Nordic Stuff

Nordic had a party at Kristiansten Fort on the 20th of May to celebrate various company milestones. We had dinner and then split into teams to play several Norwegian picnic games.

On the 23rd the Novel committee arranged a private tour of Nidaros Cathedral followed by a meetup at the microbrewery.

Apparently the cannons at the fort are fired whenever the king is in town; It seemed like a scheduled event.

The cannons are surprisingly loud. I was close enough to have my fight-or-flight instinct activated after the sound wave from the first shot displaced my spleen.

It's hard to plan outdoor events in the Springtime but we lucked out.

A handful of people ended up at Naboen after things closed down at the fort.

A little over 20 people showed up at the west side of Nidarosdomen for the tour.

Photographs aren't normally allowed inside the cathedral but we were the only people inside so they couldn't really tell us "no."

The occasional stained glass window breaks the monotony of the 172 steps that lead up to the tower.

From the tower: the view to the north includes the square with the statue of Olav Trygvasson as well as the island of Munkholmen.

From the tower: the view to the south includes the prominent NTNU administration building.

From the tower: the view to the east includes the Tyholt Tower.

The girl didn't seem to mind that I had tricked her into going for a hike.

The main organ was recently renovated and we were happy to hear someone practising on it during our visit.

The organ has a surprising number of knobs and switches in addition to the normal pedals and keys.

May 17th

This year the May 17th holiday landed on a Saturday. For some reason it doesn't seem quite as special if we don't get a day off from work. Luckily, the rain was finished around 10am and the rest of the day was rather warm. We made sure to attend a parade as well as eat our quota of pølse (Norway's national food, along with ice cream) so they wouldn't revoke our residence permits.

Becca's school has a fair where you can purchase baked goods, hot dogs, cotton candy, etc. I learned to walk on stilts while Becca mingled.

The parades start around 9am and don't finish until around 4pm. It only takes seven hours of leisurely shuffling to present 90% of Trondheim's population.

Bunads are our favorite part of the holiday.

A couple of small carnivals are set up around town. Imagine going to a county fair where everyone is dressed up for a wedding.

After the parades where finished we invited the Swedes and the Swiss over for a BBQ. We tasted various Belgian beers including a bottle of Westvleteren 12 that we had brought home from Belgium.

UK

The three of us woke up in Brussels and walked across the street from our hotel to the train station to catch the Eurostar to London. Because the train enters the UK you are required to pass through border control before you can board. Becca received a stern warning from the customs agent because her passport didn't have stamps to show that she had entered the EU. I was asked by the same agent if I "was a time traveler" because one of my stamps from Amsterdam was dated 2015. Naturally, the stamps that he gave us had an incorrect date (May 1st instead of 2nd).

A couple of hours later we arrived in London and took a taxi to the rental car agency. They tried to get us to upgrade various things and, failing that, they found a problem with our online reservation and used it to charge us an extra $160; add National to the list of bad rental car experiences we've had. Eventually they gave us the keys to a Toyota with only 800kms on the odometer. After spending 90 minutes fighting London traffic we jumped on the freeway and headed to York.

York is even more beautiful when the trees are blooming.

We spent one night haunting our favorite pubs in York and then managed to get all of our shopping done the following morning. We were eager to see Scotland so we were on the road by noon. After a couple of hours on the freeway we decided to transfer to the coastal road so the drive would be more interesting. Becca booked a hotel in Edinburgh using her cellphone and we checked into it by nightfall.

We hiked about half way up the Salisbury Crags in Edinburgh. Unfortunately, the grass along the path was taller than my tiny, Swedish tripod so there was only one place for me to take a photo.

We ended up spending two nights in Edinburgh and enjoyed the whisky and Scottish accent equally. The hotel we booked was more of an apartment and had a clothes washer as well as a full kitchen. Unfortunately, our room's clothes washer was missing its door because the previous tenant needed to leave during a wash cycle so the janitor simply removed the door in order to retrieve the clothes; The hotel gave us the keys to another room so we could use its washer. My mom was eager to get back to England, however, so we prepared ourselves for the trip south.

