Fjords





There are so many fjords snaking through the land that the distinction between mainland and island becomes merely academic. The shortest route between A and B is usually across a channel of seawater, whether or not your destination is an island.


Lyngen Alps



Best hike I've ever taken: Endless mountains, three fjords, two glaciers, a reindeer herd, autumn colors, a road at a 40-degree incline, and a glacially fed lake of otherworldly color.


Surprises

Who knew the arctic had such crystalline water?


Who knew the arctic was so lush?


Who knew the arctic had autumn colors?


Waterfalls





In the late spring and early summer, they're everywhere.

Sami

Not real Sami.


Real Sami - selling Sami souvenirs.


Sami kitsch.


A Sami lavvu in use.


Midnight in Kautokeino - where many reindeer herders live in the winter.


Possibly an outhouse. Definitely a part of a reindeer herder summer settlement.


Tromsø

Tromsø: The city above the arctic circle that I lived in for two months. Also the name of the cheap, rickety IKEA loft bed that I slept in as an undergraduate. Tromsø (the city, I mean) is so proud of its latitude that even the Burger King announces that it is the most northerly in the world.


Polaria - a museum of the arctic.


The Arctic Cathedral.


Oslo



Vertical things.


Blitz: an anarchist cafe/commune.


Unless they're giant flaming words.




Stave church. Wooden, 800 years old, transported across the country, and still in great shape.


You know you're in Scandinavia when...

...there are diagonally oriented fences surrounding a house covered in reindeer skulls.


...caviar is the only thing that's not expensive, and it comes in toothpaste tubes.



Sign reads: "remember your seatbelt."



Leaving Norway.