Day 11 - Lom to Flam

Sorry for the delay in getting up a posting!  We have been in remote areas and then just really busy!

Day 11 was an amazing day!  This part of Norway is absolutely spectacular.  I'm so glad that we made it up to this part of the country.  We woke up in Lom...it didn't even get dark last night by our calculations.  We have had a significant amount of daylight on this whole trip which has really thrown us all off in terms of eating and sleeping schedules!

When Dave and I went to bed at close to 1am last night...it was not dark, I actually think it was getting light already!

We woke up in Lom and had a nice breakfast in our cabin.  Dave went out and got coffees, and a little later Bruce went out and bought some delicious danishes from "the best bakery in norway" Bakeriet i Lom.  Super yummy!  I'm sure the bread is amazing too.

We then got packed up and headed up to look at the Stave Church. It is one of the largest and most beautiful stave Church's of Norway according to "Visit Norway".

"The church dates to approximately second part of 12th century, but was rebuilt into a cruciform church during the 17th century. The chancel was decorated in 1608, and the nave was enlarged towards west in 1634. The cross section was added in 1663, but this was made in stave like frame work. A complete restoration took also place in 1933, and a smaller one in 1973. This stave church is actually one of just a very few stave churches of which the original medieval crest with a dragon head still survives."

It was beautiful and the surrounding cemetary was really  neat to walk through.

After the church we headed over to the grocery store to stock up on lunch and snack food for the day...then we hit the road.

The first part of the drive was really mountainous yet green, and was filled with waterfalls.  As we climbed upward, the terrain started to shift somewhat to more baren and rocky with snow and glaciers.  The road we were on closes from mid Fall to Spring and you can see why...the water that we passed was still mostly frozen in June.

After we reached what appeared to be the summit, we started to come down into a very lush and almost tropical area. It was humid and felt like a rainforest.  It was amazing how quickly the terrain had changed. 

The vistas were absolutely stunning the whole way along...the only damper on the whole thing was that the weather was not really in our favour.  We can only imagine how much MORE beautiful it would have been if it had been a clear day.  Unfortunately the rain followed us from Lom all the way to Flam...it wasn't consistent, sort of rain and mist all day :o(

After the descent, we headed into what is known as the fjords.  Again, slightly different terrain again...and also what was amazing was the number of tunnels that we came across.  They just bored right through the rock to make the highway run its course. 

I completely lost track of how many tunnels we went through.  The most fascinating one for us was the 26km tunnel right before we reached flam.  We took a short ferry ride and then very quickly came across the Laerdal Tunnel.  It claims to be theworld's longest road tunnel.  It was amazing.  It was strange to be underground for so long in the dark.  They do break up the drive with a few large opening with bright coloured lights.  The girls love the colours, but it caused them to ask if there were colours in every single tunnel thereafter...which was lots!

We reached what we think was Flamsbana at around 6:00pm and Bruce whipped us up some yummy pasta for dinner as we were staying in an apartment above a souvenir shop.  This little town is small, but very nice and is where the railway from Myrdal ends and the boat excursion starts for the well known "Norway in a Nutshell" tour.  We had looked at this option but decided that driving the way ourselves was the way to go.

We stayed at the Flam Ferdaminne which was a little pricey but was lovely and spacious for the 9 of us...so overall good value. It came well equipped for cooking and had a few nice eateries nearby.  After dinner Dave and I and the boys headed to this amazing pub for a beer.  It was designed to look like a Stave Church and it was absolutely stunning.  It had a large internal fireplace with sunken seating and beautifull carved chairs.  It could be picked up and dropped in Whistler...it would be perfect there!

After the beer we headed back and headed to bed.  The boys had an early start as they were driving south to visit Odda where Bruce's grandfather had been from.  We were headed to Bergen directly to do some sightseeing.