Peeps at Many Lands: Norway

by A. F. Mockler-Ferryman

But the actual drive—how lovely it all is! Now you are passing up a valley among the hayfields and orchards which border the river, and by the roadside you find a profusion of wild flowers—great purple gentians, blue harebells, yellow mountain globe flowers, and other blossoms of varied colours. Butterflies there are also in abundance, and, if you be an entomologist, your heart will rejoice at the sight of such rare English insects as the Camberwell Beauty, the Northern Brown, and others. Now you enter a dark pine-forest, to find yourself before long emerging on to an open stretch of wild moorland; and so you cross the col, and commence to drop down into another valley, narrow and shut in by towering mountains. Waterfalls sparkle in the sun as they tumble over the cliffs, and the still unmelted snow stands out white and glistering on the distant hill-tops. The road swings from side to side of the valley, crossing the torrent in its bottom by stout timber bridges, and at last you reach the margin of the great lake, where stands the neat little inn ready to provide you with your midday meal.

The organized tours, however short they be, always include a drive of this description, and no Englishman would consider that he had visited Norway unless he had driven through a part of the country. Even in a week one can cover a deal of ground. One can go by steamer from Bergen up the Hardanger Fjord to Eide, and thence drive across the neck of land to the Sogne Fjord, through the finest and most varied scenery imaginable, returning to Bergen, if needs be, by steamer down the Sogne Fjord. Or, if there be a few days to spare, one can steam across the head of the Sogne Fjord from Gudvangen to Lærdalsören, and thence again take carriole or stolkjærre to the Fillefjeld, and so visit the wildest of Norway’s mountain districts, the Jotunheim—the Home of the Giants.

Chapter XIV

Arctic Days and Nights

Everyone has read of the midnight sun and of the sunless winter of the North. They are features of all tales of Arctic exploration. Yet, in order to see the sun shining at midnight or to experience pitch-dark days, it is not necessary to be actually a seeker after the North Pole. Sunny nights and black winter days may be enjoyed, or otherwise, even in Norway, but only in the Far North—within the Arctic Circle.

It is not quite easy to realize what things are like right away up in the North, as it were, on the top of the world, and why things are as they are is difficult to explain without entering into a host of scientific details. We will, therefore, avoid a long discussion about the movements of the earth and suchlike matters, and merely mention certain facts. At the North Pole itself there is continuous day for six months of the year, and continuous night for the other six months, while on the line known as the Arctic Circle the sun shines at midnight once, and once only, in the year, and during one entire day of twenty-four hours in the winter it does not rise above the horizon at all. South of the Arctic Circle there is no such thing as midnight sun or as a day without sunrise.

As far as Norway is concerned, a considerable tract of country lies within the Arctic Circle—in fact, an area rather larger than that of Ireland—so it is not very difficult to find a place where the midnight sun can be seen for a period in the summer-time, and where in the winter some of the days are really dark. Of course, to see the midnight sun it is necessary to be at the place selected at the right time, and even then there is always the chance of the sky being clouded over, and no sun visible. For the latter reason travellers with plenty of leisure endeavour to go as far North as possible, so as to be almost certain of seeing the great sight.

Nowadays everything is made easy for everybody, and steamers take passengers to the North Cape throughout the summer for the sole purpose of enabling them to see the midnight sun from the very best point of view. Here, provided that the sky is clear, the midnight sun can be seen from May 13 to July 31. Between those dates it does not set, and it would be a bad summer indeed if the clouds hid the sun for so long a time.

To reach the North Cape takes a good deal of time, and many people dislike a lengthy sea voyage; but even if one starts from Bergen and goes all the way by sea, there is something of interest to be seen every day, as the steamer keeps close to the coast, threads its way among the innumerable small islands, and calls at many places with beautiful scenery in the background, more especially Molde and Christiansund.