This was our last self-organized trip of the semester so we wanted to go to Trolltunga which was about 2,300 ft high in a town called Odda. The first part of the trip included Jais, Steven, Jean, and I. We wanted to save as much money as possible so we decided to make teams of two and hitch hike just like we did to Preikestolen. Jean and I were a team and Steven and Jais made the other team. Odda was about 6 hours from Kristiansand so we decided to meet up half way in Hovden. Jean and I were a great team, it was his first time hitch hiking so I taught him the ropes of the game J Everyone is always really friendly during hitch hiking, which makes it a lot of fun, even though it is very tiring. Jean and I had one hitch hike that was on his way to go look at dams. I asked him if he did it for work and he said it was his hobby. He asked if we wanted to go see the dam and we said of course! So we went with him and saw Norway’s biggest dam, which was pretty cool; if the dam were to break it would flood Kristiansand which was 3.5hours north of us.
Needless to say Jean and I arrived in Hovden before Steven and Jais; let’s just say the cars couldn’t resist us. So Jean and I went to get a coffee while we waited for Jais and Steven. Jais and Steven arrived at about 3pm and Odda was only about 2.5 hours away so we thought that we should just continue hitch hiking and be an extra day ahead of schedule. But little did Jean and I know that Jais and Steven were offered a cabin in Hovden for the evening! I was really excited when they told us because I always see these nice Norwegian cabins but have never got to see the inside of them.
The cabin was two stories and beautiful. I couldn’t believe how nice it was; Steven called the guy to tell him we made it there okay and the guy responded by saying he would turn on the floor heaters for us. It was unreal to me how trusting Norwegians are to everyone. Steven and Jais were on the side of the road asking for a hitch hike and not only did they get that from the guy but also a cabin. That evening we all relaxed, listened to music, and talked. I wanted to play some drinking games, and we had no alcohol so we compromised by hydrating ourselves with water, which was much needed.
Morning came and we decided to switch up our partners and it was time to hitch hike to Odda. Hovden was really hard to get out of as far as traffic goes. Jean and Jais got the first hitch hike after 2hrs of walking down the road. Steven and I got picked up after 2.5hr. Hitch hiking can be very depressing just waiting for a ride, but once the first car picks you up, your spirts get lifted and you gain energy again. It was a family that picked up Steven and I up first, which we were so happy about since we had waited so long. Steven was being a little grumpy pants so it was nice to get him in a car J The family was picking their daughter up from a boarding type of school where she played soccer. The girl was having a great time showing Steven and I all of her Norwegian music which was fun to have someone so eager to impress us. We got dropped off about 10min away from Odda where we ate a little something and had some coffee in like 5min just so we could get a little extra energy. We probably stood on the side of the road for 2min before a car picked us up. It was a man who didn’t talk much at all but took us all the way to Odda and wanted to drop us off where our friends were, since we had told him we were meeting friends.
We arrived in Odda and were quite happy to see Jean and Jais and share our hitch hiking stories. Jean is not an outdoor education student so he was not exactly sure what to pack sometimes. Hence the food he packed for Trolltunga was not adequate for the amount of work we were doing and energy we needed. He brought WASA crackers and liver paste, so Jais took him to the grocery store while Steven and I went and checked out tourist information. We learned that we could rent snow shoes at the start of Trolltunga which was still about 15km away on the road. So we split up into our teams again and hitch hiked to Trolltunga. Steven really likes his hot dogs so we packed him some emergency hot dogs for when he gets grumpy but we were right next to the gas station and the food in there looked too good for him to pass up so we went in and got him some food. I believe that people are less likely to pick us up when either of us our eating so I made him turn around and eat while I tried to get a hitch hike; he doesn’t really like this philosophy but I think it’s pretty accurate. We waited about 10min then a guy from Somalia picked us up and took us about 10km. Then we started walking the rest of the way to Trolltunga and just putting our thumb out if a car passed us. There were not a lot of cars but the one car that did pick us up was the same lady that talked to us at tourist information which was pretty funny but so nice she picked us upJ
Once we arrived at Trolltunga we met up with Steven and Jais, rented our snowshoes for 250NOK, than started our walk up to find a campsite. We walked uphill for about an hour, than we hit ground that was a bit more level and there was a lot of snow so we decided to put on our snowshoes. We walked for about 20more minutes then we found a place to put our tent. Jais and I made dinner while the boys put up the tent. I went to go fill up everyone’s water bottles at a stream. The stream took me forever to find which was annoying, and then I had to climb into the stream on a rock since the snow was 3ft high around the stream. After each water bottle I filled up I had to climb out and get the next one. So needless to say my feet were so cold, and I was pretty grumpy after I finally made it back to camp. I was taking off my snow shoes to get in the tent while the rest of the gang was eating on a rock; Steven yells over at me “how was trolltunga.” I was so grumpy but when he said this, I just thought it was the funniest thing, which helped me not being so grumpy.
Morning came and it was time to start our hike. We left the tent up and put some extra warm clothes, water, and food into two day packs that the boys carried. The first bit of the hike was extremely deep and exhausting. After we got use to how the snow shoes felt and we were warmed up then it was easier to hike. It was 11km to Trolltunga with a beautiful fjord next to us almost the entire way. Trolltunga was a rock that jets out from the mountain and looks like a trolls tongue hence the name Trolltunga. We were the first’s ones to the top that day which was nice to have it all to ourselves.
Hiking back was tiring but faster than the walk there and luckily for us, a lot of down hills. Jais and I were pretty cold so we were wearing a lot of layers and Steven made up a new quote “be bold start boiling hot,” vs. the saying be bold start cold. I tried to sled down the last hill when we got back but the snow was too wet and I just looked pretty silly sitting on my sit mat in the middle of a huge hill.
