I travelled from the little island of Risøya back to the nearest train station and travelled over three hours to my next hosts in Kristiansand, where I had my first reindeer meat for dinner!
Paul Andres woke me up at 9.15am to tell me that the house was mine for a few hours as the biology class had to go out onto the water for some school assignments.
I could make myself breakfast and coffee as Paul would be back around 11am to bring me back to the mainland again, into the town Risør.
After breakfast (there were no showers) I met up with the biology teacher who waited for his srtudents to return.
During his coffee break we talked short about my project and then he explained me how this area go so filled up with big smooth round rocks.
He told me how over 10,000 years ago the glaciers from the ice cap worked their way down from the mountains. The rocks below the ice worked as a sort of sandpaper, making the complete surface smooth. And of course, the ice pushed those rocks towards the sea where they lay now.
And as the ice glided down towards the sea, it created these big inland fjords here in Norway.
When Paul Andreas returned back with his boat, his class was going to investigate the differences in water levels, while he navigated me to Risør.
The sun shined bright and yesterday’s wind was gone. As we got closer to the little harbour of Risør after ten minutes, I understood why this town was called The White Town. Every house was painted straight white, very nice but also surreal.
In Risør Paul brought me to the bus station, where we met a lady journalist from the local newspaper. Before my bus would leave she wanted to have a little interview with us and she took some pictures of Paul and me.
At 12.45 my free train bus took me back to Gjerstad again. Halfway I had to change the bus to go pass Søndeled again (where Paul Andreas lives). The train then arrived at 2.15pm, taking me all the way to Kristiansand, my next destination.
Kristiansand is the capital of Southern Norway, with nickel metallurgy, timber and fish as it principal branches of industry. Kristiansand is the place is the leading centre of rest and recreation as it has the largest number of sunny days in Norway. And I noticed the sun today, too!
Again I enjoyed the travelling by train, as it also gives me enough time to write my reports in advance in a paper notebook. It works pretty good like this, because I can quickly type it over on a computer and upload the pictures without being behind the computer for too long.
I arrived in the small city Kristiansand at 5.20pm. It’s strange to make such a long distances as time goes so fast in a train.
It was my hostess Liv who picked me up at the arrival platform of the train and took me to her home with a taxi.
There I met her husband Gabriel, who is originally from Columbia and who only spoke good Spanish and Norwegian. With my Spanish I learned at school it was good to be able to communicate with him, although I am not really a star in Spanish. I also met their son Martin and the two months old dog Artus.
Liv works at the personnel department of a local bank as Gabriel is just switching to a new job in computer programming in Sandnes, a few hours up north.
When I settled myself in their apartment and played around with Artus, Liv prepared dinner. This time I was going to eat something really Norwegian, she told me.
It was my first time ever that I ate reindeer and it tasted pretty good. The meat is as soft as fish can be and looks like liver from the outside. Together with big potatoes and boiled carrots it was quite a meal for me.
After dinner Liv and Gabriel talked with me about my project and Gabriel told me about his home country Columbia.
When everybody got to bed this night, Gabriel turned on the PC in the room where my guest bed was prepared by Liv – and I went online to update the website with yesterday’s report and photos.
Just what I am doing right now, but you’ll read about that tomorrow!
Good night Kristiansand!
Ramon.
