Road-trip to Lefkara
Lefkara is a cute little town with a boutique hotel where we had lunch. The rain came pouring down a few minutes before we sat down, accompanied by thunder and lightning. Crazy. Afterwards, some of us went to breweries and wineries, and the others went around Lefkara...
Happiness trifecta: Spa, pool and beach.
The pool invited us in to have an easy start to our Cyprus week. In the afternoon Terry and I had our Aphrodite and Apollo massage at the spa and I’m fairly sure we both fell asleep at some point. In the meantime the rest of the gang went searching for eternal youth...
Cyprus!
On our way to Cyprus with 5 friends to spend a week at the Aphrodite Hills in Kouklia. After a somewhat uncomfortable encounter with an overzealous security guard at the passport control we all made it on the plane. Mario, our car rental car of 15 years at Manos car,...
Worst day of the year. For the cat.
The little black flash had two teeth pulled today. She put up quite a fight against being kidnapped and taken to the vet. Note to self: get leather gloves. Right now everything is stupid, it’s the worst day of the year, her mouth hurts and she hates everyone.
Maestro
The day that everything else was planned around. As the newspapers wrote: and suddenly Braut Håland is the next best thing from Bryne! Kaizer’s Orchestra are back! The best live band ever. What a show!
Garage painting
Now I remember. We painted the garage frame. And then we did it again today.
Uhm..
…not sure what we did today really..
Gamlingen
Swimming! Some activity was sorely needed. Mostly because it worried me that I was sore after visiting badeland. That shouldn’t be possible. Badeland. Come on. So since the weather was warm and sunny, a visit to the Gamlingen swimming pool was a good idea. Then we...
More pets
We checked out the new gigaboks yesterday and bought some rubber duckies to add to our menagerie at home. They are now swimming around in our bird bath. We were spoiled with more lovely dinner with mom and dad, sister and brother in law, and cousin. Plus the cat. My...
Grill night
We had another amazing dinner with the family, this time cote de boeuf from TT meat grilled at home by the Sivertsen patriarch.
Back home
From the cabin to Randaberg. My sister and her husband are visiting this weekend, and our parents had invited us to go out for a family dinner. It was so nice to see family again. Sometimes when you’re out at a restaurant there’s an annoying table that talks too...
Water world
Another day of outings. This time to Hovden’s own little water world. Contrary to the Easter vacation, we were less than a dozen people there today. In fact, Terry and I were there all by ourselves the last hour! Two pools, two hot tubs, two slides - all just for us....
Heavy water
After many days of inactivity we went to Rjukan to visit Vemork, the power station where the heavy water sabotage operation Gunnarside took place in 1943 to prevent Hitler from getting hold of heavy water to develop a A-bomb. A great place with a well made museum with...
Flopcorn
We made great crispy duck out of duck confit and even with homemade pancakes today. But that’s where the food luck ended. My glass of beer went all over my kindle and the table and rug… and when we made popcorn it caught fire and stank up the cabin. It was gracefully...
There’s been a trend change
Or so says my watch. Another rather clear hint to get out more.
Nothing to report
Another day at the cabin. Possible cabin fever coming on. Maybe we should get out more.
Sauna and a sort of walk
We did close to nothing today. Trip planning. Tv. Sort of a short walk in the neighborhood. Sauna! movie.
Another day in Hovden
I honestly don’t know what we did today. The days just flow into one another. I think I made rundstykker.
We did ‘shrooms
Another day of chanterelles. Risotto this time.
Chanterelle hunting
Managed to go outside today. And we found a whole lot of mushrooms and made chanterelle pasta.
Truffle mayo burger – day 2
Still staying in. Pyjamas. Future trip planning. One more outrageously delicious homemade truffle mayo burger. Movie.
Downtime
Food shopping. Lounge wear. Outrageously delicious homemade truffle mayo burgers. Trip planning. Movie. That’s pretty much it for today.
Dirdal on our way to Hovden
Leaving Randaberg behind again, Hovden was our next stop. On our way we delivered plum crumble to Steven as a thank you and even got to say another hello to the kittens and partake in some crumble ourselves. We trundled on and happened to see the “open”-sign by Dirdal...
Steven’s plums. And more cats.
I picked Terry up from his party last night, mostly because they tempted me with a cat and her three kittens, but also the opportunity to pick plums. The kittens and their mom were so adorable, and I would take them all home, but Terry put his foot down. I picked a...
Meanwhile in Randaberg
It was a warm day without much planned, so after some morning yoga, we went for a walk in Randaberg. The evening was spent watching Boeing Boeing at Metropolis by Follies Theater. Brilliant farce with some young up-and-coming actors. Got several good laugh out louds...
Oppenheimer and a cat
After convalescing for a couple weeks, little miss Stumpy gained back her freedom today and went outdoors. In the evening, we made dinner for my parents and took dad to the cinema for an early birthday celebration to see Oppenheimer.
Planning
Another day spent with family and cats at home. And quite a lot of time spent in front of a screen planning our upcoming adventures.
Recharging
The thing about being on vacation constantly is that you never get a day off. So today, we had a down day where we spent half the day on the sofa in lounge wear. Our initial plans of starting a Norway hike tomorrow has been postponed due to the massive floods in...
Deflated
Back home! SAS kindly ignored our oversized and overweight carryons and brought us safely home to Stavanger this morning. My cats had missed me dearly and each had their way to display it: one meowed and threw herself down and rolled around, the other hid under the...
