airport is located 47 kilometres from the centre of the city.  More than 19 million passengers travelled through Oslo Airport in 2010, making Gardermoen the sixth busiest domestic airport in Europe (the share of domestic passengers being 8.6 million). 

                  The capital city of a country normally warrants a stay sufficiently long to understand its historical and cultural heritage.  The vibrant city of Oslo  is not only the cultural, governmental and scientific nerve centre   of Norway a hub of Norwegian trade, banking, industry and shipping, it is an important centre for maritime industries and maritime trade in Europe. In 2003, Oslo received The European Sustainable City Award and in 2007 Reader's Digest ranked Oslo as number two on a list of the world's greenest, most liveable cities. With 20 theatres and 50 museums to boast of, only a long stay would have done justice to understand this multi-faceted city.. However ( on the flip side), Oslo has been listed as one of the most expensive cities in the world along with such other global capitals as Zurich, Geneva, Copenhagen, Paris, and Tokyo.

Unfortunately, owing to slight deviation in our travel plans we could not break our journey at Oslo for half a day during our onward journey to Alesund. The result was that we were left only with half a day for Oslo sightseeing on our return journey to India. We were determined to cover Oslo on a war footing basis during this short duration

 While waiting at the airport to catch our next SAS flight to Alesund we could get a palpable feel of the energy in the place. As I keenly watched the people take bouncy steps along the long aisles past the numerous check-in counters, I was transported back to the opening scene of the film “Saturday Night Fever” set to the pulsating beat of the song “Staying Alive”. (“….feel the city breaking in, and everybody shakin’, staying alive!….)  The long and rapidly changing flight information display is an indication of the heavy dependence of  the Norwegians  on air transport despite the mainland  Norway being slightly smaller than our largest state Rajasthan (with an area of 324,000 square kilometers)  .

We strolled outside to admire the architectural delights of the airport. There is a massive stainless sculpture of what looked to me like a giant trying to hurl a paper airplane. This is the “Utkast” by the artist Kare Groven. It was originally inside the old Oslo airport at Fornebu, but is now appropriately relocated outside, perhaps to allow the man to cover the world in his giant stride. When the new airport was constructed in 1998, the plan for ornamentation was to ‘stimulate the experience of the public when they arrive at the airport’.  The abundance of modern steel sculptures in the arrival halls and departure halls gives a ubiquitous sheen and a spanking new look to the airport everywhere.

         The striking presence of many non- Caucasian faces at the airport gave us an insight into the multi-cultural character of Oslo. A quarter of Oslo's population of about 600,000 consists of immigrants. This segment is expected to increase to between 44% and 51% around 2030. Between the period 1970 to 2007, the ethnic Norwegian population decreased by 10% while the immigrant population increased by over 800%. The major ethnic minority groups of immigrants are Pakistanis (21,000), Somalis (11,000), Swedes (9,000) & Poles (8,800). In contrast to other parts of the country, Oslo has a lower percentage of Christians with Muslims accounting for about 11% of the population. 

 The stainless steel sculpture “ Utkast” by the artist Kare Groven located at the entrance of Oslo Airport.                 

        

Oslo’s Gardermoen Airport has an energetic feel with its bright lights, the sheen of its numerous steel sculptures and with people moving around with a bounce in their walk.

As soon as we retrieved our luggage we boarded  the Airport Express Train along the high-speed Gardermoen Line to Oslo Central Station.  Oslo Central Station acts as the central hub and offers train services to most mayor cities in southern Norway as well as Stockholm and Gothenburg  in Sweden. Oslo has Norway's most extensive public transport system. This includes the Oslo Metro,  the world's most extensive metro per resident, Oslo Tramway and the eight-line  Oslo Commuter Rail .

After settling down at our hotel, we headed for Frogner Park located in the heart of the city. Oslo has a large number of parks and green areas within the city core, as well as outside it. The 600,000 inhabitants are spread out over an unusually large land area. Of the total metropolitan area ,  two thirds consists of protected areas of forests, hills and lakes. Surrounded by green hills and mountains, Oslo’s beauty is enhanced by its location between fjord and forestland. There are 40 islands within the city limits. The horseshoe shape of the city means that any point within the city is relatively close to the forest. There are 40 islands  and 343 lakes within the city limits of Oslo.  

