I’m about a month and a half into my adventure here in Norway and I’ve already experienced so much. I’ve meet some awesome people not only from here in Norway but from all over the world. There has been a lot of hikes, traveling, swimming, rock climbing, binge eating, a few parties and even a couple of snow ball fights.

My home base is a city in the south called Kristiansand, population of 89,000 people. The city is filled with colorful buildings, vibrant trees, lots of ice snow and slush this time of year, and kind people. Everyone here seems to keep to themselves, yet they are more than willing to help if asked. Learning how to get around by bus was a challenge at first, but with practice and help from the locals, I’ve mastered the system. I’ve explored in the main city, and hiked through the near by forest  A few times with my class mates practicing our orienteering skills but mostly for play.  Being in an outdoor education class, traveling is mandatory. I plan to see as much as Norway and Europe while over seas as possible. So far I have only left the country once for a couple hours. On a Wednesday during one of the first weeks here I took a fairy to Denmark with a handful of other international students. This adventure was mainly for the buffet, cheap booze and another stamp in my pass port. I hope to go back to enjoy Denmark on one of my weekends off, but for now I have been exploring this country I call home.

I took a bus one Sunday afternoon to the most southern city Norway, Mandal, with a couple girlfriends. Forgetting that here in Norway all shops bigger than 100 meters squared are not allowed to open on Sundays, we wandered aimlessly around the city. There were very few stores open. We found a local artist’s shop, she had load of colorful balloons and clouds all around with tiny people on them. We then wandered into a tourist building which we learned had a small art museum on the second floor and a hike near by. We checked out the museum and then made our way to the other side of the city for the recommended hike, Uranienborg. We made it to the top just in time to see an amazing sunset. Although the shops were all closed, it was a great day with some great people and views.

During my most recent adventure, nothing more could have gone wrong, yet it has been my favorite adventure so far. The goal of this trip was to see an ice music festival. The original plan was for us nine girls to start our travels Friday morning, we’d travel 6 hours by car to the city of Gelio. From there we would have a couple hours before taking an hour train ride to a city of a population of ten, called Finse. We would camp out after the festival and get a cabin the second night, then meet up with our class on Sunday after exploring the city a bit. We started off the adventure Thirty minutes later than expected, had a few pee breaks along the main road, then meet with a closed winter road. This closed road made us back track two hours, just the amount of time before the train departed the station. We raced the train for hours on edge. Getting caught behind multiple snow plows and slow cautious drivers we knew there was no way we’d make it in time. Stopping at a gas station we called both the train station and the concert vendors to try to reschedule for the next night. It worked! We then decided we would find a camping spot in Gelio, wake up the next morning to catch the train, cross country ski around Finse before the festival then catch the train back to get to our cabin. It was a perfect plan. We found an open area to set up camp, packed down feet of snow, and set up our tents. Waking up to -24 degrees Celsius with everything frozen was quite a feeling, not wanting to get out of my sleeping bag I laid there for a while thinking about what I got myself into. Finally making it out of the tent just before sunrise, I realized I was surrounded by a 360 view of mountains and it was all worth it. We took in the view, quickly took down camp, made breakfast and packed up the cars when we encountered another obstacle in our journey. One of our cars would not start. Over night in the bone chilling cold, the battery froze. We had multiple people try to help us but surprisingly no one knew what they were doing. With only 30 minutes until the second train left, we had no choice but to try to make two trips with one car. I got in the car with the second group of girls, speeding our way through the small town we parked the car as the train was pulling up. We ran as fast as we could to the station but we weren’t fast enough. We missed the train for the second time, we had a broken down car and I couldn’t feel my toes in my right foot. Sitting at the station dethawing, we contemplated on what to do next. First we had to fix our means of transportation, some of the girls went back to the other car, while us other sat at the station waiting for the next train. After hours of trying they finally got the car started. They made it back to the station in just enough to to warm up and to hop on the train. We didn’t technically have tickets for this train but we hoped the attended would be nice enough to use our previous tickets. We told him about the chaos we’ve been through the past 30 hours and he didn’t ask another question.

Finally making it to Finse a day later than planned, we walking out of the train to gorgeous mountain views and made our way to the igloo for the festival. This was something I never would have thought I’d experience. It is the only ice festival in the world using only instruments made of ice. As the sun went down along with the temperature these amazing sounds were over. With no trouble at all, we made it on the train back to Gelio. Getting to the cabin, we all got a task to help unload the car and make dinner. Not a lot of words were spoken by us worn out girls until we had food in our belly’s. We played a couple games next to the fire and called it a night. The next morning we woke up, packed up and headed out to ski for a few hours before having to head back down south. Having too meet with our class the next day in Evje’s for a week of skiing, we decided it would be best to go there a night early, prolonging our journey with some of the Norwegian friends we had with us. Even though, two weeks later I still don’t have all the feeling back in my toes, I think this trip was one I will always remember.

I have many more memories to make here in Norway. I plan to make the best of them even when thrown challenges like I was in my trip to Finse. So far in the next four month I will be sleeping in my dorm room for 45 nights between my adventurous elsewhere. In the up coming week I will be cross country skiing for four days straight, camping the nights in between. I have a trip’s planned for my class almost every week or every other week, I have planned a trip to London with a few classmate in the middle of march, and I have one of my best friends from home coming to study in Norway only a hour away from where I am staying. I hope to have some adventures with her while she is here and many more after.