adventures in *

Stave Church near Vann

Rain woke me up around 4:30, I fell back to sleep and got up at 8 to mostly sunny skies. Today I need to head back to Oslo to catch a flight to Longyearbyen the next morning. Along the way, I stopped by a couple stave churches – built in the 1100s, they were in great shape, I wonder how much renovation they needed through the centuries.

I drove through the Laerdalstunnelen, which was as cool as I thought it’d be. A 15 mile long tunnel bored through the mountains. 3 large caverns every 4 miles were brightly lit blue to simulate daylight. Its designed to keep drivers awake so they don’t doze off and crash. Speed cameras kept me from flooring it but it was fun never the less, I drove through it twice.

It took me 7 hours to get back to oslo, minus the detour for the tunnel – 220 miles in distance. In addition to the low speed limits, the norwegian roads are narrow and twisty. The highways are mostly 2 lanes, but vast stretches don’t have a center line and sometimes narrows to a single lane with pullouts. Its a little scary going around blind corners or steep drop offs at 80.

I made it back to the hotel at 8p and spent a few hours sorting photos, I’ll have some to post tomorrow.