DAY4 - NUTSHELL

NUTSHELL – DAY 4

The alarm went off at 5:45 AM.  We ate the biggest breakfast we had ever eaten since yesterday.  By 7:30 we were off to the train station (remember we are at the train station) for an 8:30 train. At 7:35 we are at the train and find a sweet seat.

First, we roll through the city and local environs.  This photo of an apartment building is not in grayscale, or retouched at all.  It’s Norweeger design.

So. You can’t tell by this photo, but the suspended bicycle is locked to the trees and the seat is wrapped in plastic.  Obviously, the rider could not find a parking meter to lock up to.

The train climbs from essentially 0 to 4000 ft. and down again. The first half hour was deciduous forest and tunnels – more about tunnels later.

The leafy trees gave way to pine forest,

which petered out leaving a rocky landscape.

The rocks began to be covered by snow.

A good part of the initial ride was along a lake (I think).  There were small houses scattered along the shore, but no roads. 

Well, occasionally there were ruts that must have crossed the track to something slightly more road-like, but, for the majority of these abodes, it must be a boating in situation.

The mountains around us (right close around us) must have been 800-1000 feet higher than us and they supported an occasional house or small group of houses.  One was way up near the tippy-top.  Francie and I looked at each other and mouthed, “WHY?”  These people must have had electricity, but it would take a heck of a pump to get water from the lake.  They surely didn’t drill into granite and expect to find water. But actually, how often does someone that isolated have to shower anyway.

There were more reasonable housing assemblages – well anyway I suppose the Norweegers would consider them reasonable.

We arrived at Myrdal where we had to changed trains.  Easy-peesy, a 15 foot walk to the other side of the skinny station.  And here comes the Flam Train.

That is where we’re headed.

So, on starting out, some would shout waterfall and the train would lurch as we all hustled to one side to get a photo.  After about 30 minutes we realized that waterfalls were as plentiful as sheep.  This farm (I guess) features 3 waterfalls and several sheep.

There was one stupendous (maybe too strong a descriptor here) water fall.  The train stop for us to hop out and get a picture.  Here is a famous photo journalist plying his craft.

Documentation of the stupendous waterfall.

Random (very random actually) touristos at a stupendous waterfall in, I believe, in Norway.

We got to Flam where we were to pick up a boat to go up-a-fjord-down-a-fjord.  There is not much to Flam.  One could certainly eat and buy souvenirs, but the cultural aspects of Flam-ish life are, to be brutally honest, lacking.

Here we are touring Flam.  John finds souvenir shopping very draining.

I don’t think this grassy roof concept will fly in Florida.  I don’t believe our lawn guy would do roofs.

So back to tunnels… Norweegers are quite enamored with tunnels.  They so love their tunnels that when there are no mountains to tunnel through, they build wooden structures for the train to go through.  Picture a covered bridge 2-500 feet long.  Actually, we did not run into these until the leafy trees gave way to pine forests, which gave way to rocks, that began to get covered with snow.  I have no pictures, since pictures from inside a tunnel are difficult the get properly exposed – same problem Jonah had. But YouTube has extensive video of the Bergen Railway, including much more harrowing travels than we encountered.  See A Clip.

This boat, which passed us going the other way, is like very one we are riding.  It is twin hulled with a hybrid drive.  Props are driven by electric, motors powered from batteries, which can be charged by diesel engines or by a very impressive extension cord at dockside.  

For a boat this size the wake was pretty minimal.