Sep 29 - A Quieter Autumn in Trondheim

Well life here in Norway has been considerably quieter the last month since I finished up my travels. After a very pleasant first week of end of summer weather, it has since turned distinctly cooler, and been raining pretty continuously for a number of weeks. So this year continues to set records on the weather front. Its been the longest run of warm (tops over 20C) summer days in Jun-Aug on record (beating the previous record from 1930), as well as the highest average temperature. Now it looks like its going to be one of the wettest September's on record (already 5th highest in the last 50 years).

On Sat 6 Sep I headed into town since the various public transport companies had a special day. I rode on several old buses, the original tram (from 1915), and the kids Sesam train (very colorfull!). All good fun! I then went home and watched a replay of Diana's funeral, which I thought was a very good service, a real tragedy, but I guess thats life. On Sun I went walking round Grånasen again and found another 8 orienteering posts, and and then watched some ski jumping before heading back home and watching my favorite show - Babylon 5. The rotters caught me out, they had been playing repeats, but they've started season 4 here - obviously last week which I missed (still saw it in Melb so not a disaster). Now I'll have to try harder to make sure I'm home on Sun afternoon's, sigh!

On Wed I went along to the BUL dance class again. I'm enjoying working on the various dances, the reinlenders, waltzes, and pols. Its a bit nervewracking though, coping with the class with everything in Norwegian, though I'm managing reasonably well just watching and following.

Had a pretty busy day on Fri 12 Sep. Headed off from work early to catch the tram to Lian, and then to collect some final orienteering posts from that area. I eventually located another 7 (but had some trauma when I managed to lose the card I was recording the codes on - had to revisit 3 spots which was a pain!). Still that took me up to the 200 point mark with 57 posts, which I'd been aiming for. Then raced back through home for a shower and change, and out for a brief visit to a work colleagues place, to met one of his friends who'd just returned from Australia. We had a nice chat, but then I had to head off again to go to a concert in the Kammer (Chamber) Musikk festival. It was a late night concert in the jazz club featuring a very accomplished Hardanger fiddle player, Nils Økland, and his band. Their music ranged from straight traditional (very very nice) to very avant garde (didn't appeal), but overall rather interesting. Sat was a pleasantly quiet (not to mention wet) day. I had dinner with Lynda, and we spent a pleasant evening just chatting. On Sun I went to the afternoon student concert in the Kammer fest. This featured 3 items, by 3 separate string groups (quartet, quintet, and sextet) which were well played and enjoyable. Then went to the Finale concert in the evening, which featuring quite a few of the guests at the festival. It was very interesting. Most of the items were classical (though it included a couple of renaissance pieces and a very funny spoof by "PDQ Bach"). In all, quite enjoyable and an interesting experience, given I don't usually go to classical concerts.

Another quiet week, with the regular Mon study group, and Wed BUL dance class. On Sat 20 Sep, I popped into town for a while, and looked over part of the Vitenskapsmuseet - an exhibition of 1000 years of the written word - from clay tablets to the Internet; and an exhibition of traditional norwegian church art, mainly wood carvings. All very interesting. Then on Sun, despite some overcast and somewhat damp weather, I did a final walk up in Bymarka below Skistua to collect the last of the turorienteering points I wanted - 4 from the full tour, and the missing 2 from the easy tour. I now have a clean sweep on the 24 post easy tur, and have 61 of 104 posts in the full tour for 213 points, which gives me a silver grade. I pretty pleased with that, and think its a pretty reasonable first effort. Then in the evening I headed off to the monthly Anglican service at the cathedral. It was the annual "Harvest service", and was most enjoyable, with a good crowd. We then migrated across to the Catholic church hall for a pot-luck dinner together, which was very pleasant.

The following week didn't start well when I came down with a short but violent stomach bug, that wiped me out on Tues. Still I managed to recover enough to go to the Scottish country dance class on Wed 24 Sep (which unfortunately clashes with the BUL class), and had an enjoyable evening. There were quite a few extra people from the Anglican church there, which made for a pretty lively evening.

The final weekend the weather fined up to glorious sunny, crisp, autumn days. On Sat morning, 27 Sep, I went for a 2 hour walk from home to Øvre Lierfoss (Upper Falls) along the river to Nedre Lierfoss (Lower Falls) on the Nidaro river, and then looped back home. With all the rain we've had, the water is just roaring down the river, so the falls were quite spectacular. Had lunch at home (and watched the repeat of B5 :-) before heading in towards town and then out to Tyholt Tower - the telecommunications tower (very similar to ours in Canberra). As I hadn't been up it this visit, I headed up to the observation deck, and admired the views for a while (see picture of view out over Trondheim).

On Sun I caught the bus over to the Trøndelag Folkemuseum at Sverresborg. Again, I hadn't managed to get there yet this time, and as it was its last day open I decided I'd better go. Had a lovely time wandering round the various buildings, touring the museum on the history of skiing (new since I was last there), and joining a guided tour. The weather was great, and it was just extremely pleasant wandering round. The picture shows the view from atop the castle hill, looking north over the "town" part of the museum, then past the local suburbs to the fjord. I then headed home in time to catch the latest episode of B5 (they're now showing episodes past what I've managed to see before - all good fun!).

Then headed back into town for BUL's "polskveld" - 3 hours of dancing to live music, very pleasant. I find it interesting thats they really only do 4 dances: pols, vols, reinlander, and polka. All couples dances so they vary constantly. Interesting to compare with our bush dances. It was a great evening.

So life continues. Its hard to believe there's only 1 month to go before I head back to Australia. I must admit I have somewhat mixed feelings about that. It'll be nice to get back to familiar territory and activities, but also I feel I'm just starting to get really settled here, and it will be a blow to leave. Ah well.


[Sep 3] [SSP97 Diary] [Oct 24]
Lawrie Brown / 15 Oct 97