Our Travels and Blog beginnings.

Roldal is a nice wee village at the end of a lake and hemmed in by mountains. Its about 380meters above sea level and this was probably our coldest night so far. Not that bad bit we did have a heater on in the evening before bed. We were up and breakfasted and took a wander over to have a look at the Roldal Stave church (stavkirke). Named after its construction method, its load bearing pine posts were called stafre in Old Norse, Stav in modern Norwegian.. Its a lovely looking wooden structure and it was a real disappointment to find it closed so we didn't get a look inside. Roldal is a place that looks like it deserves a bit more exploration, its such a pity there are no direct links from the UK to Norway. After a quick shop for a few supplies were back on the road, passed the closed Roldal ski centre-given the amount of snow up there it would definitely be open for a while yet if it was in Scotland,  and over a pass heading down towards Skare, or should that be scare- I had to s

The forecast had been better for today, so last night I had made up sannies and planned to get the troops up early so we could all walk up to Preikestolen, so, it was a disappointment to here the rain lashing off the van before we got up. It eased a bit, but the cloud was down to a low level on the hills so the plan was scuppered, some things just aren't meant to be. So we had breakfast, sorted things out and got on the road at our usual time of the back of 10. I wish this was an hour earlier as it has a knock on effect at the end of the day. We don't have definite places to park, we just drive a bit each day and see where we end up, but after a few days and not so many miles done it was time to get a bit further up the road, it was raining so might as well push on. We were following the 13 which is the Norwegian Scenic Route Ryfylke from Oanes to Roldal. Given the weather and the low cloud for the first section at least as far as the ferry from Hjelmelandsvagen over to Nes

It would appear that weather forecasting in Norway is about as accurate as it is in Scotland. Clearly the sea and the mountains make getting it right very difficult. It was supposed to be wet all day, and certainly in the fjords quite heavy rain. So, it was a bit of a surprise to waken up to nice blue skies. Apparently it had rained heavily during the night but my Tau induced slumber meant I heard none of it. I didn't have any sign of a hangover but we weren't up particularly early, so by the time we got breakfasted, blethered to our neighbours and redid the van for a few nights in somewhere more remote hopefully it was 10:40ish when we rolled out the campsite, not exactly a racing start. We hadn't visited the Swords in Rock so as it was only a couple of miles away we popped along there first. The monument was erected to commemorate the Battle of Hafrefjord in 872AD. It is modelled on 3 viking swords found in Norway. They are erected in the bedrock, not to be used anymore

We hadn't seen everything we had wanted to in Stavanger, our impromptu boat trip had taken up some of our time so we were torn as to whether to leave or stay a little longer. There was a lovely looking outdoor heated swimming pool right next to our campsite and the boys had been harping on since we got here that they wanted to go. So, it was gonna a bit tough to just head off and not give them a wee bit of what they wanted. After breakfast the decision was taken to head over so I went and spoke to the site manager to find out what time we needed to be out the campsite, there was no rush he said, so we could happily leave the van where it was and enjoy our swim. Over we went with swimming shorts and towels and went in, unfortunately swimming caps are mandatory, so on top of our entry price we had to buy 4 swimming caps also. Kching!! Never mind, hopefully it won't be our last swim in Norway. The pool was lovely and warm but unfortunately the main pool was 2 meters deep all over,

Before we even got here we had decided to stay a minimum of 2 nights in Stavanger, its a lovely city and a few of our friends had said there's plenty to see and do here so after a leisurely breakfast we headed into town to try and find some shops and have a look around the harbour and Old Stavanger area. On the way into town we passed one of Stavanger Museums, with a large whale skeleton outside. Unfortunately this part of the museum is shut on a Monday so we headed down and came across a Reme1000 store next to the bus station. We popped inside to get a few supplies and check out supermarket prices to see if our Norway trip could last 2 months, or just 2 weeks. The first thing anyone said to us before we came away was "Oh Norway, bloody expensive place"....this became so tiring after a while. We had actually done a little research and listened to people in the know. Aye its not cheap, but  having holidayed the Swiss, French and Italian Alps over the years I was pretty sur

All over Scotland someone has been graffti'ng the back of road signs and rock faces saying "the earth is flat"...... Well, its actually true......we woke got on the go, turned one corner and discovered Norway is flat too. At least it is in the south west corner between Egursund and Stavanger. This area called Jaeren is a bit like the east coast of Scotland around Berwick and Dunbar, pretty flat and productive farmland of both arable and pastoral types. It was quite a contrast to the area we had passed through yesterday. The weather had improved and the sun was back out. We followed the 44 north westwards towards Stavanger, its a nice easy drive and follows the Jaeren National Scenic route. This bit of coastline has many miles of beaches, we went for a walk along the superb yellow sands at Ogna. The sand was strange as it was never firm, from the back of the beach right to the waters edge wherever you walked you sank in an inch or 2. It also had weird, steep sid

It was a lovely sunny day when we woke up and it was a fine day for a walk along the coast, I bought a Rother walking guide of Southern Norway book but it doesn't really have many short walks in it but this one was about 2 1/2 hours and I figured the boys would be fine. I scouted out the blue paint flashes before breakfast so we knew where to start. Breakfast was scoffed and then the whinging started, I have no idea what gets into Callum sometimes but geezo!! When he gets started about something he doesn't half go on....Any way, we finally got under way and faced into the wind and started searching out the blue paint spots and sketchy path. The boys like looking for way markers and signs so they were happy scouting ahead and scrambling up amongst the boulders. This walk was good but definitely tougher than expected but the views were good, it was gorgeous but the wind never abated. Short sleeves would have been order of the day if it had, but instead it was plenty layers on the

Today was a day where the whole plan could go embarrassingly wrong. We had positioned ourselves further from Hirtshals than planned at Klitmoller and so still had at least 2 to 2 1/2 drive to the terminal. Our ferry was due to leave at 11:45 and last check in was an hour before that. So we set there alarms for 06:00 and woke when they went off, it was lashing down with rain outside, thankfully I had did the majority of the outside tidying and loo emptying the night before. There was no snoozing of the alarms and we got up and started to get things sorted out and the boys up. We were good to go at 07:30am, but the lady from the campsite wasn't up so I couldn't pay her or escape as the barriers were down at the entrance, so I rang the night bell and eventually she appeared down in a bit of a tizzy. She soon got her PC fired up and rattled up our bill for the 2 nights. We paid her and she kindly gave us another couple of fancy pokes of sweets for the boys and the barrier finally r