The (possibly) last batch of the photos from Norway. The further away the holiday gets, the more I forget how impossibly expensive it was; and how impossibly beautiful it all was.
Norway photos part 2
Tag Archives: fjord
Norway photos pt 1
After being on holiday for two weeks at the end of July / start of August, and taking a lot of landscape shots, I think I landscaped myself out.
Both holiday locations (Wales and Norway) were beautiful, but I was compelled to shoot and edit and I think it all got a bit too much. So much so, that it wasn’t until this afternoon that I put the Wales shots on my PC from the external hard drive.
I had another pass through them, and found some more shots that I took in Norway that I liked but hadn’t edited.
Day 8 – Ã…lesund
Today we return home. We don’t have to check out of the hotel until 12, and we’re getting picked up to go to the airport at 1 – so that is good.
We’ve had a little potter around, but it’s a long day as we have to drive back from London airport when we land. 
Whilst in Norway I have learnt:
Driving is easy – there aren’t many cars at all. Roads are long and straight when driving to different places.
Everything is expensive. Except for petrol, which was strangely reasonable.
Day 7 -Molnes
For our last full day we drove to Molnes, Vigra. I think that it is still part of Ã…lesund, but it is on a different island.
It was a nice coastal walk, and the sun was shining. There were sandy beaches, rocks and mountains! 
We were both a bit tired though, so we came back not long after dinner time and had a nap.
Day 6 – Geiranger
Today was my turn to drive, and it was a longer day with several things happening. Firstly we were to drive to Stranda Ski Village to take the gondola up to the top of the mountain.
What a view! We sat down at the restaurant at the top and had some meat soup (yum!). We pottered about for a bit before taking the gondola back down. There was free WiFi up there too – so obviously we uploaded some piccies to social media 😉 And then I went on Pokemon…… 
Then we drove on to Hellesylt to get the ferry to Geiranger. This wasn’t quite as good as I was expecting. It was a nice hour journey, but it wasn’t the best. The views, as kB rightly pointed out, are better from higher up not lower down.
Once we were off the ferry we had two view points that I wanted to shoot from. The first one was in the opposite direction to home, and it was a really steep, really windy road. Because it was in the opposite direction it meant I had to drive up, and then back down it.
The second view point was up the Eagle Road, which was another steep, windy road but this was more like the troll road so it was a bit better to drive up. After that it was back to the hotel.
Day 4 – Godya
Today we picked up the hire car. I was somewhat nervous (to say the least!) but we set off out to Alnes because I wanted to see the lighthouse. This is about a 30 minute drive from Alesund, and so with the trusty sat nav on, off we went.
Getting to the Alnes was pretty straight forward, but I wasn’t too keen on the tunnels we had to drive through, the strips of light on the ceiling made my eyes go a bit funny. 
When we got there the lighthouse had scaffolding around it! So I was a bit annoyed as it was my main thing to photograph today. We walked around for a bit though, and found the beach. We then set back off to drive to the other side of the island where there was a hike to the top of the cliff.
On the way there we made a pit stop at another lighthouse. This one was without scaffolding, and the views were much better. 
We stopped there for a bit and admired the view. It’s odd how everything in the distance is blue. Blue and misty. The weather today has been hot again! The weather forecast predicted cloud and rain from 4, but it was mainly sunny and we had a thunderstorm at about 8.
The hike up to the top was a bit nicer than yesterdays. It was more smaller rocks, which means that the ground was, on the whole, much easier to walk up. It was still a steep uphill walk though. 
When we got to the top we had more great views, slightly different to those of yesterday because we were further south. We could even see a snow topped mountain in the distance.
At this point the sun went in for a bit, so it was the ideal time to whip out my skirt and take a selfie 😉 kB says I must be the only person in the world who climbs up mountains to get changed and take a picture 😛 
Day 3 – Sukkertoppen
After last nights post there was a lovely sunset.
The sun sets at almost 11pm, and rises again at 4am. It never gets past civil twilight, so it is never truly dark. 
It’s really odd to be going to bed when it is still light!
On to today. The weather forecast was predicting rain, but in actual fact it has been really hot. I’ve caught the sun on my chest and one arm v_v Who comes to Norway to get a tan? 
We set off just after 10am. As we don’t have a car we had to walk to the hike. This took us an hour.
We got to the start of the hike, where it is covered by trees and the ground a mix of mud, roots and rocks. The start of the hike is quite steep and the ground is uneven. 
After about 10 minutes we came to a viewing point, so we had a bit of a rest and a drink (After all we had been walking for an hour before this!)
Once you get out of the trees, it’s a bit flatter and easier to walk on. There is also the added bonus of no roots. As much as I love the look of an exposed root, they’re not the greatest to walk on. 
Towards the top it gets steeper again, but it’s just rocks. The views at the top are spectacular, and as it was a nice, sunny day we could see for miles.
At the top it was really hot. We sat down for a bit and ate some dinner before walking back down. The walk down seemed a lot easier, but we both really needed a drink, and as it was Sunday the supermarkets were closed. Luckily a little cafe had opened at 1, so we popped in there and got a slush puppy and a diet coke/iced tea (And a bit of a sit down) before walking the rest of the way back to the hotel.
A lovely day, which was nothing like the weather forecast predicted!
Manadh Photography 