We made it back to the tent and took it down pretty fast and headed back down to the parking lot where everything started. Jean and Steven asked a truck driver for a hitch hike into town which was pretty legit. He took us to the bottom of the road then Jais and Jean got a hitch hike to the Trolltunga hotel where we wanted to stay for the evening, especially because everyone had wet cold feet and no dry socks. Steven and I got picked up about 1 hour later by a dad who was teaching his daughter how to drive. So they drove us all around town and we looked to see if there were any places that were cheaper than the hotel. That was Steven’s and my last hitch hike together and it was definitely one of our best onesJ I convinced them that his nick name his hot dog king and that he is a professional tree climber and what not. He tried to make some jokes about me but they weren’t nearly as funny, but at least he triedJ We paid 330NOK for the hotel that evening which was like a hot sauna box, which was hard to sleep in but at least all of gear was dry in the morning. The breakfast was a bit shy but at least we didn’t have to go out and buy anything extra.
Jais and I were hitch hiking to Bergen by ourselves that day and let’s just say it was a piece of cake! The first guy that picked us up absolutely loved that we were both from Nebraska. Let’s just say that picking up two girls is more appealing to people then a boy and a girl. The next people that picked us up were a family that had a daughter who ran cross country in Georgia, so we had a fun connection to the states. And then the last hitch hike was a young girl who took us all the way to Bergen but she stopped at a famous waterfall that she let us take pictures at.
Once we arrived in Bergen we met up with Jean and had a beer together and reminisced the trip and how much he learned on the trip since he wasn’t an outdoor education student. The poor guy got sunburned on the mountain and sadly he looked like a lobster. Jais and I stayed in a hostel that evening and Jean flew back to Kristiansand. We stayed in a room with 32 beds and I can honestly say I’ve never slept in a room with so many beds before.
The next day Jais and I walked around town and just toured the place. I bought a hat which I was really excited about and Jais got a souvenir for her sister. We had coffee for lunch which was nice, were pretty good at having meaningful conversations which I think fruliftsliv helps us with that. Jais had her first Kebab that day and she liked it! We spent the night on top of a mountain that we took a little lift up to the top. It was my first time just camping with only a girl this summer and that was a fun experience. We set up the tent in the rain but it was still wet from the Trolltunga trip so that didn’t matter too much.
Morning came and it was time to meet up with some friends in Stavanger and climb Preikestolen once again. Hitch hiking was really hard trying to get out of Bergen. We walked around town for about 2 hours trying to find the correct highway to stand on but once we found it, it looked impossible to get a hitch hike because there was no good place to stand. So we decided to just take a bus into Stavanger; and I am glad we did because there were a lot of ferry transfers and it took 5 hours which would have been a really long day. Our bus arrived at Stavanger around 6pm, and then we took the ferry to Tau and hitch hiked to Preikestolen from there. The guy that picked us up was a senior in high school and said it was his first time picking up hitch hikers. He had to go buy some gas, but after that he was kind enough to take us all the way to Preikestolen where we met our friends.
Will, Steven, James, and Chris had been waiting for us in a café; so once we arrived we started our hike up Preikestolen. Just like last time we camped about 1km away from the top then went to go check out the view. It was my first time sleeping on a rock outside, but the ground was so wet that we didn’t really have any other options because our tent would just get soaked through. It was a little chilly throughout the night but that was probably because I wasn’t sleeping in the middle and it was pretty wet and rainy the whole night.
Steven woke us up bright and early to go take a look at the top of Preikestolen. It was clear skys when we woke up but by the time we arrived it was really foggy. I felt like I was in haven there was so much fog I couldn’t even see the ground from the top of Preikestolen.
It was then time to make our way back to Stavanger. Jais and I got a hitch hike from a New Yorker who was in Oslo for a conference. He was a pretty cool guy who had done a lot of stuff but he was definitely pretty full of himself and not easily impressed, let’s just say it wasn’t my favorite hitch hike.
Once we arrived in Stavanger we went and met up with the boys who had taken the bus into Stavanger. We all went to go get Will and Steven’s favorite all you can eat pizza from Eggon, which was really good. After pizza we dropped off our luggage at the hotel and then just toured the town. We went into a couple of different bars and tried out local beers which was fun. When it got later the boys had problems getting into the bar because of their dress code so we ended up going back to our hotel lobby and having a few drinks there. Most everyone went to bed but Steven and I weren’t tired so we stayed up talking then went to go get some fish and chips in town!
Needless to say the next morning Jais and I were exhausted since we had been out all week hitch hiking, camping, climbing mountains, and touring cities. We both really wanted to get home so we started our hitch hike early. We probably hiked around the high way for about 1 hour before we decided to take a bus to the next town because it would be easier to get out of verses the big town of Stavanger. Sadness was the next town, where we hiked probably about a mile then a lady told us that we were in a bad spot for getting back to Kristiansand, so we were both so tired and upset from failing that we went and looked at train times, but we had missed the train by 4mins. So we went back to a road and hitch hiked for probably 45min before we found a ride that we wanted. Once we got the first ride, the rest was easy. The first guy that took us was a bit weird so Jais and I were glad we had our knives on us. The second guy that picked us up was the cutest old man who had three children getting married this summer, so he was fun to talk to. Then we had a guy in a work truck pick us up who’s nick name was bob the builder and he was famous in Stavanger for his work on houses. The last ride was one of the bests; it was a cute couple mid 20’s who just got back from a Christian program in Stavanger. They loved talking to us, and even got our facebook information because they want to hang out before we go home.
The last hitch hike was definitely a good one to end on for Jais’s and my hitch hiking career together. This trip was so tiring but so rewarding. Again we made a lot of good experiences with our friends and it was just another successful trip in the books for this semester.