Late Nights in Spain

I had a few late nights last weekend.

Last week Friday I returned to Santander. It was Luca’s, a friend from near Rome, last few days in Santander and I wanted to say goodbye. So after work I caught a bus to Santander.

Luca was out to dinner with his brother and his brother’s girlfriend, so I met up with Giulia and Margherita first. Luca is usually the one to cook while Giu and Margherita are just there to look good, or something like that. Well, this time I was treated to a dinner made by the girls. Despite their being Italian, they are not like the Italian grandmother everyone wishes they had. Instead we had jarred pesto and pasta. We had some great homemade bruschetta though, so I will have to give them that one.

After dinner and some drinks we headed out for a night of dancing, drinking, and talking. Ten months into my stint in Spain and I am still not used to 6 am being the earliest you can go home, but I stuck it out.

Saturday we went to Somo Beach, the same one that I learned to surf at. Some of the group went surfing while the rest of us tried to relax on the beach. I say tried to relax because it was so windy out that sand kept on pelting us. It was difficult to look towards the direction the wind was coming and there was sand all up in our food.

Soon I had to meet up with my land lord so I said my goodbyes and bussed it back to Bilbao to move into my new apartment. My new apartment is… underwhelming. I like my room, it is decent sized and has a lot of space. Yet, it has a window that opens onto the balcony that we all share and my blind is hardly opaque. I feel like everybody can see me.

After moving into my new place I caught the metro to Erandio where a friend from class lives. The girls and I met David and had a drink before we headed to the fiesta Erandio was hosting up on the other side of the mountain. Apparently during the summer every pueblo has a fiesta. This one was kind of like a really small fair. It had cheap drinks, food, and like one carnival game. It also had live music and later, a DJ.

Since I am in Basque Country, this fiesta had a band playing traditional Euskara music. Euskara music is kind of like Celtic music. Everyone was dancing along to the music. It was quite incredible to see a really small town show off their pride of their culture. We tried to follow along in some of the dances, but apparently these people have been learning these dances since they were little, so they all knew what was going on.

I said I had a few late nights. Friday we stayed out until 6:30 the next morning. Saturday, we got to the fiesta at around midnight and the bus back wasn’t until 8:00 the next morning. I ended up getting home, exhausted, at around 9:00 a.m. I was so tired, but had to work on a paper I still have due for my Prehistoric Art class. Ah, well. Only five more weeks of living like this. It is going to be bittersweet.

Last Days in Norway (and a Little Bit of London) Pics

Last Days in Norway (and a Little Bit of London)

It’s getting to the end of Norway, the end of probably one of my most favorite trips in Europe. Sad! But we still have a little bit left!

Late into the morning of day 4 we woke up to the sun shining into our tent. I walked outside and was greeted with probably the best view I will ever have in a morning, Bearded Valley’s fjord, and the sound of a waterfall a few meters down the trail. We slowly packed up our things and started our trek back to the cars. Only 4 miles this time, nothing too extreme.

Once on the road we headed towards Odda, the small village that we had been frequenting for food. Odda is really quaint, sitting right on a beautiful fjord. The Norwegians said it was an ugly town. I hope they never visit Gary, Indiana or Detroit. If Odda is one of their ugly towns, I think I could live with that.

Well, we stopped for some Chinese food for lunch and then had some dessert at Langfoss. We said our goodbyes to Cecilie and Trygve and headed back to Kristine’s. Once back we showered and cleaned up because we were eating dinner at Kristine’s parents’. Let me tell you, a good home cooked meal after climbing mountains for the past three days is one of the best things you can experience. Her parents were delightful and the food was perfect. It was traditional and comforting, exactly what I wanted as it was actually raining. Did I mention we lucked out with no rain during the backpacking? Well, the food, like I said was traditional Norwegian. We ate these balls made out of potatoes that Kristine assured us we wouldn’t like (but did) and a bunch of meat. Top that off with some ice cream and I was in heaven.

After dinner we just relaxed at home and fell asleep early. The next day we woke up late, ate breakfast, saw a mini Statue of Liberty where the French got all the copper to make the statue and went to the airport for our flight to London.

