Summer in Norway

Patti and Cornell have been in Sandnes visiting us for 2 weeks. The weeks before they arrived were cold, rainy and windy. In short, terrible weather and I was wondering if things would shine up, especially since we had arranged a 5 day mountain hike for them, Patti's first time.
Well the morning they arrived, the sun shined and the weather warmed up drastically. We hardly saw another cloud until this morning, the day they left. We had fourteen days of the most wonderful summer weather we have seen here. Hard to believe. Reb and Patti eating a snack.

They arrived on Saturday morning and on Monday we left for a 5 day/4 night hike in the Hjelmeland mountains. The 4 cabins we visited are; Viglesdalen, Stakken, Grasdalen and Melands Grønahei.The cabin Stakken down by the lake.

The highest we went was about 1100 meters above sea level. The view from up there was amazing. There was still some snow up there and although we were wearing shorts and t-shirts all the while we had to cross snow banks about 10 times. The water up there tasts so good and we seldom walked more than 1 hour without finding some fresh cold running water to drink. That is one of the best things about hiking in the mountains here.


Thomas took a dip in an ice cold lake with snow banks on the shore. He's much tougher than I am! We used between 8 and 10 hours walking each day, the hikes are not that long, but we took our time, lots of breaks and helped Patti along. She was somewhat shocked to see how rough the walks really were, but she did it! Her diary only has two entries; one for the scenery: "Oh my God!" and one for the hike: "I can't believe I walked that!".
We made it home again, no twisted ankles, broken legs or arms. Patti's knees were no better for the wear and she was hurting for the rest of the visit, but hopefully it's not too bad.
We were home just Friday night to Sunday morning before heading to the little island with one little cabin where we spent the next 5 nights doing - well - nothing.





We ate good food, read books, lazed around and played cribbage and 500. We took the boat in one day and wandered around the town of Mandal until late afternoon. One afternoon we went down to the dock where Knut, Cornell and I had a cigar (Cornell brought a small one for me) and flew a kite after that. Knut and Cornell played two rounds of boccia ball and on the last evening we built a small fire down on the rocks. That's about it. R&R to the point of decadence - it was delightful.
Once back in Sandnes again Pat and I made a big mexican dinner for Siren, Per, Aud Jane and Morten. She brought 36 corn tortillas for tacos and canned chilis for chile rellenos. It was delicious. Knut and Cornell did all the shoping and made killer margritas for us! It was a delightful evening for all of us.



So Pat and Cornell are in the plane as I write and I miss them already, but I'm looking forward to seeing them in August when I go back with Arnlaug and Jorunn!
Reb