This trip was something special, not only did the Norwegian Friluftsliv students join us, we also stayed the whole week in the same spot: An old military base on an island in front of Kristiansand, Randøya. In order to make this easier for me to write I will call it “Randoya” in the following text.

The island was, and to the day still is, inhabited. Even though the population keeps decreasing, the old school building, the post office and the church can still be found. If the local children want to visit school they have to take the ship every morning to the mainland. If the winter is really cold and the sea freezes, the people sometimes have to be rescued from the island because the water pipes freeze as well and they can’t get any food. I will go on about the military base a bit later, for now let us start with…

 

DAY 1

Packing for this trip felt strange. We knew that we would be sleeping in real beds; there would be a kitchen to cook in bathrooms to wash ourselves, and even a cooling room to store food which we would not have to carry around the whole day. Nonetheless I packed my backpack for a field trip and saved in weight and space which I, looking back at it now, wouldn’t have had to do. The only luxury I allowed myself to have was a carton of milk for breakfast. As I picked up some others with my car, I already realized that some had definitely made more use of the freedom this trip.

In order to reach our final destination we had to drive to a place called “Kongshavn” which means “King’s haven” in English. As we got there, we arranged all the gear and helped loading a life boat with it. Sadly the second boat broke down just that morning and so most of us had to take the Taxi boat to get to the island. We got dropped off at the north end of Randoya and as we walked to the south of it, we already witnessed how times there had changed and many buildings got turned into summer huts or just got torn down.

We spent the rest of the morning moving in and arranging our gear that we would need throughout the week. As noon passed by, my partner and I went out to meet our lecturer. Before we went on this trip, we got sorted into pairs and every pair got a task to fulfill during this week. Our group got assigned with the first lecture: Techniques in kayaking. The weather was good, just a bit windy and so we didn’t have to reorganize the lesson we planned. All of the groups were consisting of 8 people, half of them internationals and the other half Norwegian. We started with some dry practices on land, for example how to hold a paddle the correct way and how to paddle most efficiently. As we got our kayaks to the water it got clear, that we had quite a range in our group considering the skill and comfort sitting in a thing so close the water while the wind is blowing. My partner and I decided to take the group on a trip around the islands nearby and we used the multiple little bays and their wind protection to practice steering, turning and balancing the kayak. Of course we also included games like tag or “kiss the Kayak” which helped the group ease up and also melt together. As a part of our trip we paddled out through the “needles eye” to the open sea. Even though we stayed close to the coast line, we felt the strength of the waves and the difference in the wind. Towards the end of our trip we encouraged our group to capsize and some of them even tried to do a roll with their kayak.

Wet but happy we made it home and were able to have cooked lunch with a stunning view out to the sea, the lighthouse and the many little islands that cover the coast of Norway.

Later that evening we got a tour around the island and the old military ruins by one of our lecturers. We started off on top of an old military bunker that faced towards the sea and we got told how the use of this island changed through World War II and the cold war. The big guns on this island were last used 1991 in a ceremony after which the Norwegian military left Randoya and the buildings were handed over to the public. The university, the boy scouts and other institutions are now caring for the old barracks and are hosting camps and seminars there. The tour went on through old ruins and bunkers that are still accessible nowadays. The highlight of this round trip was the old headquarter. They are located inside the island and we had to walk through dark stone tunnels. This place also functions as a museum and so the old machinery from the war was still in there and we could play around with it as we learned some more about the islands history.

That evening I started having some troubles with my stomach, just like many others, and I started to fear that the flu was grasping for us.

 

DAY 2:

Tuesday started off just like Monday ended, sunny but windy. My condition got worse and so I did not join in on the second Kayak trip but stayed with another group. With them I took in the nets they had been throwing out the evening before and helped cleaning them. They caught approximately 9 fish, which was a small catch compared to the ones that were to come. We learned a lot about the different kinds of fish and the Norwegian tradition of catching, preparing and selling fish. Then we started making filets out of them. Since I would be doing that with my group as well, I stayed in the background, watched and soon went to the kitchen in order to prepare the provided vegetables for a meal. Some other members of that group joined me and together we managed to prepare a nice fish soup and even some backed fish with vegetables. In addition to this I have to say how great they integrated me into their group despite I have been a part of it  just for this morning.

After the filling meal we cleaned the kitchen and I almost was late for the second lecture of the day: Shallow water biology. For this lecture we went on a little walk over the island towards a little bay. On the way we got some interesting input about local wildlife and the importance of the balance even the smallest insects have. In order to get the full experience of the shallow water we put on wading suits and grabbed some water magnifying glasses. Armed with small nets we went out to catch what we could find. We gathered a collection of sea weeds, shrimps, crabs, snails, starfish, mussels and little fish. The highlight of this session came towards the end when our lecturer boiled some of the mussels and snails and everybody got to try these marine creatures. I have to say, they were quite salty and did not taste of much, but they were pretty tiny so that might be a reason for it.