Once at Stansted, Caitlyn and I headed into London while Hillary went to a friend’s house. We didn’t do too much in London honestly. We just studied for our last final, Foundations, over a pint outside and then had some delicious burgers at another pub. I fell asleep really early (9 maybe).

The next day I woke up really early. I felt like I should at least sightsee a little, since after all, this was only my second time in London, so I left Caitlyn to her studying and walked around to Big Ben, the Globe Theater, Saint Paul’s Cathedral and a few other notable sights. We then headed back to Stansted and caught our flight home to Santander.

Norway: Third Backpacking Day Pics

Norway: Third Backpacking Day

Day three could be described by numbers.

We hiked close to 20 miles for 14 hours.

We climbed over 600 vertical feet.

We followed the sky ladder for 200 meters

We ate 1 piece of bread for lunch.

We saw 0 lemmings.

There were 99 bottles of beer on the wall.

Day three could be described in numbers, but that wouldn’t tell nearly the whole story. No, it wouldn’t even begin to describe the awe I felt at the summit, the sweat that was dripping down my face 100 meters into the sky ladder, the hunger I felt at hour 13, the frustration I felt at mile 14. Numbers cannot even begin to capture the beauty I experienced at the edge of Trolltunga, the sense of accomplishment that filled me as I got into my sleeping bag at 3 in the morning, or the wonder that flowed through me as I looked down into the Bearded Valley.

That’s right, I was in Bearded Valley (Skjeggedal for those of you who understand Norwegian). That is where the story begins.

We wake up and start the 4 mile hike to the base of our ascent. This was probably the easiest 4 miles of the entire trip. It was actually a flat path! In Norway? No way! Way. So 4 miles in we drop off some of the weight from our packs. We had to decide between ascending with full packs and camping at the top, or getting rid of weight at the bottom and coming back down to sleep. Thankfully we dropped off most of our weight at the bottom. Climbing so much with full packs would have been extremely exhausting.

Then some of the fun part comes. We have to hike up along the dry river bed to reach the base of the Sky Ladder. This sounds easier than it turned out to be. First, there were no marked paths, so we were kind of just hopping from boulder to boulder, approximating our path by just heading toward where we thought our goal point was. Second, after the dry river bed there were the extremely high grade slopes that were covered in snow. While some of the girls thought the climb was scary, I was not looking forward to our climb down those slopes. That climb down could very easily turn into a short tumble down. By short, I mean many, many meters long tumble down the side of a mountain.

No paths and steep slopes aside, we made it to the base of where the actual climb began. Trygve gave us a short lesson on how to use the carabineers and harnesses to secure ourselves to the ladder and we were off. Let me tell you, this was one of the greatest experiences I have had in my life. I was climbing up a ladder bolted into a sheer cliff face hundreds of meters above the base of the mountain. The largest cave I have ever seen, easily over a hundred meters tall (probably inhabited by trolls), waterfalls pouring over the cliffs, and the fjord down below were easily the most beautiful natural views I will probably experience in Europe while harnessed into something… okay, or ever.

After a good hour or so of straight up I climbed over the last leg of the Sky Ladder and was greeted with triumphant and relieved faces, and of course, a view. But this isn’t where we were going to stop. Although the views from here were absolutely breathtaking, Trygve had another place in mind to blow us all away, so we started trekking off into the snow blanketed landscape.

A few kilometers later and I realized that we had reached our goal: Trolltunga (or Troll’s Toungue). Interesting name right? Well, if you imagined the mountain was a troll, you would think that it would have a pretty big tongue. Now, if the mountain/troll stuck out his tongue, it would be a giant stone jutting out over the fjord. That is exactly what this was. Imagine a Norwegian version of Pride Rock from The Lion King but taller and without the supporting rock. Well, I got to stand on the end of that. It was incredible. Absolutely incredible. Check out the pictures if you don’t believe me.

Again, we had a little photo shoot, some lunch of just one slice of bread and some bacon cheese and headed off back down the mountain. Again, we had to make a decision. Do we go back down the way we came or the longer route which is milder in its descent? It was getting late and we didn’t want to navigate the boulder hopping in the dark (nor did I want to deal with sliding off a cliff due to the steep snow covered slopes) so we headed down the longer way.

