Seagull eggs

A couple of weeks ago we mentioned to The Natives that we were curious about eating seagull eggs. AL's northern connections delighted us once again last weekend when she delivered six gorgeous eggs and a recipe: "Kok i 15 minutter. Loff, godt smør, Mack øl."

The recipe is simple: white bread, good butter, seagull eggs, salt, pepper, and Mack beer.

Norwegians are very fond of open sandwiches (smørbrød) and boiled eggs are a very common topping. Mack beer is brewed way up north in Tromsø. Seems legit.

Two egg halves cover a single piece of bread nicely.

The eggs themselves are 1.5 to 2 times bigger than a large chicken egg. The shells are thin and adorably speckled. There isn't anything particularly interesting about the white stuff but the yolk has a noticeable caviar flavor.

Seagulls are obnoxious; This is what revenge looks like.

I can certainly appreciate why they are prepared so simply. I'm not a fan of Norwegian food but this is exactly the kind of stuff that they get right.

Thanks to AL's family we get to scratch one more item off of the Norwegian-wildlife-that-we-would-like-to-eat list!

Keiko's gravrøys

The Natives recently asked us if there was anything we really wanted to do in Norway but had not done yet. The first answer that came to mind was visiting Keiko's burial mound.

Anyone that was in school in Oregon in the mid-nineties remembers raising money to build a rehabilitation tank for Keiko at the Oregon Coast Aquarium. Most of us had the opportunity to visit Keiko on field trips (during one of my field trips there was a photographer on-site supporting this product).

After Keiko died he was buried on the shore of the fjord where he had been living. He was a local celebrity so the local school children honored him by building a cairn on top of his grave.

The reason we hadn't visited Keiko yet was because his fjord is in the middle of nowhere and is only accessible by car. The Natives offered to take us on a roadtrip so we hit the road before they could change their minds.

This is the view from an arbitrary parking lot about an hour from Trondheim. Not pictured: cute little seabirds with orange straws for noses that sound like squeaky toys.

I left the safety of the parking lot to get closer to the pink flowers. At one point in time I upset a flock of seagulls and was very relieved when they didn't attack me.

The same location as the preceding photo but looking in the opposite direction.

Becca's geocache-sense was tingling when she saw this large, old tree near the road. She climbed up and took a look around.

Keiko's burial mound attracted thousands of visitors per year for several years after his death.

To get to the beach you have to park your car next to the road and then walk down a hill through a lush meadow. Pretty much everything that is worth seeing in Norway requires some sort of a hike.

The vegetation in the meadow seemed to grow unnaturally large. Pro tip: if you want to grow award-winning squash bury a whale in your garden.

This barn is located about 100m from Keiko's burial mound.

Taknes Fjord seems like a nice place to die.

Most of the stones have artwork or personal messages written on them.

We had a great day and we were happy to see that Keiko was able to spend time in such a beautiful place.

A good week for food

On Tuesday, May 27th The Natives invited us over to their place for a delicious, fancy dinner. For lunch on Saturday we had our Swiss friend over for beef fajitas from the grill. Then, still on Saturday, we went back to our Swiss friend's house for fondue dinner. The food that week was good enough to warrant a blog entry.

My new favorite way to eat halibut: pan fried in a mixture of flour, butter, salt, and pepper. It's traditional in northern Norway and the world definitely needs more of it.

I don't even know where I would go to purchase duck in Norway but that's OK because The Natives know how to both purchase and prepare it.

A delicious Springtime desert served on an real-life, Norwegian, grandma's plate.

The trick to being happy with Norwegian beef is to marinate the heck out of it. And then marinate it some more.

In the foreground: authentic, bubbling Swiss fondue. In the background: fresh pretzels made by Becca.

Tom Waits-løpet

We were determined to join this year's Tom Waits Run in Trondheim because we missed it last year. It started at 2pm and we eventually bailed at around 9pm because we were tired of standing in queues. Overall, it was a fun experience but the crowd was mostly composed of old folks in groups so we kind of just felt like we were loaners crashing a series of retirement parties (the lame kind of retirement parties where beer costs $15 a bottle).

The Raindogs Duo were our favorite band of the night. The keyboardist looked like he was having a great time and the singer absolutely nailed the Tom Waits voice.

These guys were called Bushmills and they had all of the necessary instruments to execute the loungy Tom Waits songs. They did an especially great job with "Tom Traubert's Blues."

On May 24th in Trondheim the sun doesn't set until 10:47pm (as opposed to 8:41pm in Eugene). We snapped this photo of Spring flowers on our way home at 9:15pm.