Cabin Fever Chronicles - Norway

The summer before our big European adventure, we spent 17 weeks cruising Alaska. Don’t get me wrong: Alaska is beautiful beyond words - but even glaciers, snow-capped mountains, musher sled dog puppies, and bald eagles diving for dinner can get repetitive after 17 weeks. So when we arrived in Norway for the first time after departing Amsterdam - and both the weather and the scenery seemed a little too familiar - the first words out of my mouth were: “Are we in Alaska again??”

We found out very quickly that Norway, though equally endowed in beauty and reindeer sausage, was a completely different kind of beautiful. Our first dock was Eidfjord, a quaint town nestled cozily in a beautiful fjord that housed our favorite cafe serving delicious waffles and jam. A trail led us past a mirror-like lake that made the mountains towering above look like they trickled into infinity. We walked up a hill and past mounds that rose out of the ground like moles - ancient viking graves - and hay rolled up as neatly as swiss rolls. Each house sitting on the hill was small and quaint, but many of them shined with solar panels on their rooftops. As we reached the top of the hill, we saw our beautiful ship sitting below us on that glass ocean; even only having been on it for two days, we felt a fond connection to our new home.

Vøringfossen

We would have stops in Norway throughout the next few months until September 13 at the following places:

Bergen - home of the cutest fish market, brimming with fish that looked both delicious and scary (some of those fish had fangs!) Every time we stopped in Bergen, I’d grab a sample of reindeer, elk, and whale sausage from this fish market. Other gems at this market: very expensive but delicious paella and fish caviar out of a tube!! I wish I had taken a picture of the market, but I was always too busy eating…

Other days were spent riding the tram up to Mount Fløyen where goats and trolls played, museum hopping to appreciate the moody paintings of Scandinavian artists, riding the Hop On Hop Off bus when walking seemed arduous but a tour of the charming Bergen houses still sounded nice, and getting on a free ferry on a whim but then immediately succumbing to panic when I realized it was taking me much further than I had anticipated. Also, a quick shout out to the Bergen seafarers lounge that had free knit beanies for us to take to colder parts of Norway!

Mount Fløyen

Molde - we only went to Molde once, and we spent it doing the grueling Varden panorama hike. When we finally reached the top, we kept saying “It was definitely so worth it!!” Looking back now, I’m not entirely sure it was actually, but the view was beautiful.

Honningsvåg - there was no wind fiercer than the wind in Honningsvåg. We met some of Santa’s reindeer here on our way to the northernmost point in Norway, the North Cape. The textures up here were so breathtaking: how smooth the ocean was as it blends into the sky, and the rough rocks juxtaposing.

Skjolden - the most serene, untouched beauty of Norway in my opinion. My fondest memory of this place is hopping on a kiddie bike and biking my heart out to see one particular waterfall and back in time for sailaway.

Stavanger - not only the home of a beautiful music hall and many hungry, outspoken seagulls, but also of my favorite hike! To get to Pulpit Rock, a ferry ride and bus schedule came into play for time. I wasn’t sure if I could hike to the top and get back down in time to meet the all-aboard time, but I was so happy I took the risk. The view was stunning every step of the way, even when it started misting halfway through.

Flåm - home of the Flåmsbana that took us on a train ride stunning from beginning to end. Part of the ride included a waffle and jam break, before heading back to town; let me tell you, nothing beats a Norwegian waffle!! We were even treated to a traditional Norwegian dance performed by one dancer at the waterfall pictured below.

Oslo - a picture perfect city. We had several stops here and each one was fun and different: renting a BIRD scooter and making my way to the Edvard Munch Museum, climbing the Oslo Opera House (pictured below) with my parents before enjoying some Mövenpick ice cream and playing some piano on the Aker Brygge pier, and riding the subway up to the top of a ski mountain to enjoy smoked salmon smørrebrød with an old friend. I’d never seen so many Teslas in my life than I did in Oslo.

Hellesylt - another gorgeous Norwegian town catered to the natural beauty that surrounds it. The centerpiece of the town was a beautiful waterfall, and here my friend Ravi showed me the magic of an ND filter.

Ålesund - another stunner. I don’t think I ever quite captured the charm of this city through photography, but the architecture was utterly charming, the boardwalk was always filled with stands selling Norwegian treats and cotton candy, and stunning views were ample from the many peaks the city provided - one of them, the Byrampen Viewpoint, exactly 418 up and over the city of Ålesund. The other, Sukkertoppen (Sugar Top!) was a lovely excursion done with my brother and sister-in-law!

