Two days ago Xin (who has accompanied me from Bolna to Lønsdal) and I have crossed the polar circle. What a great and symbolic moment on my journey to have crossed this imaginary line after two and a half months on the road! On the trail it is set up a little wooden gate so that one cannot miss the moment 😉
I have come back to Oslo for several days from the north. Still hope that I could stay a little longer up there, and perhaps also meet German daddy.
It’s not like we’ve not done hytte tur together before, but this trip in Nordland just somehow turned out to be rather special.
I guess it’s partially because of the nice people we met, whose frozen pizza we attended for more than 1 hour and still looked undercooked, who sat with us around a bonfire and chatted til midnight, who invited us to freshly made blåbær syltetøy with polarbrød, who asked us in great details about our trip and were yet keen to learn more.
I guess it’s partially because of the stunning nature and remarkable landscape Nordland has offered us. We started with woods, then we crossed above the tree line. Walking through meadows, I could see the Earth’s surface, so soft, bounces back following every step you took. Then were the friendly swamps, one ends up always wanting to cross them so that one could savor a couple of more multer (perhaps only me). Rivers run in between of mountains, it’s a lot of fun to cross bridges, it’s even more fun to wade streams, especially barefoot. We were greeted by herds of reindeers, who run around on hills, and curiously watch us from up. There was an hours-long walk on stones, with no soil to be seen, one basically leaps/jumps between big or small rocks. It was rather enjoyable, for water runs below many of them and made the way melodious. The marvelous thing about Saltfjellet is that even though we were mostly in valleys, the landscape is so open, so vast that we could see afar off. We had clouds, we had drizzles, we had summer snow, we had bright sun, we had golden moon in perigee. It’s simple astounding that a 3-day trip of 55km could offer such a varied vegetation and landscape in such varied weather.
I guess it’s more because of the companionship we had. There is something which modern ways of communication just could not convey. Being in the presence of friend, having your company, even reading a book in silence is somewhat more delightful.
Thanks for having me on your journey, and thanks for taking care of me along the way 🙂
I try to attach some photos before you get chance to do that 🙂
Wow, lovely photos! It’s great that you and Jakob got to hike part of the way together. 🙂
Hey Xin, thanks for keeping the blog alive in my absence and for the vivid description of this stage! I should engage you as a ghostwriter in the future 😉