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Published: November 25th 2009
The walrus named Walter
We made friends with a walrus named WalterToys going to the Arctic
Once or twice every year dad takes us on trips when mum doesn't come along. This summer dad took us on one of these trips and the destination this time was North Cape.
North Cape is the furthest north you can go in Europe. That sounded to us like a big adventure so we happily followed dad on this trip. We thought that we would have to walk for days in snow and ice, sleep in a tent, fight with wild animals and generally risk our lives to reach this remote destination so far up in the Arctic. It turned out it wasn’t quite the adventure we thought it would be. There is a paved road going right up to North Cape and once you are there you find a restaurant, a hotel and a souvenir shop. Instead of desolate wilderness we found Las Vegas… But we liked it anyway. Once we arrived to North Cape it was cold and foggy so we were quite happy to be able to have a warm house to hide in.
But now we are going to fast. We’d better start in the beginning of the trip.
Talking to our friends
Three of our best friends at home are walruses. Here we are telling them about when we met Walter We started in a town called Tromso in the north of Norway. The first thing we saw there was a walrus named Walter. We are very fond of walruses. In fact three of our best friends at home are walruses. We talked to Walter for a while to ask him about how life in Tromso is. He said that summer is good, warm enough and plenty of sun, but winter is not so nice. In winter there is a lot of snow and for several weeks there is the Polar Night. Polar Night means that it is dark all day and all night. Walter said that he’d rather be somewhere warm, like in the West Indies, during the winter months if he could have a choice. We said goodbye to Walter and we promised to send his greetings to our friends at home.
When Walter talked about the West Indies it made us think that maybe it is a place we can visit some day. We’d better talk to mum and dad to see if that can be arranged.
After we left Tromso we went to a place that dad claimed was one of the highlights of
One of Walter's friends
This sailor is one of Walter's friends this trip - the place where the countries Norway, Sweden and Finland all meet. When we got there it turned out that all that was there was a chunk of concrete that marked the position where the borders all meet. We expected armed guards, barbed wire fence and possible a mine field to mark that these borders are important and that no trespassing is allowed. Instead it was often impossible to tell where the actual border was. Up at the concrete marker it was possible to walk around and take photos as much as you like. We thought passing borders was important business, it usually is in the places we travel to, and here it is less exciting than going from the bedroom to the kitchen in our apartment…
When we stopped the next time on this trip dad said “Now you are going to see a Jökel". When he said that we jumped up and down with joy and shouted “Ice Cream! Ice Cream!”. You see, in our family we are not allowed to curse. If we curse we have to pay a fine of one Swedish krona and if mum or dad curse they have to buy
Waterfall
Northern Norway is famous for the wild and beautiful nature. We took this photo of a waterfall to show what it can look like the rest of the family ice cream. When dad said “Jökel” we thought he said the Swedish curse “Jäkel”. That is what made us happy. If he curses we get ice cream. He explained to us that “Jökel” is a Norwegian word that means glacier. We have heard the word “glacier” before and last time dad used that it meant “iceberg”. We think that maybe dad was making up the thing about “Jökel” being a Norwegian word to avoid paying his fine but we could never prove that. We don’t know enough Norwegian to argue with him there.
He was right about the iceberg though. There really was one there. All we could see was a small section of it. But according to dad it really is big and most of it can’t be seen unless you have a plane and can fly over it.
This iceberg we could only see from a distance. We would have had to walk a long time to get close to it and we didn’t have time to spend a whole day here. But the iceberg looked cold so it was OK with us. We have seen an iceberg once before when
Three countries meet here
The place where the countries Norway, Sweden and Finland all meet we were in Iceland three years ago. Then we were very close to an iceberg. We remember how cold and nasty that was and now we were quite happy to have a good distance between us and the iceberg.
When we left the iceberg we were sure that we wouldn't get close to any more snow on this trip. Sadly, we were wrong. At one place where we stopped dad saw a large snowdrift that still hadn't melted since last winter. Dad walked up to this snowdrift and put us in it! Dad thought he was fun doing that... For us it wasn't fun! Our butts got cold!
In the north of Norway there are lots of reindeers everywhere. We tried to make friends with them but they preferred to be on their own and not talk to toys. We managed to get a photo of them and us but dad had to use a zoom lens to make the photo come out good. Well done there dad. But it is still not enough to make up for when you put us in the snow. We are still mad at you for that!