Geirangerfjord - last but not least, we had one day to enjoy Geirangerfjord. Despite a rainy start, it was one of the most beautiful, lush places I’d ever laid eyes on. I had to forfeit my white Keds to a hike through mud and llama poop, but getting to experience such untouched and thriving nature in such an intimate way is unforgettable.

Cabin Fever Chronicles - Amsterdam

A picture is worth a thousand words…

…and a plane ticket to Europe. In the last few months as I settled into a new home in Atlanta, GA, I’ve often looked nostalgically at the thousands of photos I took during a 4.5 month-long cruise contract this past summer. The turquoise waters of the Mediterranean Sea, the whimsical canals of Venice, resident llamas in Geiranger, Norway…I love my Georgian sanctuary, but I miss traveling. I even miss - to a certain extent - the stress of traveling. With the pandemic in the United States reaching new peaks and the collective sense of cabin fever mounting, I felt like going through and sharing some of my photos and experiences from a time when traveling was my job! It’ll be my little way of going back to Europe and getting out of my apartment virtually this summer, and hopefully it could scratch a similar itch for you.

Our first stop after a 6-hour red-eye from New York City was Amsterdam. Bleary-eyed and illiterate in Dutch, we trudged through the airport with 4.5 months’ worth of luggage and were eventually whisked off to our hotel for the evening. Tomorrow we’d board our home for the summer: Holland America Line’s Ms. Nieuw Statendam, their newest ship promising a summer of beautiful travel memories for everyone onboard, including us! That also meant that this was our only full day to explore Amsterdam; the next nine days we had left in Amsterdam would only be a few hours long and dispersed throughout the summer months.

None of us had been to Amsterdam before, so we consulted a Googled list of places to go. Our Uber dropped us off at the Foodhallen, where we ironically got Thai food. It’s difficult to imagine such a packed venue as Foodhallen now, with social distancing measures in place and the fear associated with large groups of people. In that pack of people, however, we spotted a mutual friend and enjoyed an unexpected reunion over our spring rolls and noodles.

The next stop was the Albert Cuyp food market, where we bought our first Amsterdam tote bags and ate our first stroopwafels. There was a promising line-up for a food stand making fresh ones, the caramel being slathered onto each thin biscuit the size of our faces, so we waited with glowing anticipation. The verdict? They were only okay. When made that fast, the caramel-to-biscuit ratio isn’t satisfying, and you couldn’t feel the tug of the gooey caramel center the way you could with carefully crafted ones.

The disappointment was fleeting as we took a stunning walking tour through Amsterdam en route to the Red Light District, wanting to stop by every canal to take a picture. There was a certain quality of light that hit Amsterdam in the early evening that made the water under the canals sparkle like jewels. Every building was art, some leaning on the shoulders of its neighbors and others straight as an arrow. Some were adorned with carefully arranged florals and inside the open windows, beautifully decorated homes peeked through. On the water, riverboats glided lazily along and sidewalks wore vintage bicycles like jewelry. Amsterdam was a dream, an alternate reality where everything was beautiful and the air smelled like weed.

We frequented cozy artisanal coffee shops every step of the way as we combated our jet-lag valiantly. At one point, we thought we’d lose one of our members to sleep deprivation, but a quick cup of coffee got him on his feet again. Nearing the end of our battle with consciousness, we gorged ourselves on Chipsy King fries and bought dinner from a herring stand near Chinatown. Amsterdam’s charm had tired us out by that point, and we admitted defeat to staying up all night in the city.

Subsequent adventures in Amsterdam included a harrowing bike ride through the city, where my lack of finesse on a bike and lack of experience as a biker in traffic came to bite me in the butt. I distinctly remember a local calling towards me: “Look first, then bike!” Common sense to her, simple and effective advice to me. The Van Gogh Museum was a work of art displaying his works of art, and I devoted an entire afternoon to drinking in each painting. The Rijskmuseum I found slightly less captivating, but the beauty in the museum architecture itself was charming. Chips krakow - a mixture of mayo and curry sauce over fries - was a decadent lunch one day, and Sea Palace - the floating Chinese dim sum restaurant - satisfied my parents’ craving for Asian food another day. Taking the wrong ferry to NSDM resulted in a sweaty walking adventure of Overhoeks before reaching the original destination, A’DAM Lookout. Walking by the bloemenmarkt became my usual path through the city, and stopping into Tony’s Chocolonely stores and cheese shops for samples also became a frequent stop for every Amsterdam trip.

Even now, I can navigate Amsterdam in my mind. We spent so much time exploring on foot, taking in each street and each canal with care. Hopefully there will be another day spent in Amsterdam so I can get another stroopwafel from Melly’s (in my opinion, better than van Wonderen!)