Scenery like this drew our breath away...
Bergen.....the second largest city in Oslo was founded in the 11th century, and became the center of Norwegian trade by the 14th century. You can guess what they traded.....cod. The way it was dried made it easy to ship all over Europe. After dropping off our suitcases in an old train hotel, we went to the fish market, the Torget, along the North Sea. The mix of seafood, furs, and local Norwegian food filled our nostrils and we couldn't help but stand and sample some (the crab legs, not the wolf hide!)....
Because this city gets over 80 inches of rain in a year, you can bet it's not sunny very often (around 60 days per year, actually). It was a bit overcast and rainy, but that doesn't stop these hardy Norwegians. One of their sayings: "There's no such thing as bad weather, just inappropriate clothing."
A walk along the harbor in the evening as the rain cleared made us wish we knew someone with a boat....
....and sunset is around 11:00 pm!
The next day we went back in history to the oldest area of the city, Bryggen, a merchant center of the Hanseatic League. We toured the old homes, shops, and banks where young men came from all over Europe to learn the trading business during the middle ages. Many of the old wooden building have burned down over the years, but some are still intact. We also toured some excavations beneath the city.
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| Ribs of an old ship excavated under Bryggen |
For a beautiful view of the city, we took the funicular to Mount Floyen...
Because the evening was light so late, we spent the rest of the day wandering around the town. An interesting thing happened to us at the little restaurant where we had dinner, though. The waiter noticed the "Tollefsrud" name on the reservation and lead us to a table. The waitress serving us told us that she was from the town of Tollefsrud!
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| Love those narrow streets! |
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