I cannot say with certitude if it was the best choice. At least an hour after we started our descent, we were still higher than when we had started. I realize Norway doesn’t really understand downhill, but this was getting ridiculous.

Several hours later (and admittedly, many more breathtaking views of glaciers in the distance or fjords down below) we started to make some progress downward. It was almost dark when we reached the steep downhill similar to that of Langfoss from before. To deal with our frustration of ours of hiking and seemingly no progress, we started to sing “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall” and, incredibly, finished it just after reaching the road we were camping on.

We drove into Odda for some food to celebrate what we had just accomplished, but still had the 4 mile trek that we did in the morning to get back to our site. Trygve and Cecilie, the champs that they are, ran ahead again to set up camp so we could get to sleep as early as possible.

It was after 3 a.m. when we finally made it to camp, tents already set up and pads inflated. It felt so good to go to sleep after a day like that. I slept like a rock, not even a troll could have woken me.

Norway: Second Backpacking Day Pics

Norway: Second Backpacking Day

I though the first day of backpacking couldn’t be topped. Well, what was in store for me on day two was incredible.

After a filling breakfast of cinnamon oatmeal and a little bit of cleaning up, we were welcomed into the fresh, Norwegian mountain air by some welcome sun. The day before our views were somewhat obscured by fog, but not today. No! We had blue skies and it was warming up considerably. Good thing too, because our hike took us further up and there was snow everywhere. It was kind of funny seeing us in shorts and tee shirts hiking through the snow, up mountains and across snow fed rivers, but it was also incredibly gorgeous.

Every so often we would have to fill up our water bottles. If you have been backpacking before, you might know about these little things called iodine tablets. Iodine tablets are what make water potable when you are in the middle of nowhere and can’t boil it. Well, for those of you know what iodine tablets taste like (essentially you are drinking pool water), you will be very jealous to know that the water is so fresh in Norway that you don’t have to use these. Nope! We just filled our water up from streams. It was cold and fresh, the best I have probably ever had.

Well, after a few hours of trekking through some of the most indescribably beautiful scenery we made it to our second cabin. This cabin was the cabin a famous Norwegian actor would build. It was huge! Room for thirty people to sleep, a gigantic kitchen, leather couches, fire places, a drying room, a dining room with several long tables for family style dinners. Seriously, nice. Well, we weren’t staying here, but we did enjoy some bacon cheese from a tube on bread and cookies in the company of some other Norwegians and their dogs before heading to our day’s goal, Langfoss, or Long Falls for all of you who can’t read Norwegian.

It was sometime between the morning and our hike to the falls that I realized, there are mountains stacked on these mountains. Day one was full of uphill hiking and I thought we reached the peak. Day two was more uphill hiking. What? Where did that mountain on top of the mountain I just hiked up come from? Did I mention that Trygve said that we would be going downhill after lunch. This is when the second realization of the trip hit me, the downhill is Norwegian for more uphill, and then some downhill, but mainly uphill. Tricky bastards.

Well, the Norwegian downhill was well worth it. After many hours of tough hiking, we finally made it to the top of Langfoss. Let me tell you, it was the best view of the trip by far, and probably my life. I was looking down upon a sun-filled fjord nestled between two mountain ridges. Waterfalls and streams poured down the sides of the mountains. It was perfect. Picturesque is too weak of a word to describe it.

A photoshoot later we headed down along the side of the falls. I thought downhill (the real kind) was supposed to be easy, but this was one of the hardest parts of the day. We had to descend 600 meters of essentially near vertical terrain. I was trying my best not to fall or slip on the rocks, but also take in the views. Sometimes, while I was staring at my feet trying not to misstep I would look up and be reminded of what surrounded me. It was a bit of a pity I had to pay so much attention to not dying.

At the foot of the falls we took in the surroundings some more while Trygve and Cecilie hitchhiked back to the cars that we left on the other side of the mountain. We enjoyed some kebap in the town of Odda for dinner and then set up camp near the point of our next adventure. If you like the pictures from this day, you won’t believe the ones from day three.