We drove past many sheep farms to visit Melrose Abbey on our way back to England: the surrounding farmland was almost as impressive as the ruins.

We took the scenic route south so we could visit the Melrose Abbey. Along the way we stayed in a very old hotel in Yorkshire that was originally a Victorian house from the 19th century. The next day, we drove further south into the Cotswolds and spent some time in Chipping Campden before heading to Bourton-on-the-Water. While enroute Becca found a nice B&B for us to stay in.

Bourton-on-the-Water is eerily quiet after the tourists have returned to their buses and gone home.

We were surprised to see these people shampooing a horse in the river in the middle of a small tourist town. We later learned that they were gypsies that were travelling to a nearby town for the purpose of setting up a temporary market on a piece of land that they own. Later, we saw a horse-drawn gypsy caravan that was stopped on the side of the road while its horses grazed on the grass that grows between the road and the fences of the adjacent farmlands.

The Cotswolds area is defined by the stones that are produced there. Many of the houses seem to be occupied by old women with impeccable gardens.

We left Bourton-on-the-Water and headed to Bibury on our way to Lacock.

This is a short path in Bibury that follows the water from the cottages to the mill.

It's impossible to visit Bibury without driving past the Arlington Mill.

Unfortunately, the place in Lacock where we had intended to have lunch had gone out of business a few months prior. We found a pub with WIFI and booked a hotel in Bath for the night.

I had already decided that wisteria was my new favorite flower by the time we arrived in Lacock. I'm disappointed that it isn't mentioned anywhere in LoTR.

If you squint really hard you may be able to see some of the fashionable ghosts from the 1800s that haunt the area around the Parade Gardens in Bath.

The Hilton hotel in Bath was a huge disappointment. We did, however, get to spend an evening in Bath and when we woke up we were less than an hour away from the Longleat.

One of the goals of trip was to be in Longleat for the giraffe feeding event. Even though the weather was rainy the animals were very active (I suppose they are accustomed to the English weather). Becca says: "Did you know that a giraffe can run at 35 mph for short distances and 10 mph for extended lengths of time?"

One of the themes from this trip was a children's show called 'Mr. Tumble and his Spotty Bag.' Unfortunately, it appears as though we have been bitten by the British accent because the proper way to sign 'giraffe' is notably different from what Mr. Tumbles taught us.

For a small fee you can feed the Parkland Deer. The part they don't tell you is that if you stop feeding them the more aggressive ones will kick the crap out of the door of your rental car.

Have you ever been close enough to a rhino to hear the sound of it tearing the grass out of the ground? It's amazing.

After we were finished with the safari we took a trip to the adventure park and rode the miniature train and the river boat. These sea lions (notice the ears) knew that the passengers on the boat were capable of feeding them and where therefore quite noisy.

We decided to head back toward London (via Stonehenge) and arbitrarily chose a hotel in Dover because we couldn't think of anything better.

The weather wasn't great at Stonehenge but there were relatively few visitors and the grass was very green. FYI, they opened a completely new Stonehenge visitor center last December.

It's actually impossible to miss the 'white cliffs' while visiting Dover.

Dover was a nice, quiet little town and we had fun ordering appetizers for dinner in the hotel restaurant 15 minutes before it closed. We drove a little bit out of town the next day to have breakfast at a pub that had particularly good ratings on the internet. Then we filled the car up with gas and pointed it back toward London.

We spent a relaxing afternoon in the Kensington Gardens for Mother's Day and enjoyed the afternoon tea service at the Orangery.

After we returned the rental car (in flawless condition) we checked into our hotel near the Tower of London. On Saturday night we saw 'The Book Of Mormon' and it was hilarious. On Sunday we visited the Camden Market and had high tea at Kensington Palace. On Monday we took a private car to Heathrow, ate breakfast, and flew home.

