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Nelsons Are No Longer In Norway. Elvis has left the building. We departed the ship in rainy Bergen and spent the time organizing ourselves, walking around the city and eating expensive dinners. The latter highlight was pretty unavoidable. The evening we arrived we just ate in the hotel's "Whiskey Bar" -- two 12" skinny crust pizzas a wine and a beer -- for $70. The next night we found a cute Italian restaurant, which had good food. We had two pasta unfancy dishes, beer & wine for $60 -- a much better deal, in my opinion, but come on. The cost of living is high in Norway (housing, cars, gas, clothing, food), and they are heavily taxed (total tax burden of roughly 45% of GDP, more than twice the U.S.).
On the other hand, college tuition is generally free and healthcare is free or requires inexpensive co-pays.
Basic jobs (dishwasher, etc,) get a living wage, maybe $35K. Teachers start in the upper $40's, with experience-based increases into the $70's. Engineer's start around $50-60K. The average CEO makes $200K -- 11 times their average employees’ salary versus 270 times for the U.S.
But I digress…
We walked around buying gifts for back home,
and we went up the funicular.
The track is 2700 feet long and rises almost 1000 feet. At the bottom; note no cable visible.
Have not passed the other car – note one cable visible.
Almost up top – note two cables visible.
The two cars are attached to either end of a cable. They share a single track except where they have to pass each other. They make a couple stops on the way up to drop off the cliff dwellers living on the hill.
Views from the top. That's the Richard With at dock.
Francie makes friends with a local.
Norway is tiring.
Nelsons Are No Longer In Norway. Elvis has left the building. We departed the ship in rainy Bergen and spent the time organizing ourselves, walking around the city and eating expensive dinners. The latter highlight was pretty unavoidable. The evening we arrived we just ate in the hotel's "Whiskey Bar" -- two 12" skinny crust pizzas a wine and a beer -- for $70. The next night we found a cute Italian restaurant, which had good food. We had two pasta unfancy dishes, beer & wine for $60 -- a much better deal, in my opinion, but come on. The cost of living is high in Norway (housing, cars, gas, clothing, food), and they are heavily taxed (total tax burden of roughly 45% of GDP, more than twice the U.S.).
On the other hand, college tuition is generally free and healthcare is free or requires inexpensive co-pays.
Basic jobs (dishwasher, etc,) get a living wage, maybe $35K. Teachers start in the upper $40's, with experience-based increases into the $70's. Engineer's start around $50-60K. The average CEO makes $200K -- 11 times their average employees’ salary versus 270 times for the U.S.
But I digress…
We walked around buying gifts for back home,
and we went up the funicular.
The track is 2700 feet long and rises almost 1000 feet. At the bottom; note no cable visible.
Have not passed the other car – note one cable visible.
Almost up top – note two cables visible.
The two cars are attached to either end of a cable. They share a single track except where they have to pass each other. They make a couple stops on the way up to drop off the cliff dwellers living on the hill.
Views from the top. That's the Richard With at dock.
Francie makes friends with a local.
Norway is tiring.
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