Day 9 - Gudbrandsdalen Area

Today was a day of well deserved rest.  We haven't had a quiet day really, so thought we could use one. 

Mackerel/tomato spread

Breakfast here was pretty typical except there was this packet with a mackerel on it and tomato in the ingredients.  I tried it, but can't say I'd recommend it unless of course you like those two flavors mingled together with lots of salt. 

Single lane brige - Tretten

After breakfast and LOTS of coffee, we drove into Tretten and crossed the river for the shady side of the valley on a one lane wooden planked bridge over a raging river. From there we drove over to Favang.  Most of the roads were paved, but some were not.  Some of the gravel roads showed signs of erosion and wash out from last week's rains.  In one spot there was a gravel truck dumping new gravel for the road with a grader parked off to the side waiting to finish the work.  While you're trying to picture all of this, keep in mind that these are all really narrow mountain roads.  The paved roads don't have a center line, but there is generally room for 2 cars.  The gravel roads have no markings and rarely any guardrails.  Fortunately, we met few cars and trucks.

Our harrowing drive led us to Ringebu which has a cute downtown with cafes, bakeries, clothing stores, book stores, you name it, but nothing with the words "Ringebu" on them.  Bummer.  We did have coffee and split a sweet roll.  The bakery had about 30 different types of loaf bread, so I did the touristy thing and took a photo. 

Then it was off to see Ringebu's famous stave church!  It's a beautiful church located a few miles south of town up a windy little road.  The stave church was built in the 13th century, but it followed a post-construction church that was built in the 12th century.  Of course that one rotted, so the stave church replaced it.  The front door is from the first church, so is about 1000 years old.  Next to the front door there were symbols carved into the wall (early graffiti work?) showing the symbol for each farm in the area.  They looked like the brands that ranchers use to identify cattle.  In a post-Viking sort of way.  They didn't allow photos inside.  At the tops of the wood columns (that are sort of painted to look like marble (?) maybe) there are heads painted.  This seems like a cross between a classic era capital and a greek caryatids.  The heads here supposedly represent norse gods.  Apparently during the early parts of Christianity in Norway it was acceptable to include a little paganism. 

We visited a little art museum near the stave church and then headed off on highway 27 to see the Rodane National Park.  It is seriously one of the wierdest places I've seen.  It's a cross between Wyoming, Arizona, the Bad Lands, and maybe Alaska.  I posted a very brief video on you tube, so check it out! http://youtu.be/bhXCILPSLTY

Afternoon snack at Rodane

What makes it so wierd is that you cannot see that this area even exists from the valley that we're in.  The video was taken about 45 minutes away from Ringebu and it's like we were on another planet.

We're back at the hotel now, fed and getting ready for bed.  Tomorrow we drive to Aurland to see the fjords.  We don't think there will be any problems with the roads as the flood has visibly receded since we arrived.

Day 9

Two things that I must share before breakfast:

1.) I have figured out why our family left.  The were poor sleep deprived souls who just wanted to get some sleep. 

2.) Thank God for the Dutch!  We got in late last night (10:30 p.m.) and our hotel was locked up tight.  If it wouldn't have been for some observant Dutch tourists staying at the hotel with a room overlooking the entrance...we would've had to sleep outside. 

Day 8 - Favang!

