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Published: August 18th 2012
The t-shirt in the shop window said it all:
"If we had dolphins we'd kill them too".
Hewn into that same t-shirt was a diagram heavy on the graphics.
Norway takes some pride in its success at turning the cold shoulder to world opinion on whaling, right down to selling great chunks of whale meat in heavily touristed waterfront fish markets. Snubbing their collective noses at anti whaling lobbyists, Norwegians state:
"Don't like it, don't come"
In reality, Norwegians don't need our tourism bucks anyway, there's oil in them thar hills.
Via that oil, Norway is rich, the perennial top dog in polls centred around the world's most liveable or the highest standards of living.The reasons why Norway is placed on such a lofty pedestal aren't exactly covert. Public wealth manifests itself in an ultra slick infrastructure, there's nigh a blade of grass out of place, tiny villages and the old quarters of towns are impossibly cute with their uniform timber structures, the people are polite and the entire nation is essentially bilingual, the product of a functional and well financed education system.
What doesn't seem fair is that not only was Norway given
Geiranger
The cruise ship looks out of place. I think so anywaythe gift of black gold, it was also at the front of the queue when landscapes were being handed out. The entire sphere of alpine vistas are on show, the real star being its fjords. The south west coast looks as though it was taken to by a giant lumberjack who'd had a couple too many drinks, carving out chunks of land that have since been filled in by the waters of the North Atlantic.
With that much going for it, Norway should be one of the world's premier tourist destinations. It kind of is but at the same time this nation can make itself tough to enjoy.
Our hands are rarely out of our pockets and only then emerge clutching wads of fiscal smashing krona. Norway is THE most expensive country I've ever been to.
Ascertaining the rough cost of living at a new destination, Penny will use the price of a latte as her terms of reference. I'll normally take the more blokey angle and a 6 pack of beer hits the scales at around the $30 mark.
How about that baguette in the organic bakery - $12
The packet pepperoni pizza at
a 2 star hotel - $32
A litre of unleaded fuel - $2.50
All those currency conversions are courtesy of an Oz dollar at its current dizzying heights. 5 years ago you could ramp up those prices by 50%. As a result we've regressed from flashpacking to backpacking, but side stepping such extravagant costs is no cakewalk, these Norwegians are astute at cutting off the angles.
An example? Why not.
We were trying to travel from Bergen to Stavanger, about a 100 mile jaunt. Take the boat, $150 each. The bus, $90 each. Seemed exorbitant so we looked at car hire. At $40 a day the car option was a no brainer. That 100 mile drive then racked up $150 in tolls and obligatory ferry crossings. Factor in the $90 GPS, the $100 parking fine for being within 5 meters of an intersection (4.9 meters wasn't quite legal enough) and the car rental wasn't looking so savy after all.
But ya gotta eat, ya gotta get around and:
Ya gotta have a roof. Unless you're prepared for dorm beds, the $100 room in Norway is a long extinct species, even with shared bathrooms in
Pulpit Rock
How close do you go? a hostel. In fact the $150 room is on the critically endangered list.
At least we've had some interesting lodgings, not the least our room in Stavangar which was part of the city's hospital. Not enough patients and the void is filled with struggling travellers. Hotel guests get to rub shoulders with folks on walking frames and mothers breast feeding newborns. The upside is when nature calls in the middle of the night there's always a bed pan within arms reach.
We've slunk to underhanded, stingy tactics in an attempt to minimise the bleeding. We now plump for rooms advertising buffet breakfasts in their price structure. My fleecy North Face jacket may look out of place in the centrally heated breakfast areas but it's amazing how much food can be shoved into its pockets for lunch later on. Even then there's this constant thought in the back of our minds that somewhere on CCTV a Norwegian Big Brother is watching and the credit card will be docked for the value of the 2 boiled eggs and cheese sandwiches we squirrelled away.
So you spend up big eating, moving and staying, but eventually the costs become prohibitive when
you actually try to DO things. While we don't have a serious budget, some constraints need to be observed.
