Ausflug 38

A Midsummer Night's Dream

June-July 2013


 

3 Bergen
Geiranger Fjord 4
Index


 

June 20th: Flaam, Norway

Bright and early in the morning, the Caribben Princess sailed into the Sognafjord, which runs mainly East-West and cuts deep into the heart of Norway. Our destination was Flaam, which is located at the end of an arm of the fjord that extends to the South. It was an overcast morning and clouds were lying low against the mountainsides as we glided along.

Having the tickets for the train and walking tour starting in Flaam, we were Johnny-on-the-spot at 8:05 a.m. to join the first group heading out to the train. Although filled by tourists in the summer months, the electric train from Flaam to Myrdal is a working train hauling people and probably various types of freight to the main Oslo-to-Bergen railroad track during all times of the year.

The main scenic attraction was the Flaam valley itself. Some farms dotted the lowest parts of the U-shaped, glacially-carved valley, but the valley walls were still rugged and dotted with waterfalls plunging down into the valley floor in a white cascade of foam. We stopped after riding the train about an hour, almost to the Myrdal junction with the main Oslo-Bergen line. Along the way we stopped once to take a close look at a waterfall that cascaded right under the tracks and down into the valley.

After a bathroom break and a brief snack of waffles, raspberry jam, and clotted cream at the restaurant/hotel adjoining the train stop, we started our walk back down a hiker-biker trail into the valley. The trail was an old construction road used while building the railroad and kept up in minimal shape for emergency use, I think. The upper part of the trail was VERY steep and we descended down the rocky road about 1,000 feet in a kilometer or two via 17 switchbacks! Although we had to watch our footing, we were rewarded with rather nice views of the large, long, kind of braided waterfall at the head of the Flaam valley.


 

Once on the valley floor the road flattened out and followed the main river draining the valley's rain runoff into the upper arm of the fjord. Along the way we encountered a herd of at least 60 goats who were lying all across the road, apparently soaking up the residual warmth there whilst calmly chewing their cud. The were the friendliest doggone critters, which much surprsied me since my last experience was with a billy goat who was definitely NOT friendly. But these were very laid back nanny goats who seemed to just plain like us. We ended up petting and talking to them, and some of them in turn tried to follow along when we continued on our hike, a ploy prevented by our guides standing guard at the gate at the lower end of the pasture where the road continued down the valley.

After a very relaxing hike and a lot of nice pictures, we stopped at a train station about 10 kilometers or 6 miles down the valley (about midway on the Flaam-Myrdal run) where we boarded the next train headed back down. I spied some serious electric bicycles there, but the owners were not around so I could not ask about how well they worked out in practice. I was interested partly because we had a pair of electric bicycles waiting for us in Germany at the end of our cruise, and I wanted to know what to expect, so to speak.


 

Once back in Flaam we returned to the ship for a quick lunch and then went back out to shop in Flaam a bit. Monika found pretzels in the Co-op store at a reasonable price, so I picked those up to use on our cruise. I didn't get the 1.5 liter bottle of Coca-cola, however, as I did have another can of Coke and two cans of Sprite available from the mini-bar on board ship. Finding ourselves really low on energy and the prices at the tourist-oriented shops to be really high, we then gave up on shopping and returned to the ship for the night.

But at the end of the day, we did enjoy sitting out on our balcony and watching the georgeous, majestic scenery of the Songnafjord slowly and quiety glide by as we sailed back out to sea. It was the best view in the house!

Copyright 2013 by Robert W. Holt and Elsbeth Monika Holt
Southampton Bergen Flaam Geiranger Fjord North Cape Tromso
Lofoten Islands Stavanger Haffkrug Eutin Neustadt Bad Malente

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