Around The World With Lena: How to destroy a plan – A Project Manager’s confession :-)

J and I had made a plan before the trip to Norway, as some of you might have seen in an earlier blog. Of course we both agreed that it was just preliminary, but I don’t think anyone of us had understood how much we needed to change it. ;-)

The original plan looked like this:

Day 1 (24): Way Gothenburg – Oslo, Drive 3,23

Day 2 (25): Visit of Museum Island (Bygdóy: Wiking Ship Museum, Kon-Tiki_Museum);

Day 3 (26): Oslo – Nærøyfjord, Drive 4, 52, Kayaking

Day 4 (27): Kayaking, Nærøyfjord – Bergen, Drive 2,07

Day 5 (28): Bergen - Hardanger fjorden, Drive 2,48, Folgeganna Nationalpark Kayaking

Day 6 (29): Hardanger fjorden Hike to Trolltunga, 10 hour

Day 7 (30): Hardanger fjorden to Sognefjord, Drive 4,28, Hike Molden, Lustrafjorden 4h

Day 8 (01): Sognefjord, Hike Vettisfossen 5h , to Geiranger Fjord, Drive 4,0

Day 9 (02): Geiranger Fjord with Hike Storseterfossen

Day 10 (03): Geiranger Fjord Kayaking to Lighthouse, Drive 3,02

Day 11 (04): Lighthouse to Ålesund, Drive 3,31 Hike

Day 12 (05): Ålesund-Trollstigen-Trondheim, Drive 4,55-5,52

Day 13 (06): Drive Stockholm, Drive 10,49

The first thing that happened is that we had to start the trip one day later than planned due to the traffic jam in Germany that made J miss the ferry.

But then we started to follow the plan quite good. Yes, the drive to Oslo took a bit longer, since we first had to take care of some errands in Sweden, but it just meant that we arrived later than expected to Oslo. No harm in that.

We spent the next day in the museums according to plan. But then the plan started to be messed up. It took us far more than 4, 52 to drive to Nærøyfjord, so we arrived 15 min after the camping closed and had to set up the tent outside. This meant, of course, that we had to spend some hours the next day to pack, check-in and come to order on the camping site. But we also discovered that we really liked the area and the camping PLUS the weather was absolutely great. So we decided to stay an additional night in Nærøyfjord/Flåm. It was a lovely stay and we got to try the kayak.

At this point we were, in other words, 3 days after our original plan, but it was a delay that we enjoyed. Nærøyfjord/Flåm was one of our favorite places on the trip.

The drive to Bergen took of course much more than 2 hours (nearly 5 hours). This was not only because of the winding narrow roads, but also due to the fact that we hit a traffic jam caused by an accident (looked bad :-( ) and that we took it easy and stopped many times to take pictures and enjoy the scenery. We arrived in Bergen late in the evening and had to go for dinner even before we looked for a camping. But what a great evening it was and we made some new friends. :-)

In Bergen we decided to skip Hardanger fjorden and all the activities planned there. It was a hard decision since we both really wanted to go there. But we made a promise to ourselves to come back later and then spend longer time in Hardangerfjorden and do all the activities that we planned and some more.

We continued instead up north to Sognefjorden. Now we decided to change our hiking plans and to go for Norway’s highest situated hut, see more the blog Hiking in the snow storm Whatever I thought before the hike, I now think it was a great decision. It was a fantastic challenge that I’m proud that we managed.

But the hike also meant that we arrived to Geirangerfiorden one day later than expected and we had no time for kayaking. The funny thing is that when we came down to the fjord we noticed that it was NOT a nice place to kayak. There were too many tourist boats in the water. Instead we had a great relaxing day, that you can read about in the blog A Great Day and the Night in the Lighthouse

Since we liked the place for the lighthouse so much we decided to skip to go to Ålesund and instead look for the Puffin/Sea parrot. Both of us are more interested in nature than cities so it felt like a much better decision. The only bad thing with that was that we didn’t realize how much time we would spend driving. But considering the rest of it – it was still a great decision.

At this point we felt that we had enough of the driving in Norway and decided NOT to drive back to Stockholm in one day, but in two. That was a very wise decision and gave us a nice relaxing drive and yet another beautiful camping site, just by a lake, to spend the night.

So what is the conclusion? If you want to have vacation in Norway – focus on a few areas, stay there and enjoy all activities close by. Then just go with the flow, the weather and enjoy. Plans are sometimes made to be broken. I think we had a GREAT vacation and I’m looking forward to go back and see the parts we didn’t have the time to visit this time.

Thanks J for making the trip to Norway so memorable!