Flam has an almost ethereal setting in a cosy corner of Songefjord. Kayaking looked fun - $220 for 3 hours. Howzabout the much hyped 45 minute each way train ride from Flam to Myrdal - $120 for both of us return. What if we go one way up and return down on rented bikes - $220. Bike hire is twice the cost of car hire!
Got the point? Doing things in Norway can bankrupt you quicker than you could gaff a whale. The result is that you end up NOT doing things that were on the agenda and that, dear readers, is disappointing.
In the past six and a half months I've promised to give my best shot at returning to plenty of places. As impressive as it is I don't know if Norway will make that wish list. My tip, New Zealand. Same look, a day's flying time closer to home base and half the price.
Let me now place my head on the chopping block (a dangerous place to put your head if you've seen
Kayaking in Flam
If you can afford it what a Norwegian can do with a club in his hand and a whale in the vicinity) and steel a line from a reader's comment earlier in the year:
Norway - it's a great place to live but you wouldn't to visit there.
Yeatesy
Travelling around Norway was proving expensive, the trains and buses were sending us bankrupt. We chose instead to hire a car. Compliments of Hertz, our cheapest option was a Volvo station wagon for the price of a Ford Fiesta. Backpacks in the boot, we hit the road in style looking for the elusive budget accommodation and hoping to sample some of Norway's finest cuisine along the way.
Mistake number one. There is no budget accommodation in Norway. It is budget in theory but you pay a kings ransom for something even the Polish immigrants would hesitate to stay in. When the choice of accommodation ranges from a hotel attached to a hospital, a prison converted to rooms with ensuite and some family rooms (maybe they were the cells the hangings took place in allowing an upstairs and downstairs!) or a mini motel, emphasis on mini not much motel,
you know something just don't add up. The mini motel in fact was an octagon, with five cheese wedges cut into it to resemble rooms. Located at the rear of a supermarket carpark, you've got to wonder who came up with this concept and who in their right mind would stay there. Colvin /Yeates candidates number one along with Italians, Belgiums and Danes all finding the dollar/ Kroner just doesn't go far in Norway. The hospital hotel wasn't much better. The travellers check in on one side of the reception counter and hospital admittance is on the other. However once in our room it did feel more like a hotel if you ignore the crying baby during the night and the sound of the helicopter landing on the roof another. But it is about the destination and not getting there, so what do I think of Norway?
Prices aside, it is a beautiful country packed with fjords, snow capped mountains, lush green vegetation and wild flowers galore. The drives have taken us deep through mountain tunnels, across numerous ferry crossings and along lakes and fjords where their mountains dwarf even the largest of cruise liners in town. It is picture
postcard material and we have enjoyed the less expensive task of taking photos to the constant cost of entrance fees for some of the tourist attractions. We have also been blessed with the weather, cold crisp mornings, clear sunny days with long twilights. I guess fine weather is a rarity when a local girl was so delighted that "it hasn't rained since Sunday", as if that's some kind of record, no rain for 3 days. I can't really comment on the food in Norway as we have had hit and miss meals trying to find inexpensive options each night. With a supermarket packet pizza costing over $30, bread +$9 and a coffee at a gas station $5-7 there is not a lot of choice. We were told we needed to try typical Norwegian food while we were here (ie) fish cakes or whale!! We didn't try the whale. For one it just doesn't look appetising. It is black in colour, large and chunky. They tell me it tastes more like meat than fish, (I guess not really surprising since it's not a fish) and is a popular with the Norwegiens and Japanese only. I'm not surprised. The fish cakes on
the other hand we did try, but I don't know that the ones we had were a true representation of the Norwegian speciality. Ours tasted like reconstituted fish with a touch of chilli sauce. The fish cakes were advertised as 52percent real fish, I don't know what the other 48 percent was! Hopefully not whale. We are now heading for Sweden where they tell me is much cheaper than Norway. Here's hoping.Penny
More images at:
www.colvinyeates.zenfolio.com
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D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
We are experiencing the same prices in Greenland
This is an amzing country. Looks like we will add Norway to our short list. Awesome blog! Love the stories. Carry on and enjoy the adventure.