Gearing down
It was a late morning in Aberdeen where we finally didn’t have to worry about when to check out. (Terry’s sister is nice like that). Brunch and chai latte and coffee was enjoyed at a local cafe, Figment, where the food featured colors other than brown for a change,...
Full circle
Montrose beach On our way to circle back to Aberdeen to finish our Scotland tour, we first stopped at the Horn. It’s a cafe that Terry used to go to when he was young and reckless with his friends to have their tasty bacon rolls. It turned out that in the meantime...
We went for a tattoo!
Terry finished his Scottish pilgrimage by visiting the Bannockburn battle site where Robert the Bruce won a great victory against the English. The tour at the visitor center was entertaining and allowed us to handle the weapons and dress up in period attire. In the...
Pod and spa
Day two of hot tubs! The day of sleeping bag accommodation is over and we’re staying in a hobbit hut or mountain pod for the fourth(?) time at this wonderful hotel and spa. This one is larger and has a bathroom and kitchenette as well. The day started with a large...
The end
The day finally arrived! Our last day on the West Highland Way! 24 last km through the Highlands meeting sheep, butterflies, fly agaric, mountain peaks, lochs and other hikers and arriving in Fort Williams for the last sore steps. It was like any other attraction: we...
Reached Kinlochwishitwasover
An artist rendition of the WHW We’re still on our way. The West Highland Way. One more day to go. There’s still throbbing in the feet whenever I take my boots off for the day, but these last days that were supposed to be harder aren’t as hard as portrayed online. We...
Back to Glencoe
Rainy day… not unlike in Norway today too. It started out well, seemed like it would be slightly overcast. Just a drizzle here and there. I put my raincoat on and off twice. So the next time it started raining, I wasn’t going to fall for that again. Which meant that I...
Closer to the highlands
We left a rather rude and curt hobbit hut manager in the morning who apparently meant that checking out meant exiting the entire premises. We were told with a menacing stare that sitting on the bench outside after leaving our keys was not acceptable. In the shop along...
The actual easy day
Our fourth day on the West Highland Way. The ascent to the Highlands has begun, but it was gradual so the day was relatively easy. Either that, or we’ve gotten used to the long hiking days. We left Drovers Inn which had an abnormally large taxidermic exhibit of...
The “easy” day
Day three of the west highland way is done. This was the day with the flattest terrain, and we didn’t spend too much time completing it, but I can still feel the thumping in my legs and feet after 24 km along Loch Lomond. We were well rewarded at the Drovers Inn with...
Second day of WHW
Our second day on the West Highland way from Drymen to Rowardennan. We ventured up Conic hill, 361 m, and was rewarded with this splendid view. Luckily, this was our only large ascent today. We had a long stop in Balmaha. It’s amazing how good orange juice and...
West Highland Way – here we come
We drove to Milngavie (pronounced Milgay, because…Scottish people) and left the car there in an overfilled railway station parking lot. Milngavie is the starting point of the West Highland Walk, our goal for the next 8 days. The first few days the height profile looks...
Shopping and more wifi
No hiking today. Charging our batteries for the West Highland Way starting tomorrow. Went shopping in Fort William at Aldi, M&S, and a price bargain shop and had great fun. Topped it off with a large (and I mean LARGE) cup of coffee and chai latte at Costa coffee....
Church cat and Oban
Sootie Finally a cat day! At St Conan Kirk, this friendly feline took a good portion of my dreamies and nearly my finger in the excitement. According to the cafe next door to the church, she has been known to walk brides up the aisle in the church, but was...
Glencoe Lochan and good wifi!
Sunset from the Kingshouse hotel A small walk wouldn’t kill us, so we did the very manageable trail around the lake if Glencoe Lochan which featured both mountain, forest and lake. I made good friends with the local ducks who feasted on our leftover bread. The rest of...
Skyfall
Today needed to be a chill day considering we (I) was still sore after the hikes. We went to the Glencoe visitor center and checked out their replica turf and creel (a kind of wooden weaving) house from the time the massacre happened. We found some fun souvenirs like...
The Lost Valley hike
After picking up a few Scottish souvenirs, we left Fort Augustus and drove to Glen Coe. This was the place where a big massacre happened in the 17th century where the MacDonald clan was killed by the Campbells. Our hotel still has a sign that says: “No hawkers or...
Fort Augustus chill day
It was time for a chill day after the arduous Ben Nevis hike. We slept in since we were lucky enough to have our hostel room to ourselves, and then found a tea room where we had tea and scones with clotted cream for a kind of breakfast. We wandered around Fort...
Ben Nevis
After waking in our sleeper train, we made our way to the Ben Nevis visitor center. The weather has been dodgy and today looked like it the best day for hiking. And so it was, no rain, cold weather or strong wind, and just the right amount of cloudy. The hike up was...
Isle of Skye and another train…kind of
Today was a day of driving around the Isle of Skye, more specifically the Trotternish loop, for some scenery. The views included the Trotternish Ridge, Quiraing, the Old man of Storr (supposedly a buried giant whose thumb is still visible), and the one pictured here:...
Kayak, Nessie, castle, and a Norwegian king?
Aviemore’s Old Bridge Inn was our accommodation for the night, and we headed out early for a paddle on Loch Morlich in kayaks. I loved the trusting ducks that would come over and expect a nibble. We drove through Inverness and along Loch Ness, but no sighting of the...