733 km later.....

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A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step" – Lao Tzu

This step I was about to take, but in this case it wasn't a thousand miles, only 733 km. My first stop on this adventure is a country which has been called "The World's Best Destination" by National Geographic Traveller, namely Norway. I'm headed to Stavanger, where I will live a life as a student for 5 months.

Just to get the introduction in place prior to departure, I am Lis. I am 22 years old, and studying International Tourism & Leisure Management at the University of Southern Denmark in Esbjerg. I just finished my third semester, and despite a lot of paperwork, I'm now able to consider myself a student at the university of Stavanger.

Since my passion is to travel, and preferably as much as possible (whenever I have the money), one of my great experiences is my time in Australia. I went down under for 8 months, back in 2009, and I had a blast. It was quit a different way of travelling, since it was my first time on my own, going on a Work & Holiday Visa and not to forget with money in my pocket. Now I have thrown myself into a Study Abroad program in which alms in the form of SU (Every Dane over the age of 18 is entitled to public support for his or her further education - regardless of social standing) is the only thing keeping me above water. So what the future in Norway, Stavanger to be more exact will bring is uncertain, but hey, I'm sure it is going to be awesome.

January 2012 16:35, departure from Billund Airport in Jutland. Had managed to hold back with the partying at New Year's Eve, so didn't have the anual hangover. Instead I was finally after 2 years of "celibacy" in Denmark going to travel for a longer period again. Unfortunately, there are always some hurdles along the way which must be concured. The first came abruptly when I said goodbye to my boyfriend Mads. The original plan was actually that he was to come along, but sometimes plans changed. I will however fill you guys in later on why our plans changed.

Before departure from Billund, there was time to embark on one of my Christmas presents, namely, the biography of the man that gets B.S. Christiansen to look like a little boy scout; Bear Grylls. However, I only got to read a couple of pages before boarding. The flight to Stavanger with stop in Oslo, I would describe as piece of cake, compared to my trip to Australia. It should, however, later turn out that I had overestimated the whole thing a bit, but that's another story which I will return to later.

21:05 I arrived at Sola Airport, tired and very exhausted in spite of the short journey. Since I wasn't familiar with the buss routes in Stavanger, and couldn't find the energy to try figure out what bus to take. I decided to grap a cap, wondering how much this was going to cost me. I knew there was "only" like 17 km into city center, and according to the university's webpage it should cost me about 250-300 NOK. The fact that it was to pay 400 NOK I had not foreseen, but hey it was worth it and I am a big believer in enjoying life even though i'm a "poor" student.

My first night in Stavanger, I spent on a hostel, our so it said on the internet, but it actually had some great comparisons to a hospital hotel kind of thing. There where even patients and nurses warking around. My room was nothing special, there was the necessary things and a little extra in form of TV and free internet. For me, however, it was time to knalde brikker (swipe pieces) as we say in danish. So after I had been on skype and not to forget facebook, I fell asleep ......

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Photos

the road of a traveller
From my time in Australia