Just back from sailing through the Norwegian fiords on M/S Nordnorge, one of the Hurtigruten fleet. It’s a service that leaves Bergen every day, each ship taking twelve days to complete the circuit, dropping off cargo en route at small villages and towns – and a few cities. We went all the way into the Arctic Circle and round the top of Norway as far Kirkenes.
The scenery was awesome – shades of black, grey and white when we set off, but spring arrived as we came back south and within a few days all the mountains and islands had a fringe of green. One of our guides described the weather as ‘nine months of winter and three months of crap weather’. Well, maybe so, but we did see a little sunshine.
We wore our ‘YES’ badges every day and though that may have made a few people give us a body swerve, many took the chance to ask what they were for, and were interested to hear about the campaign and the prospects for independence. Some didn’t understand the issues, some against the idea and some were supportive - probably on balance, there was more support than resistance to the idea.
The scenery was awesome – shades of black, grey and white when we set off, but spring arrived as we came back south and within a few days all the mountains and islands had a fringe of green. One of our guides described the weather as ‘nine months of winter and three months of crap weather’. Well, maybe so, but we did see a little sunshine.
We wore our ‘YES’ badges every day and though that may have made a few people give us a body swerve, many took the chance to ask what they were for, and were interested to hear about the campaign and the prospects for independence. Some didn’t understand the issues, some against the idea and some were supportive - probably on balance, there was more support than resistance to the idea.
We landed in Trondheim – the ship decorated with Norwegian flags and bunches of birch twigs just coming into leaf – on Independence Day (17th May) What an experience that was! Independence is still ‘very precious’ to the Norwegian people and they were out in their thousands to march through the streets, behind bands of every description, to celebrate it. It seemed as if the entire population was out, many of them in national dress. Wonder how we’ll celebrate our first ‘Independence Day’? Aimee |