Shazam!  We met with Ole Jon and his wife tonight.  Ole Jon is a relative of one of Mom's school mates.  Anyway, Ole Jon did some research on one of mom's (and my) relatives, so we discussed that in our hotel's restaurant over coffee and streudel (though it has to be called something else here, right?).  After our talk, they offered to drive us to some of the farms.  The first and most important farm to us is the one posted below.  It's called Bjorgevangen.  It was the last place that Mattie Vang (Mathea Amundson VANG) lived before she and all of her living brothers and sisters and parents moved to Timberland/Barronett.  She took VANG in the U.S. as it is part of the name of the farm: Bjorgevangen.  It looks like someone might own it, but they certainly don't live there on a regular basis.  It's beautiful, isn't it?  Ole Jon thinks that it was built between 1800 and 1850.  Mattie Vang emmigrated in 1894.  She was my great great grandmother.  [My mom is Marlys Nyberg Renz.  Her mother was Elva Rydberg Nyberg.  Her mother was Mathilda Hanson Rydberg.  And her mother was Mathea "Mattie" Vang Hanson.]  This wasn't a house or a farm that they owned.  They rented it and worked the land.  Mattie's father was also a tailor and a logger.  (Can we say jack of all trades?)  Ole Jon thinks that the last people who permanently lived here was in the 1920s.  We did see some other farms and homes, but they were not places that that family lived for very long.  We are tired and going to bed.  It is 11 p.m.  Still light enough to go for a walk, play frisbee with a dog, set up a tent, etc.  and we have no light blocking shades tonight.  Tomorrow might be a good day for a nap. 

Day 8 - Fjallbacka to Tretten

Mom in front our hotel

This is the view from our room
looking north

Just writing to let you know we made it to Tretten.  The flood is bad but the roads were fine.  We have seen a camper in the water and lots of logs.  I think campgrounds located on the river with permanent campers or small cabins were hit...as were some low lying farms and houses.  South of Lillehammer the river is wide like the Mississippi.  They call it a Lake.  The water was glasslike, but it looked high.  North of Lillehammer the river narrows and is just raging.  E6 was a good 4 feet above the river at the lowest point of the road (though the road goes up the side of the valley sometimes too), though at one point it looked only maybe 1 - 2 feet higher than the water.  I think it's starting to recede.  Janna Glomstad, of Glomstad Gjesthus, said that the flood came on really suddenly Friday and that people were trying to move campers in Ringebu Friday afternoon.  They lost 3 campers.  We think we saw one of them. 

Our hotel is up the side of the valley 5 km north of Tretten.  The drive was sort of like the drive to GrandDad's Bluff in La Crosse...before it was closed.

More later...

Day 7 - Uddevalla to Fjallbacka

Today we had a 1 hour drive from Uddevalla to a museum we wanted to go to in Tanum.  We took a highway called E6 which is a lot like the 4 lane highways we are used to.  The landscape has been changing a lot in Sweden.  Yesterday, in Jonkoping, there were lots of big rolling hills with huge farms.  Today west of Uddevalla, there are huge granite outcroppings. 

Bronze Age Farm at Vitlycke, Tanum

One of the many, many rocks with
Bronze Age rock carvings.

At Tanum there is the Vitlycke Museum which has both rock carvings in several areas around the museum and also a replica farm.  Both the rock carvings and the farm are from the Bronze Age.  It really was a great museum! We got there around 11:30 and stayed until 3:00. 

After Tanum, we took a smaller road to Fjallbacka through a little town called Grebbestad.  Both Fjallbacka and Grebbestad are touristy fishing villages.  We're here a little before the tourist season, so things are a little quiet, but all of the shops and restaurants are open. 

Tonight we are staying in Room 7 at the Bryggan Fjallbacka.  It's on Ingrid Bergmans Torg, which we guess might the little square right below our window.  We ate dinner at the Bryggan restaurant downstairs and were able to eat outside.  Mom had a seafood casserole which turned out to be a cream-based fish soup and was yummy!  I had a grilled tiger prawns on pasta...equally yummy!

Tomorrow we leave Sweden for Norway.  There has been a lot of flooding in Norway so we are anticipating that we will have to take some detours.  We'll be leaving right after breakfast and hopefully will be in our next hotel by 4 p.m. or at least for dinner.  Wish us luck on navigating our potential alternate routes!

(photos will be posted soon!)