 Our taxi driver was a Pakistani and most of the cab drivers that we saw were either Pakistanis or Somalis. Likewise the market places were teeming with immigrants. The population currently increases at a record rate of over 2% annually, making it the fastest growing capital in Europe. This growth stems from immigration as the native Norwegian population in the city is actually decreasing, The immigrant share of the population in the city proper now counts more than 25%(about 152,000 inhabitants) With the immigrant population accounting for about 82% of the population growth of the city, the share of the immigrants is  predicted to increase to almost half of Oslo’s population around 2030.

 Frogner Park or Vigeland Park is the biggest and most reputed park in Norway with a large collection of sculptures of Gustav Vigeland . It contains over 212 sculptures  in bronze, granite and cast iron, the notable ones being the  Obelisk and the Wheel of Life.

            “The Obelisk”  at Frogner ( Vigeland) Park

   The “Wheel of Life”  inside Frogner ( Vigeland) Park

Inside Frogner ( Vigeland) Park

        " Slottet" is the home of the Norwegian Royal Family

                             

The National  Parliament of Norway—the Storting

                                 he National Theatre, Oslo

The National Theatre is the largest theatre in Norway and is situated between the Royal Castle and the Parliament Storting .

      50 different museums are located around the city of Oslo

                   The Old Building of the University of Oslo

       Vignettes of   OSLO CENTRAL RAILWAY STATION

But when one is confined to the aseptic precincts of the airports for too long, one does not get the feeling of having arrived in the country. We were restless to step into Fjord Norway, whose pictures in’ The National Geographic’ had whetted the wanderlust in me from my early schooldays. Our flight from Oslo to Alesund’s  Vigra airport was a short one taking only 45 minutes for  a distance of 565 kilometres..  The 16 kilometre journey from Vigra island to the mainland of  Alesund   involves the crossing of three undersea tunnels connecting the islands of Vigra, Valderoya, Ellingsoya  and Alesund in that order.  The combined length of these three tunnels is 11.5 kilometres  and the longest tunnel is about 4.2 kilometres.. By the time we settled into our beds it was past midnight.  I found it hard to believe that I was still fresh as morning dew despite having been awake since 3 o’clock in the morning and having travelled 6335 kilometres wheeling my baggage through various counters in four different airports! My schoolboy dream had come true during my middle age! God bless my classmate and may he bless her employer too for not posting her to a smelly, sooty industrial city!

                Section 2-  
 Alesund – Picture –Postcard Perfect!

The next day started off on the right note being greeted a soothing view of the deep blue sea , the sea gulls and the island of Godoy with its lighthouse at Alnes, all in a single range from the window  of our room at Radisson Blu Hotel.  The trawlers and passenger ferries anchored on the jetty just beneath our window were tantalizingly close enough to beckon us to jump off on them. A short walk away from our hotel was the Brosundet, the guest harbor for leisure craft.  We did a quick reconnoiter of the quay.

  Alesund can rightly claim to be the fishing capital of Norway, having  the most important fishing harbour in as also possessing one of the most modern fishing fleet  in Europe. The town’s low population of less than 43,000 belies its importance in a country which is the 10^th largest fishing nation in the world having an annual catch of more than 2.5 million tonnes.  Norway has a coastline of over 25,000 kilometres, the eight longest in the world. Thanks to its unique and innumerable fjords, Norway has a high coastline/area ratio of almost 82%.

       However the fact  that even this population qualifies Alesund  to be  the largest city in the  More og Romsdal county is  an indicator of  the low density of population of Norway at 12 per square km (in  contrast  to India’s 324 per square kilometer). Unless one is connected with the fishing industry, in the itinerary of a first time visitor to Norway, Alesund often gets relegated to that of a brief stop-over for visitors en route to Hjorund and Geiranger fjord,. Fortunately for us, the lavish hospitality of our hosts, Sundari and her colleague Smitha, kept us in a tension free state to enjoy   leisurely strolls in this picture postcard town. Soaking in the sun at every cosy corner, we were the perfect practitioners of ‘dolce far niente’- pleasant relaxation in carefree idleness!

