Norway is expensive but the price we paid for bad breakfast at Geiranger town was jus ridiculous. Since we had a kitchenette, there was no reason to let that repeat. So we head to the grocery store to get some stuff, dump it in the car and start our trek.
You see we had decided to go trekking, because apparently there are many spots where you can take good photos from. We had asked someone at our cabin and she couldnt explain very well but she managed to point us to the right direction. In the town, we found the tourist information office, and decided better to reconfirm. I have no idea why the lady the tourist info gave us a completely different route. We believed her and started walking. We heard waterfall some where, we followed it and saw something that cannot be described. I will jus put a photo up. I think we trespassed into someone's personal grounds cos when we tried to go back we found barricades. To show some signs of summer, you could see small flowers here and there. Sumit started teasing me for taking so many pictures of them.
After a while, we were sure we were not going where wen intended to go. But then, being the optimists that we are, we found a nice rock with a great view and had a picnic lunch. Bread-butter sandwiches with fruit yougurts and apples. Yum!
The walk back seemed a lot faster (maybe because I had stopped taking pictures of the flowers). We managed to reach town by 2pm. We felt it was still early and we could go for a spin, what use of getting a car rite? There was this zig-zag path that Sumit wanted to drive up on. Ofcourse the view from above was splendid.
Once again chef Sumit decided to make dinner, the menu - tomato soup, hard boiled eggs and bread with cream cheese.
We had to leave early the next morning, we were driving to Briksdalbreen glacier and we had to reach by 10am. Although google promised us 2 hours, there was a feeling that it would take longer. We were right to leave early, and I was right to let Sumit drive. The highways were at places were 'hidden' by low lying clouds and then kept getting narrow. As soon as we hit the country road, there was only one lane for two way traffic, so one had to be careful. Also there were no sign posts on the country roads. So we were not sure if we were lost. But in front of us we saw this huge glacier (we dino that was where we were going until later), so we decided if we really were lost we will jus get as close as possible to the glacier in front of us and take it from there.
Finally we reached Briksdal glacier. Now we were supposed to go on a glacier safari, which involved (from the pictures) going around the glacier lake in a raft. I expected it to be a very relaxing sorta, easy activity. We were driven up most of the way till the glacier lake and walked up the rest. If at any point till now we had felt Norway was cold, we were about to experience the worse. The wind was so strong, it kept pushing us. There was a German couple who joined wit us and our guide. We managed to get the raft in the water, then we were told we had to row against the current and wind!. So we huffed and puffed, rowed till our arms hurt, only to see we had hardly moved. The current was taking us away much faster than we could row. After about, I am guessing, 20 mins ( what felt like eternity), we were pushed onto shore. We decided to make another attempt. It would seem for a minute that the wind stopped blowing, but that was just a cruel joke being played on us. We just went some distance and anchored on one side, took fotos, asked questions to the guide. Tried one last time to go closer to the glacier, we managed to make it close.
The trek back was slow and tiring. Coffee was badly needed to wake my senses. My feet were numb inside my shoes. We met many chirpy people walkin up to the glacier, all greeting us with the widest smile. I wasnt sure if they would smile on their way back. Anyways, we had managed to finish the whole experience much earlier than anticipated. For my efforts I decided a treat was due, double chocolate chip muffin, Europe size!
We only had the last stretch of drive, 3 hours to Lavik left. We had decided we wouldnt stop for fotos. Seriously you cant help it when the whole damn country is so freaking beautiful! But half way thru I was too tired. We had packed lunch, which we had on the way, so we didnt really have to stop much. We reached Lavik around 5pm.
Lavik Fjord Hotell, family owned, straight out of an Dutch novel. It was like a boutique hotel with its own view of Sognefjord. The dutchman behind the counter was more than excited to help us with our room and also made us some hot drinks. There was a lovely bookcase just outside our room and an arm chair. I felt the only thing missing was a glass of wine, but since we were driving, we din want to risk it (Norway has very strict laws on drink driving). Evening dinner was specially made for us, hot spinach tortellini with salad on the side. We couldnt have asked for more.
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