Day 6 - Stockaryd to Uddevalla

We just arrived at the Riverside Hotel in Uddevalle.  We had a very exciting day!!!  I will leave you with this one photo for now, but will write more after we eat dinner. Mom is standing with Mikael who isthe great grandson of Oskar Svensson.   Oskar was the brother of Claus Svensson who changed his last name to Nyberg when he move to the U.S.  Claus is Mom's grandfather.  They are standing in front of a newer house built around 1900.  The smaller house to the right is the house that Oskar and Claus were born.  That makes this the Svensson/Nyberg family house.  That also makes Mikael Mom's 4th cousin and my 5th cousin.  It was a great day!

Day 5 - Stockaryd

Hey hey! Swedes in smaller towns say this greeting really quickly.  In the big cities, it's just "hey."  It's not spelled "hey" it's spelled "hej."  When you say it back to them, they think you know Swedish which in my case always ends badly once they reply with some comment about the weather or some such thing.  Trying to fit in is not always a good thing.  I think I'll revert to "hello." 

We left Vaxjo this morning.  Drove over to the "Crystal Country" where they make nice things by Kosta, Orrefors, Boda, etc., etc.  We bought some things that we will have to be careful about packing and some fun things that we won't have to worry about at all.  So far our meager purchases have been self-serving.  (Don't want you to get any hopes up.) They did have a glass skull. I thought of you, Tom, as we have something like it in the liquor cabinet, but really, it's not worth the haul...and it's creepy. 

The road from Kosta up to Stockaryd (pronounced Stocka rude) looked a lot like Ely, Minnesota: tons of logging, no cars, and huge rocks.  And guess what the big industry in Stockaryd is?  Logging!  It's like we're in Hayward or someplace. 

Mom reading the note left for us at
Old Hjelmssryd Vicarage

We are staying in the Old Hjelmssryd church vicarage.  It's old and nice and cheap.  We had a dinner of bulghar salad and bread with caviar paste.  It's right next to the the old Hjelmssryd church which was built in the 1200s and was usurped in 1800s by the new Hjelmssryd church which is just down the road about 5 km. There are 3 villages with the name of Hjelmssryd within 25 km.  And here I thought Barron and Barronett was bad.  Har har!



House in Kalberga

 

House in Kalberga

So we got here early and were able to drive around both before and after dinner.  Mom brought photos from home of some of the farms/homes that our relatives lived in.  The photos are from a village called Kalberga and were taken around 1900.  We found Kalberga.  It's about 8 homes on a dirt road leading off another small asphalt road.  In the photo mom has, the house door is very distinctive, so as we were driving we focused on finding a door that was exactly like it.  We also focused on finding a 1.5 story house with little half windows on the second floor under the eaves.  Here's what we found:

1. ) The distinctive door is on 5 houses...still...100 years after the photo was taken.  It's like they all shopped at Sears.  I'm betting the handle and hinge would be the same too. 

2. ) There are 2 main house designs.  1.5 story houses with a center gable dormer and 1.5 story houses without a dormer.  (check out photos from these 3 houses, to see what I mean)





Bottom line, we didn't find the exact house, but we know we are in the local area which is in itself a pretty neat thing.  The name of the house in Kalberga is Torpet Nybygget.  It means "newly built cottage" and sadly has nothing to do with "Nyberg"  though the Nyberg family is the one who lived there.

Kalberga's one road

We went to the Hjemssryd cemetaries today and found some Nybergs who we are not directly related to, no Rydbergs, and 2 Rylanders (thinking of Billie Rylander from up at the farm). 

Since we did a lot already today and got here earlier than expected, we're only going to stay here one night.  We're not sure where we'll be tomorrow night, but it will be between here and Fjallbacka.  Maybe we'll get to the west coast tomorrow. 

Few more things: 

-we spent 500 Skr on 3/4 a tank of gas

-photos aren't uploading well so we'll post them tomorrow

-we saw an animal that looks like a musk ox

-we saw a store called "Em"

'til tomorrow!

Deb and Marlys