Belgium

My mom and I flew into Brussels and then hopped on the first train that we encountered that was heading to Bruges; apparently we chose the slowest commuter train possible. The trip was nice but we didn't arrive at the hotel until around 10pm.

I made a quick run to a nearby kebab restaurant and brought dinner back to the hotel. As it turns out, a couple of feathers in your chicken kebab is all it takes to make a mother vow to never eat kebab again.

Bruges really is a very pretty city. There is a reason why it's sometimes referred to as "The Venice of the North."

Pro tip: come here and take this photo early in your visit and then put your camera away and spend the rest of your time drinking beer here.

We really enjoyed our three nights in Bruges. Our hotel was located on Burg Square so we didn't have to walk very far to see anything and we were surrounded by beer, waffles, and french fries. My mom really enjoyed shopping for souvenirs and I managed to find a couple of these.

On Wednesday morning we found a proper train to Brussels (more than twice as fast as the first train) and checked into the hotel a few hours before we expected Becca to arrive. My mom was pretty worn out so we left her in the hotel and Becca and I explored the city. We only had one full day in Brussels and that day was a holiday (May 1st) so the public transportation was only partially running; thankfully, taxis are quite cheap in Brussels.

My idea was to have breakfast at a beer bar. Stinky, French cheese and sour, spontaneously fermented beer (mmm, fruity with a hint of vomit!) are both horrible breakfast ideas. The girls survived.

The Delerium Cafe is a great place to get a beer and use the toilet if you are wandering around downtown Brussels. Unfortunately, after 5pm it's intolerable due to the hordes of 13 year old kids getting drunk.

I have literally worn one of these CBS shirts in every country that we have visited since the 2012 National Homebrewers Conference. It seemed especially comfortable in Belgium for some reason.

Brussels felt very much like an inexpensive version of some random neighborhood in Paris. Our bags were filled with chocolate and beer when we boarded the Eurostar train for London.

Amsterdam and Copenhagen

Becca and I flew from Gothenburg to Amsterdam and had one night to settle in before my mom arrived in the morning. As it turns out, April is the perfect time to visit the Netherlands because the weather is pleasant and every single flower in the country is blooming.

Obligatory canal photograph.

There was a little carnival in Dam Square. We weren't brave enough to ride any of the rides but we did take the opportunity to eat some carny food when we got caught in a rain storm while walking by.

We took a five hour bus tour out to the Keukenhof gardens. We drove by many farms like this one.

The flowers in Keukenhof were all basically perfect because they are grown somewhere else and then selectively replanted inside the park.

There were several water features in the park. It is a pretty big park.

A walk in the park is a great way to recover from an international flight.

The three of us spent one full day in Amsterdam and then headed back to the airport the next afternoon for a short flight to Copenhagen. Our main objective in Copenhagen was to see the zoo and we were not disappointed.

We hustled across the zoo so we could see the otter feeding event. We were horrified and delighted to discover that they were being fed baby chickens and mice. Becca still wants one.

The baby elephant was absolutely our favorite part of our visit to Copenhagen. He was mischievous and hilarious.

We decided to spend an evening in the Tivoli Gardens because the weather was nice and we wanted to see the fireworks. Unfortunately, a bomb threat at a nearby parking lot caused the park to be evacuated before the fireworks started.

We really like the ferry from Copenhagen to Oslo despite its reputation for being a rowdy booze cruise.

In Oslo we spent a couple of hours having lunch before boarding the six hour train to Trondheim. The trip was beautiful and we were home before the sun set.

We were in Trondheim for a total of six nights. During our stay we ate reindeer at Ai Suma, had The Natives over for a BBQ, took a drive around Jonsvatnet with Håvard, rode the train out to Stjørdal to have a delightful dinner on David's patio, and took a drive to see Hegra fortress with David. The girls also watched the Nordic soccer team lose 15 - 0.

Most of the tunnels were closed because it's early in the season but this was one of the main entrances to Hegra fortress.

There was still a bit of ice floating around the edges of Jonsvatnet.

On Sunday morning my mom and I boarded a plane and headed to Belgium.