  Despite being located at 62.5 degrees north, barely 650 kilometers from the Arctic Circle, Alesund boasts of a weather considered moderate by standards of continental places located on similar latitudes in say Canada or Russia.  This is owing to the warm Gulf Stream currents from Mexico warming up the shores. The town is compact enough to be covered by foot within a day and the sights are varied and breathtaking.

There is a fresh, spic and span look about Alesund. It is a very young town considering that it   had a Phoenix like resurrection from the ashes of the Great Fire of 1904. On the night of 23 January 1904, Alesund was subject to one of the most terrible of the many conflagrations which have rewritten the history of several Norwegian towns including Oslo and Bergen. Practically the entire town was destroyed during the night, the damage having been hastened by a gale. The entire populace had to leave the town in the middle of the night with only a few minutes' notice. It was indeed miraculous that only one person (a 76 year old lady) died, though more than 10,000 people were rendered homeless.

 When Kaiser Wilhelm of Germany heard about the fire he personally took the initiative to raise funds. After the fire, he sent four warships with materials to build temporary shelters and  barracks . After a period of planning, the town was rebuilt in stone, brick, and mortar in Jugendstil (Art Nouveau), the architectural style of the time. The town has an unusually consistent architecture, most of the buildings having been built between 1904 and 1907 in a special version of the Art Noveau style, the dragon style. Intricately detailed turrets, spires, beautiful ornamentation using faces of beautiful women as decorations and motifs from nature are some of the striking characteristics of this architectural style.

 Having loitered around sufficiently in the cobble-stoned streets, it was now time for us to catch one’s our breath. The park adjoining Kremmer Gaarden was the perfect place to sit back and watch the world go by while admiring the still waters of Brosundet. It inspires the latent artist in you to capture the reflection of the Art Noveau Buildings like Hotel Brosundet on a canvas. The harbour also hosts the Annual Boat Festival (which also has the Norwegian Championship in Cooking as a feature.). Alesund is also the site of the annual Norwegian Food Festival. The disgorging of visitors by leisure crafts anchored in the Brosundet is a testimony to Alesund’s popularity as  a  tourist attraction, both due to its picturesque town center and its proximity to two  major fjords, the  Hjorund and the Geiranger fjords, the latter being on UNESCO’s  list of  World Heritage Sites.

Vignettes of the Brosundet,the guest harbour for leisure craft, as seen from an adjoining park. The greenish building to the right is  Hotel Brosundet , reputed to be Norway’s finest boutique hotel. It houses the  restaurant, Maki, which  serves some of the best seafood in Norway.

                       Other Vignettes of the Brosundet,

                                      

Jugendstilsenteret (the National Centre of Art Nouveau). This museum chronicles the catastrophic fire of Alesund in 1904 and the challenging reconstruction of the town in Art Nouveau style thereafter.

Alesund abounds with several striking buildings exemplifying the Art Noveau Architecture, like that of Rica Hotel Scandinavie (above) and buildings like the one below.

 Walking down the cobblestoned streets of Alesund is a

 pleasure. The air is so clean and bracing

                   

While walking down the cobblestoned streets of Alesund , you 

could also choose to relax in the open at its numerous street

 cafes.  There's no fear of  air, traffic or noise pollution.  Could

 this be the template for paradise ?

  Did it require a fire to give an impetus to Art Nouveau at Alesund or would it have evolved naturally in the course of history? It was too taxing a poser for my hedonistic self! Having wandered sufficiently all over the town to savour the architectural quaintness of the buildings alongside the cobble-stoned streets, I realized that I would be missing out on the natural beauty that the surroundings of Alesund offered. It was now time for a getaway to the hillocks nearby.

            We next head towards the Alesund Church at Kiepervikgata . Gata  is the Norwegian term for street.  Winding our way through a couple of more ’gatas’ we land ourselves at the Alesund Museum, which is housed in a cosy double storied cottage. It gives you a fair insight into the history of the place. The entrance ticket at 50 Norwegian Krones (NOK), (about Rupees 410 each), was a bit steep considering the relatively limited exhibits. However, it gave us  two budget  travelers  a 'veneer of sophistication’ for making a genuine attempt to immerse themselves into the history and culture of Norway ! Otherwise, back home in our social circles, we were in the danger of being branded as a philistines looking nothing beyond the gastronomic delights during the tour.

