The strangest place

Friday, September 15

We wake up to a sunny morning at the Kysthotell and join other travelers for the traditional rich Norwegian breakfast, which features several types of herring, coldcuts, eggs, cheeses, yogurts, and jams. Long loaves of bread are held in cloths while one saws off great slices. We're used to a little yogurt and granola in the morning with coffee, maybe some fruit, but tuck in with gusto.  As a result, in a blur of what Victor might call a "madd carb fog" we take a drive arround the nearby Hadsel island, centered by impressive jagged mountains

and bordered by long vistas of water and mountains shining in the sun from the neighboring islands.

In the fields the sheep haven't bothered to get up yet. Yesterday we saw them lying down in the early evening. They must enjoy a long sleep in their cozy wool furs.

We stop at a picnic area near a beach, where a woman is preparing breakfast outside a camper, accompanied by a watchful dog. He's chained next to a sheepskin stretched out on the ground for him to lie on, and his eyes follow us as we walk by to the beach. In Norway the rules surrounding dogs are incredibly fierce. Dogs can be ordered put down if they are interpreted as attacking people or livestock. We have heard several horror stories of frisky, but normal, dogs being given a death sentence for jumping on people or chasing other dogs in play. Consequently you never see a dog off the leash.

On a lighter note, the "rønnebær"(rowanberries, service berries?) are at their freshest orange color,

and the moss is spectacular.

The beach is covered with soft sand and lies between mountains and vistas

Back at the hotel we load our things into the car,  and select a smaller winding road, along the Eidsfjord

towards our new destination, Nyksund. We're listening to a classic acoustic soundtrack downloaded from Spotify, are munching on potato chips from a supermarket foray (sorry Victor 😳 it's a roadtrip!), and feeling very pleased with ourselves and with the splendid weather that seems to follow us. An hour later the sun has disappeared behind low grey clouds and and there's a rather strong cold wind. We've been driving along the westernly edge of the Øksnes island, and reach a turning point where the  road to Nyksund begins. There we spot two older ladies sitting with a thermos of coffe between them and an elderly (leashed) Beagle at their feet. The view behind them is out of this world - glittering water and jagged moutains in the distance as far as the eye can see. They seem eager for conversation, and after revealing they're from "there" with a vague gesture behind somewhere, they quickly and efficiently interrogate me in Norwegian. They listen patiently to my story of the great-grandmother from Sortland (whose earrings I'm wearing), but really snap to attention when they learn I know the family of the Princess Ragnhild in Rio de Janeiro, and that my son went to school with the grandchildren. The Beagle has been growling, mouth pursed, but at this point senses there's no longer any cause for alarm and lies down.
The roads in Norway are amazing, smooth and well-kept, but not the road to Nyksund. We're reminded of the most frightening car ride ever, in Ireland, where Oswaldo drove on an unguarded cliff, with a sheer drop to the waves beneath, which he couldn't see, steering from the "wrong" side of the car. Victor and I were screaming, as we struggled up through hairpins. This road is not at the same level, having small guard kerbs, along the twists and turns, and ups and downs of a narrow road full of potholes, but it's still pretty scary. It ends in a long curved bridge leading into a ghost-town with old wooden houses built on stilts between the cliffs and water, and seabirds flocked on a ledge,  screaming eerily like fretful babies.

It looks like something out of "Fitzcarraldo," a mad construction in the Amazon, except freezing, of course. We find our hotel, Nyksund Ekspedisjonen,

but there's no-one there - which is a problem, since I would like to visit a bathroom sooner rather than later. We get out of the car and meander around, wondering at the great absence of anybody, the mixture of chiquely renovated houses and college town style delapidated ones, and barely noticing the amazing beauty surrounding us on all sides.

Eventually someone comes and lets us in out of the wind, and things begin to shape up. We're given a cute little suite with a small bedroom and a cozy sitting room with a full kitchen and windows all around. Our day ends with a fabulous meal from the house restaurant. Oswaldo vetoes the whale carpaccio ("How can they kill those wonderful and huge mammals?"), and we have langostines

followed by an enormous slice of perfectly cooked halibut with a seaweed hollandaise.

The talented chef, Slovenian Marco, another helpful youth who fails to help me with the Norwegian SIM card, tells us of his two months in the Peruvian jungle with a xaman, high on various mushrooms. "Those guys really know what they're doing," he says. "They totally changed my life."