Nerdo and I left Arendal and Eydehavn the afternoon of Day 5 and headed North and West on HWY 42. Our destination for the evening sleep was to be Odda. On the way out of town, I thought it appropriate to take a snap shot of one of these..


After driving a couple hours or so, we turned North onto Hwy 9 and toward the Byglansdsfjorden area. After driving through a beautiful valley, which for some reason,I didn't snap any pictures of myself, we came upon this Stave church. It's called Addal Kyrkje, built in 1827. Not what I expected of a Stave, but interesting none the less. I believe this was just North of Evje.


This is the first picture of Byglandsfjorden.


Nerdo enjoys a nice drink of "diarrhea coffee" She prefers it to hot coffee.


A cliff face and waterfall at Byglandsfjorden.


A picture for Dave-O. Dave, the literal translation into English is "50-300 Damp Farts Per Meter". Thought you would find that interesting.


There was so much water all around us on this leg of the trip. It was easy to see why everything was so green and alive. Everywhere we turned, there seemed to be water...pool, ponds, lakes, streams, rivers...take your pick. This is between Byglandsfjorden and Araksfjorden.


We drpve through the Setesdal Valley to get to the fjordens. Thi is that Araksfjorden. The picture is only a very small part of the body of water.


On the way to the town of Vagslid, we went up a pretty steep pass and went through this tunnel. Please note that the altitude is marked by the superior metric method of measurement.


A picture on the outgoing side of the tunnel. It was starting to get dark, partly because of the cloud cover and rain. Even so, we needed to get our picture taken at this very pretty area.




We met some new friends as we continued on.



AFter this it got pretty dang dark and reeeeeeeeeeally rainy. Not too long later, we ran into two tunnels that were closed and had to drive around some very challenging passes in some bad weather. I'm convinced that we saw snow at one of the passes. Nerdo did an excellent job getting us through alove. I felt guilty that I couldn't do some of the driving. After the most challenging and time consuming of the two detours, we got to the other side, and it turned out we hadn't even advance a single meter toward our destination!

Eventually, we turned North on E134 and got to Odda, where we stayed the night. We got in around 1:00 a.m. I think, maybe later, and the very helpful and friendly Inn Keeper welcomed us and we finally got some rest after a little unwinding in their lounge area.

HAHAHAHA... I had forgotten about the goats! Tjihi!
And you even got a picture of the "Dump your fart" sign!! Hilarious!

Yeah, guys, and I have to tell you, Scott is a real sport! During these narrow roads over the mountain where all I saw were the tail lights of the car in front of me and the edge of the road where it went straight down. Scott wasn't nervous or anything (at least he didn't express that to me). He even taught me the proper way of going downhill a steep hill by riding a low gear and not riding my brakes. I'm sure I have learnt this before, but that info had escaped me during the years as we don't have long, steep hills down south.
Still after teaching me that, he still wasn't nervous (or at least didn't show it).




-<nerdo>-

an excellent array of photos nonetheless !!

"Diarrhea coffee"? "50-300 Damp Farts Per Meter"?
I thought the herring, sheep brains, and mackerel, would be enough.
Have I said thanks for the photos yet Scott? I've been meaning to. Thanks, this is fun.
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And the video had me cracking up! :p

Rimmer: So, let me get this straight. You want to fly on a magic carpet to see the King of the Potato People and plead with him for your freedom, and you're telling me you are completely sane?!

All that talk about damp farts per meter

Well, what to say, after our detour to Arendal, we had a choice to take the boring but fastest route along the highway or the scenic route up Setesdalen. After some serious thinking and discussion of possibilities, the scenic route was the one we chose. However, we had a slight problem as we had NO CHANCE to catch the ferry to get to our destination as we were leaving Arendal too late in the day.

Thanks to Bloom's information for the cabin we already had booked and Scott's hostel information we managed eventually to find a motel/hostel with two beds vacant that weren't too pricey in Odda. This hostel (Vasstun) I can recommend to anyone. You can get the more pricey rooms there and you can get four person bunk bed rooms as well. The people who work there are AMAZINGLY service minded too.

Well, jumping ahead of time here. We decided to take the scenic route, and my dad warned me for a lot of tourist campers on the way. We drove past one so we were extremely lucky.

On the way from Evje we needed to get some more gas, so we stopped and tanked at this old fashoined place.


You can't see what Scott is showing off? Here's a zoomed in version:


The price here was 12,40 per litre. MAN, that was the priciest gas on the whole trip! Talk about luck!!

When we got to Hovden (a busy ski centre in the winter) we stopped to get some food. And they had this tasty pasta. Steve, just for you we took these food pictures. I must admit, Scott's food looks awful in this picture, but it looked better in real life!


My food (delicious!!):


YUMM-EE!!!


On the way we did these stops to grab pictures of the amazing nature on the way. And I promise you, both Scott and I were OOOO-ing and AAAAAA-ing over the magnificence of nature on the way.
And look, I had a sighting of this weird creature by the side of the road lurched over some flowers. I've looked through books to see what kind of creature might have such a fascination with anything as ordinary as "lyng" but I'm at a loss here... Any suggestions?




-<nerdo>-

Thanks for posting the awesome pictures! It must have been hard to make yourself go back home.

____________________________________

Lisa formerly of OK, now Lisa in Telly

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You are remembering some of the stuff that I'd forgotten. You'll need to help me with my journal!!!!!! Um...please.

those are awesome pics from both of you...love the goats!

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I'm convinced Norway should be evacuated, and turned into a national park. It's too beautiful for humans to live on!

I ain't moving, so I would have to find a way to become one of the attractions!!!
Oh. I know what my job could be!! HAHAHAHAHA!
Well, I'd have to put someone else out of a job, but that's fine.

We'll show you what kind of job it is eventually, it'll pop up as a video in day 7!!
Ooooooo, I can't wait! :D ROFL!

Soon we are arriving Rivendell!

-<nerdo>-

With some imagination you can pretend there is no color difference here....



-<nerdo>-

I've been there!!!

It's the town of Ouray, flooded 20 feet deep
Very beautiful fjord!

Thanks you guys for posting these! It's so fun to see each day of your adventure.

Rimmer: So, let me get this straight. You want to fly on a magic carpet to see the King of the Potato People and plead with him for your freedom, and you're telling me you are completely sane?!

The flowers that are called 'Lyng' in Norwegian are called 'Heather' in English.

-<nerdo>-