Lofoten

On a beautiful scenery route we drove to Svolvær („swelling weather“) on Lofoten.

We arrived just on time for a tour to the Troll Fjord with sea eagle feeding.

On the way there we went against 18 knots of head wind *ui*

The mountains, islands and partially turquoise blue water around us were gorgeous.

What was even more amazing for the girls was viewing sea eagles closely as they dived through the air to catch a fish on the sea surface that our guide had thrown there.

Apparently, the Lofoten are the area in the entire Europe with the densest eagle population.

We also got to touch sea gulls as they snatched fish out of the hand of our guide. One even landed on Erna‘s hand *wow*

Statue to honour the wife of a fisherman who had often worked 24/7 when her husband was out at the sea.

When we came back the temperature had risen to 27 degrees, which must have been a heat record for this very Northern region of the Lofoten.

After a lot of planning for the next days with the help of the people who sold us the boat tour, we went on a small rock climbing hike to enjoy our water melon by the Northern Sea.

We were brave enough to get briefly or even jump (Magda & me) into a very cold lake.

We were lucky with our dinner and overnight parking spot: splendid green mountains around us, clean toilet, lots of space, completely quiet – when the truck stopped the engine from 2-6 am.

The next day, we went on a fishing tour. The boat was rocked by the waves but luckily nobody got sick.

The skipper always stopped where he knew from experience there should be a lot of fish and where a radar showed him the fish.

We all dropped our fishing rods very closely to each other into the sea. I was surprised that two people actually caught some big cod. But they didn‘t want to keep it.

After catching myself (tip of the forefinger), I caught a pretty big mackerel and a small cold fish.

Magda caught a small mackerel, Alan a deep sea red fish.

After demonstration by the skipper, Alan prepared many mackerels as other people didn‘t want to bring any. Dinner was secured =oD

The girls were busy feeding the sea gulls until their beaks hit them too hard. *outch*

We went to Haukland beach. The wind was super strong and cold. Only Alan and Magda were brave enough to get into the North Sea.

Mackerels, Red Fish, and mushrooms for dinner:

After-dinner-walk:

We started today‘s exploration of the Lofoten with rock climbing around Å, the last village of Lofoten.

The girls were adventurous like mountain goats. Wilma „I do alone. Bye!“

Around Reine:

In Reine, we stopped at a sea food restaurant/shop. Alan bought the halibut he hadn‘t been able to catch and some interesting sea weed chips.

The restaurant even had a small playground and we used the empty outdoor seating area for our cream breakfast with still very delicious Swedish blueberries and an amazing mountain/sea panorama.

Unfortunately, Wilma didn‘t watch out for cars and I couldn‘t warn her early enough. So she got hit by a car when she wanted to speed from our car to us on the other side of the drive way. Luckily, the car was going very slowly and just pushed her to the gravel, didn‘t roll over her. Anyway, all of us, including the young German driver took some minutes to calm down.

We spent some joyful time at the very windy beach Skagsanden.

The girls wanted to wash their hands and feet in a bigger puddle that had formed during the low tide. But the sand was so soft that they sank deeper and deeper and Erna even fell. The result she was dripping wet up to her belly. Thanks to sun, wind, and a short boost by our heater dried everything again.

Any spot along the roads in this Western part of the Lofoten was taken by cars – super busy! Also Henningsvær was full of restaurants and tourists.

We enjoyed a delicious raspberry nut cake by the harbour and climbing rocks with beautiful island views.

We had halibut dinner on the big parking lot by the ferry stop in Svolvær, like the first night on the Lofoten. This time, the place was just much busier.