The visit to North Cape was only
Seeing an iceberg
"But you called this a summer trip, dad? That's an iceberg over there. In summer the only thing that starts with 'ice-' is ice cream, and an ice cream you owe us..." a short one. It was so foggy that we couldn't see anything. It was cold too! When dad after only an hour told us that we were going to leave we were quite pleased. It was fun to have been there but there was not much we could see because of the weather. Therefore no point in staying longer than necessary.
Instead we went to a city called Hammerfest. Dad told us that there are two reasons for visiting Hammerfest.
1 It is the city in the World that is closest to the North Pole
2 There is a monument there over an important and very successful scientific project, the Struwe Geodesic Arc, there.
We can agree that the city's proximity to the North Pole makes it worth visiting but to visit a monument over a scientific project sounds like a terrific waste of time. But dad wanted to go there and we had to come along. Dad is a scientist and he likes to visit boring places as long they are science oriented. Well, dad pays the bills and he drove the car so we didn't have much of a choice, did we?
In Hammerfest
You are not funny, dad!
Dad found some snow and he thought it was fun to put us in it. "This is not funny, dad! Not funny at all!" we found something that was more to our liking - a real polar bear! People say that polar bears are dangerous and that they can eat small toys and even big humans. It is not quite true. The polar bear we met was very nice. She let us pet her and she was really nice.
Jean-Claude: "She really had wonderful fur. Much softer and thicker than mine. Easily the nicest fur I've ever felt."
Emma: "You look all dreamy! Are you in love with her?"
Jean-Claude: "Er... um... no..."
When we arrived to the monument over the scientific experiment dad explained how important it was. He talked about the hard work and the hundreds of measurements they make and how they in the end, after decades of hard work, managed to come to the end of the project. They managed to prove that the Earth is not round. We started to laugh like maniacs! So the scientific project was all about proving that the Earth is not round. Even we, and we are just toys, know that the Earth is round. People have known this for hundreds of years. So the scientists wanted to prove that it is
Reindeers
We could not get closer than this to the reindeers. It seems like they don't like toys very much not round. What did they want show really? That the Earth is flat perhaps? That's hilarious! And then we laughed some more. Dad then explained that the Earth is almost round but not completely. The Earth is actually a bit flat on the poles, or flattened out rather, and a bit thicker at the equator. So in a way you might argue that what the scientists actually wanted to prove was that the Earth in fact is flat. This made us laugh even more!
We actually laughed so much that we started crying. When we finally stopped laughing we dried our tears and then we looked at the actual monument... Then we started laughing again, even more than before! The monument looks like a giant pen*s! We have not laughed so much in years.
After we left Hammerfest we travelled south again. Well, it makes sense when you visit the city closest to the North Pole that you travel south from there, doesn't it? The place we stopped at first is called Alta. There they have a place where there are a lot of pictures on display. The pictures are painted on the bare rocks and first we
North cape
The visit to North Cape was only a short one. It was so foggy that we couldn't see anything. thought it was graffiti. But then dad told us that the paint is just there to highlight the pictures and that the pictures really are carved into the rock. Dad called them rock engravings and said that they are more than a thousand years old.
We walked around there and looked at the pictures. It was nice and the setting was nice too, like a big park. Dad said that the rock engravings were really old but they looked so nice that we couldn't get rid of the feeling that maybe it was all fake. Maybe the pictures were carved in the rock only a few years ago and not 2000 years back. When something looks so perfect, as these pictures really were, it makes you wonder...
The last place we stopped at on this trip was just outside Tromso. It was a place where a big German navy boat sank many years ago. All that was left of the boat today is a memorial plaque and some scrap metal on the beach. It is not much you can see today but if you can imagine what it all looked like in the 1940-ies when the boat was
North cape
It was too foggy to see anything here too. moored there and when it was attacked by British pilots who wanted to destroy this big German navy boat and how they managed to put in a direct hit and how the boat keeled over and finally sank it can be interesting.
Hope you enjoyed reading about our adventures in Norway.
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Malte Malaria & co
non-member comment
Var inte ni i västindien??
Jamen, ni missade ju världens grej när ni hälsade på Walter. Han VILLE till Västindien, men ni har ju redan varit där... eller var inte ni i Kolkata? Det ligger väl i västra Indien? Eller åkte ni till Indien efter Norge? Annars kunde ni ju berättat för honom, så hade han kanske uppskattat Tromsö-livet lite bättre. För såna som vi trivs inte i Tramsö och liknande områden. Det är för tramsigt kallt för de flesta av oss. Brrr!