Norway: First Backpacking Day Pics

Norway: First Backpacking Day

A little late, we wake up and have a Norwegian breakfast of bread, meat, cheese, and spreads. Kristine bought this fresh strawberry honey at the Viking festival which was really good as a jam replacement. Oh! And I finally had some good milk in Europe! Finally. After months of wishing I could buy some good, cold milk which is pretty impossible in Spain, my wishes were fulfilled.

We all made sure we were packed and ready for the mountains. Well, as ready as one can be for what we were about to embark on. We hopped into the car and headed off eastward, into the mountainous region of Norway.

The ride was gorgeous. Seriously, the country is something unlike I had ever seen. I never imagined myself winding through the mountains on roads that hugged the fjords, but here I was, taking it all in.

Soon enough we met up with Cecilie and Trygve, some Norwegian friends of Kristine’s, loaded our packs with food after a stop at a supermarket, and made our way into the mountains.

First, a little bit on Cecilie and Trygve. Cecilie is one of the most energetic and happy people I have ever met. For example, after our 14 hour, 15+ mile trek and climb through the mountains, she ran around 4 miles back to the campsite to set up for the night. Trygve is super outdoorsy. He planned the entire trip for us, and new all the best sites. He also lent us most of the gear we used. He was equally as excited as Cecilie, and since he was the most experienced with this type of lifestyle, he also had to do the running when necessary.

Well, like I said, we made our way into the mountains. A short drive and a few sheep filled roads later (I feel like I can qualify as an experienced sheep herder based on the amount of sheep that fled our vehicle) we were at the base of a mountain, near a waterfall that ran into the fjord, surrounded by sheep. This was the least picturesque it would get for the rest of the trip. Seriously, what a terrible country.

Okay, right, so we started on our way up the mountain, crossing over the waterfall at various moments, passing through expansive hillside fields and over giant boulders. Only a few hours in we made it to the first set of cabins. Trygve asked if we were interested in going a few hours more to the next cabin, but our large, out of shape, American asses were quite content on staying at these.

Wow, were these cabins nice. They were equipped with food, cooking utensils, a stove top, some had leather couches, beds, books, games, fire places. Everything you could want for a cozy cabin in the mountains, it was there. Hint: Stansted was the roughing it of the trip. Well, we settled into the cabin, prepared a fire and made tacos for dinner. Afterwards we enjoyed each other’s company over the Norwegians’ first smores and some rounds of Dutch Blitz.

Since it was still light out (Norway, by the way, never gets dark during the summer, even in the south), we took the row boat out for a spin. Oh, did I mention that these cabins were overlooking a mountain top lake and were equipped with row boats? We soon realized that we were terrible at rowing boats as we could only go in circles or lines approximated by arcs. It was still really enjoyable though. Eventually it got somewhat dark so we retired to the cabins and went to bed. What a day.

Hasta Luego Santander

All the posters are off the walls. Each shirt is out of the dresser and packed away. Nothing still hangs on the hangers. I have just about packed up my room. It is my last day in Santander. 295 days have passed since I first arrived, bewildered, confused, foreign. Today I leave, still bewildered, confused and foreign.

I head off to Bilbao today for my internship. And although it is only an hour away, it feels like I am leaving a huge part of my life. Everything that I have known and grown accustomed to in the past ten months is staying here, and I have to venture into the unknown again. Scary, huh?

One of the scariest parts is that I still don’t exactly have a place to live. I mean, I have been in contact with this guy since… yesterday. I think the place will work out. But that apartment isn’t free for another week, so before that I am supposed to live in an alternative apartment. And that isn’t free until tomorrow. So tonight… I stay with David, a kid from my classes who lives near Bilbao. And thank God, because I really don’t want to start off in a hostel. Hopefully he can show me around a bit.

Anyways, I am procrastinating. Everything may have been emptied and cleared away, but now it just sits on the floor or on the table tops. I am putting off packing and writing about Norway. They just seem like daunting tasks. Instead I am writing about packing, kind of like two in one. I think that counts at least.

Well, I guess this is good bye Santander. It has been great. Don’t worry, I will come back to visit very soon.