The U Boat at the Alesund Museum. The U Boat was a German submarine used during World War 1. It is the short form for"undterseeboot" (literally undersea boat)

We next headed to the Town Park. Nestling comfortably in the shade of the trees is the statue of Gange Rolv  ( Gangerolf) , the 10th century founder of the dynasty of the Dukes of  Normandy. 

Statue of Gange Rolv (Gangerolf), the 10th century founder of the dynasty of the dukes of  Normandy.

We brace ourselves for climbing the 418 steps that wind their way up the Aksla Mountain taking you to Fjellstua, the prominent mountain lodge at the top. Alesund lies at the foot of the Aksla Mountain with the Heissafjord on one side and Grytafjord on the other.  The hilltop of Aksla is the best place to give you a bird’s eye-view of the pretty town. In the distance you can see the island of Vigra, on which the Alesund airport is located.  Also visible are the smaller islands of Valderoya, Ellingsoya and the larger island of Godoy. Underneath the expanse of water are the underground tunnels between Alesund and Vigra via other islands. They are depicted on the visitor’s guide map at Fjellstua.

The town of Alesund as seen from the top of Aksla mountain. In the distance is the island of Godoy. It houses the Alnes lighthouse ( built in 1876 and is protected as a relic of Norwegian coastal culture).

 The reflection of the woods of Aksla Mountain captured in the placid waters of its lake.

 The next day we headed towards Atlanterhavsparken in Teunset, a five minute drive from the heart of Alesund. This place hosts several giant landscape salt water aquariums. A special attraction is the feeding of the penguins at the appointed time of 14.30 hrs every day. Likewise fish in the giant aquarium are fed by divers each day at 13.00 hrs.

                Penguin feeding at Atlanterhavenparken, the unique salt water aquarium of Alesund

The scary yet charmingly sinister looks of the Wolfe Fish, a carnivore fish. It is found offshore in cold waters below 5 degrees Centigrade. If looks could kill! But fortunately, the aquarium of Atlanterhavenparken  protected us from its deadly intentions !

Thanks to the generous supply of home food by our caring hosts and the rich spread in the complimentary breakfasts of our hotel, we were already finding it difficult to squeeze into our trousers within a week of our arrival. It was time to take a cue from our body language and trek to Sukkertoppen (Sugar Top) Hill on the outskirts of Alesund. The financially deterring alternative was the revamping of our wardrobe in an expensive Scandinavia!

Sukkertoppen (Sugar Loaf Top) is Alesund's most popular mountain as can be seen by the continuous stream of hikers and also the dogs accompanying them. The top is located on the island Hessa, which together with the islands of  Aspoya and Norvoya defines the heart of Ålesund. The 1.8 kilometre trek to the peak at 315 metres takes less than an hour. Going to the mountain top   was half the fun and we were richly rewarded with an all round panoramic view of the island of Alesund.

The views from the top are extensive, and Alesund is "blessed" having such a viewpoint just outside its city center.

Alesund as seen from Sukkertoppen (above and below)

The ‘ Gunnar Langya’ one of the largest trawler ships in the world parked in the jetty abutting  Hotel Radisson Blu, Alesund where we were staying. This photo was taken from our hotel room which was so close to the trawler that we could have almost jumped on to the trailer ( the only restricting factor being the social decorum to be observed by law abiding civilized human beings !)

           Not everything about Alesund is fishy!  Its surroundings host a large furniture industry. Some well-known household items are manufactured here. When oil was found in the North Sea in the 1970s, the local fishing fleet ship owners were quick enough to smell an opportunity beyond their regular catch of fish. They started rebuilding fishing vessels to serve the infant oil exploration and production industry. In the process, they were able to build purpose designed offshore vessels at local shipyards to serve the North Sea oil adventure even better. Through leading offshore supply ship owning companies today, this activity has become the mainstay of the residents in and around Alesund. Beneath the laidback façade of the town, there lies a shrewd sense of commerce among the Alesundians.  Who says that business and pleasure cannot mix without polluting the natural environment ?
                  Perhaps , we Indians have a lot to learn from Alesundians and other Norwegians. But before we start our eco-conservation measures in India, the challenge before our think tanks in our country is to arrive at a low population density of 12 persons per square kilometer (knowing that the last valiant attempts made almost 40 years back brought about a historical political upheaval)!