Towards the evening the weather got worse and worse. The sky blackened and huge thunderstorm rose up on the horizon and rolled over us. Every night a different group was out on an island for a survival night. The group that night came back since they “stranded” on an island with almost no trees and the lighting struck their island just 10m away from where they were staying.

 

DAY 3:

Starting this day, the weather stayed grey, rainy and windy. Our day started where the last one had ended, with biology. Though this time it was deep water biology for which we went to another bay. In order to stay warm, we put on wetsuits with two layers that added up to a total thickness of 14mm and kept us cozy and warm underwater. With snorkels, big water bags and weights, not on our feet but around the waist to drag us down, we started diving in the bay. Again the task was to collect whatever we could find and gather it in the end. During our snorkeling another group in kayaks showed up and we realized how lucky we had been with the weather during our trips. The underwater world was fascinating and we saw a lot of fish, from colorful to grey and blending in with their environment.

After we came together and got out of our wetsuits, we learned about what we caught and before we went back to the base we released everything back into the sea.

This day was something special since the survival night was coming closer. Tension and excitement were equally rising in the group as we sat down for lunch. Some of us were already preparing their packs for the night out while others took it easy and said there would still be time for that later on. Before the group could leave for the night out, we had another lesson coming up; fishing and nets. On the big meadow in front of one of the houses we stood and unrolled two giant nets in order to untangle them and check them for dirt. After this deed was done, our lecturer told us how to put them out and take them in. Before we could do that we had another break in order to prepare for the island stay. Due to my damaged health I could not join in on this adventure. But as the group started off I joined them to put the nets out. We rowed out in rowing boats and as it was my first time in a rowboat, I felt really uncoordinated and not helpful at all. The strong wind didn’t make that feeling any better. My boat mates were very encouraging and helped me wherever they could and eventually we managed to throw the net out and they dropped me of at the jetty again.

I spent the evening together with another group member who couldn’t join and the other groups in the big kitchen room that also functioned as a common room. The two big groups, Norwegians and internationals, had such a good chemistry that one could call it a pity that they had not been put together for activities earlier.

 

DAY 4:

Our group came back early this morning, tired but happy. They had had a great experience and caught 16 fish in the nets. Later on we went down to the shore in order to do what I already learned on Tuesday: cleaning the nets and preparing the fish. We caught many flounders so fileting was a bit more difficult than with fish that are not flat. I could feel the tiredness in the group but everybody gave their best and with great effort we prepared a meal that was even better than the one I had had on Tuesday!

The afternoon held a surprise for us. “Big boats” was the name of the lecture and I did not know what to expect of it. In fact, we got taught how to stir a boat with a small outboard motor. It requires some multitasking and you have to be really careful to not crash the motor against something. After most of us got used to the way the boats were driven, we went on a tour. The same tour we already took with the kayaks on the first day. As we drove along we practiced our knowledge of sea navigation with the sea maps we had and learned some more about certain symbols on these maps. Once we got through the “needles eye” we realized how strong the wind actually was. The waves were foaming and our little boats were jumping over them. Or they would have been if not one of the motors broke down. Since I was sitting in the boat with the strongest motor we maneuvered next to them (which was harder than it sounds). So that’s where were, out on the storming sea, two of us holding on the other boat while they were trying to fix the motor. Luckily I didn’t get sea sick as we were pitched and tossed by the sea. Unfortunately we didn’t manage to fix the other boat so we had to tow them. The other group members had not realized that we stopped and were long gone. With a boat behind us, we kept going through the waves, always taking care to stay in a certain angle to them so we would not flip over. After an intense search for the others we found them in a calm bay. They said that they were about to come searching for us which was, somehow, comforting to know.

After such a stressful day we went to bed early, the last day should be a bit sunnier again and we wanted to get the most out of it.

 

DAY 5:

The day started off as grey as the others. After a good breakfast and some preparations for the trip home we gathered down at the jetty again. “Rowboats” was the plan for this morning and I looked forward to it in order to improve my rowing. For the third time we went on the course around the islands. You might think that it got boring, the contrary was the case. Every trip was unique and brought different challenges and experiences with it. Due to the waves still crashing against the shore, getting through the bottleneck of the “needles eye” with just the muscle power of 2 rowers was quite a fight. Also the route along the open sea had its moments, so to say. The mood in the boat was cheerful and jokes distracted from the anxiousness that might have been creeping up.

As soon as we got back we were on a tight schedule. The rooms had to be cleaned, the gear had to be packed and transported down to the lifeboat. I was amongst the people that were going with the fully loaded lifeboat. We had to look out for rocks coming close to the boat and also taking care that we lost no gear. As we reached the mainland we unloaded and bit by bit the others arrived, either with the taxi boat or with the second tour of the life boat.

This trip was an amazing experience for all of us. The groups melted together and everybody supported the other. No matter how big the challenges were or how bad the weather got there was always somebody laughing or cheering the others up. I learned a lot about Norwegian history and culture in just one week and got in touch with an environment that had been pretty unfamiliar to me up to then: The sea and coast. I can’t really put in words what we experienced in these short days but I hope you got at least a glimpse of what it had been like.