Cruise lookout

Thursday 6th July 2023

Today we docked in a tiny village called Skjolden.  Apparently it's the mouth of one the longest Fjords and is just breathtakingly beautiful.  Fortunately the sun came out in the morning and everything looked like a scene from Heidi,  we even saw sheep for the first time. The ship docked around a corner from the bay mouth and the turquoise colour of the water is supposedly that colour because it's from the melted ice of the glaciers up 'stream'.

It's amazing to see pockets of snow tucked under rocks or in between the cracks in the valleys. The village has around 300 residents and a small primary school was higher up from the village center.  I'm fascinated by people living so remotely. It seems so quiet until 2000 cruise passengers step into their streets,  cafés and supermarkets with demands and noise, and hopefully dollars.

I walked up to a lookout point up on a hill and was impressed with the stunning view. Fortunately only about 100m of the path was real forest walk with rocks and roots and I took my time seeing the different flora from this Nordic country.  I got to the point just before a crowd arrived so sneaked a moment of quiet calm before the jostling of selfie spots started. I had a quick drink and decided to leg it before the crowd moved down because I'm slower than them all and didn't want to feel rushed.

In the town center there's an indoor pool and small museum explaining some history and its fascinating to see how hard the past lives must've been. It must take a certain type of hardy people to live in this extreme climate which feels so remote but perhaps they're more organised than I'm thinking.  And besides, they've got decent electricity, (sorry Saffas)

Angie and I met up again on the ship and had a later than usual dinner. Afterwards we went to see a show in the theatre of a juggler. He was actually quite humorous and now I'm ready for bed. It started raining again thick cloud is hanging over the mountains alongside the fjord, as we sail along to our last day off the ship tomorrow- Haugesund.