My last week in Bergen

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I’m officially done with my research this summer. On Wednesday, I gave a final presentation of my study. As most everyone in the office is already on holiday, there were only five people there. It was good practice for a larger presentation that I will give when I arrive back in Tucson. I have learned a great deal this summer while researching. Nothing really ever goes as planned, and you just have to go with it. This has been a wonderful experience that has gotten my foot in the door of the research world. I will be continuing this study back at UA with two more subject groups. It will be interesting to see what those results are.

For my last week in Bergen, the sun continued to shine. However, today I had planned to hike the last two mountains, but as we are expecting a large amount of rain, that will have to wait until August 1st when I return from Germany. Rain or shine, I’m climbing those mountains! Then I will have accomplished my goal of climbing all seven mountains surrounding Bergen.

Yesterday, Stephie took me with her to another island for fish counting. We took a two hour boat ride from Bergen to Hardbakke a small village on one of the islands. From there we took a 45 minute bus ride to the tourist vacation rentals. Only one of the tourist fishing groups they had expected showed up. So instead of counting fish, most of the afternoon Stephie and I relaxed in the sun on one of the docks. The weather was amazing. The sun was shining, but there was still a breeze too keep you cool. The water was bright blue, and area was surrounded by large boulders and stone-faced mountains. Stephie and I joked that one of the mountains looked like Mount Rushmore and tried to decide what parts looked like faces. We started home around 5pm and landed in Bergen at 9pm. It had been a long day in the sun.

That night we met our Friend Kenneth at the bottem of Floyen, one of the mountains. He hadn’t told us what he had planned. Stephie and I weren’t dressed for hiking, but we climbed anyway. We ended halfway up the mountain at a small place off the trail. Kenneth had brought us to a place he had picked blueberries with his family as a child. For the first time in my life, I had the chance to pick fresh blueberries. As we began picking, we were attacked by small biting bugs. We decided to keep moving. After collecting half a cupful of blueberries each, we walked partway down the mountain to escape the bugs. We sat on a bench overlooking the water and sunset. There we made blueberry “smoothies.” We poured milk and a bit of sugar in the cup with our blueberries. We mixed it, and suddenly we had blueberry milk. It was really tasty. After the sunset, the bugs found us again. We decided to head back to town and take refuge in Kenneth’s house. By midnight, it had been a long day and I was ready for bed.

Today was my last day in the office, I only went for lunch to say goodbye to people. I can’t believe my eight weeks of work is already finished. I’ll be relaxing the rest of today and heading into the city tonight to pick up my parents. I’m excited to see some familiar faces. More of your travels to come…

Ha det, Allison

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Comments

[Grandpa Shannon]

Your Blog has been very informative! Keep us posted on the rest of your adventure and give Mom and Dad a kiss from us! Grandpa and Grandma