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An Unwanted Guest

I saw a video online the other day of an unwanted guest in restaurant on Paris’ Champs D’Elysees.  My least favorite pest, a mouse, was comfortably eating away at a “fresh” sandwich.  Unfortunately, it wasn’t our favorite rodent from Ratatouille.   I  recently travelled and bought pastries from similar cases, which stomach knot up.  It was rodents, rats and rat fleas, that were responsible for the spread of the bubonic plaque.

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Interestingly, the Black Death reached Norway before reaching many parts of Western Europe due to trade routes.  The Hanseatic trade routes played a pivotal role in the Black Death arrival in Norway via Bergen.  Some accounts place the blame squarely on a British ghost ship that ran aground near Bergen with infected rats and infected rats flea.  The Kongevegen, the King’s Road, which travelled from Bergen to Oslo provided a quick path for the plague into west central Norway and beyond.

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Another one of my least favorite unwanted guests is the cockroach.  A palmetto bug, which looks simliar, is enough to send me into a tizzy and running for higher ground.  I see them in our garage occasionally and that is way too much.  I couldn’t take it when they were on display at the Bergen Aquarium.  They’re so gross and also major carriers of disease.

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Cousins Experiencing Norway Together

One of the best parts of this trip thus far is the time our boys are getting to spend with their cousins X, P and Kai. Since we live in Florida and X & P live in Minnesota and Kai in Seattle, the kids don’t get to see each other nearly as much as they would like to. This is a trip that they’ll savor because of the good times they shared with their cousins.

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Breakfast on the Fjord

While all my boys are still sleeping, I took the opportunity to enjoy a nice, simple breakfast on the fjord.  Nothing better than a croissant and some strong Norwegian coffee with views of the Aurland Fjord to start my day.

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A Little Side Trip

After a wonderful lunch and visit with our Norwegian relatives, we decided as a group to make a border run since we were so close.  We caravanned our way across the Norwegian-Swedish border and stopped to take a couple of pics. Since we were so close, it made sense to explore Norway’a neighbor.

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Exploring Trondheim

We spent our morning exploring Trondheim with my parents, my grandma, my brother and his family, my cousin and her family and my aunt and uncle. Trondheim is a great walking town, so we haven’t needed the car once since we got here. The weather is quite a bit colder than Florida, a refreshing and rainy 55 degrees.

One of the coolest sites in Trondheim is Nidarosdomen, Nidaros Cathedral, which is the northernmost cathedral in Europe. The cathedral was built on the burial site of St. Olav and work started in 1070 as a tribute to the King and was completed in 1300. The church’s denomination (as with the rest of Europe) was originally Roman Catholic Church, but post reformation it’s denomination is the Church of Norway.  It is truly a saintly place.

We stayed for the organ meditation where many of us fell asleep courtesy of a long travel day and some jet lag. The kids were only hushed once, which was a complete miracle. My boys lit a candle to honor Debbie. Each of the kids lit a candle to say a prayer, threw coins into the wishing well, and left a note of gratitude with a stone on an alter. Only two of them burnt themselves on the candles, another small miracle.

 

After the brief nap, or the 1:00 pm organ meditation, we made our way down to the crypt. Its much different from the catacombs of Rome or Notre Dame in Paris. In Norway, the burial practices were much different. In medieval times, they did not embalm people and they reused graves. This means the headstone would change when they would bury someone else in the grave. These headstones, some of which were for knights and other dignitaries, were what was kept in the crypt.

In the Nidaros Complex there are several museums including the crown jewels, the Archbishops palace where you can see the actual excavation sites, and a military museum. We were able to go into all of them on our combined ticket. The boys favorite was the military museum while mine was the Archbishop’s Palace and the military museum.

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Post cathedral, we took a nice nap. For those that know me that will come as quite a shock as I am not a napper. Tomorrow I’ll grab some pictures of the free breakfast, which is absolutely incredible.

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Mad Dash

Life during the school year, known as hockey season in our house, is a barrage of mad dash days strung together by weekends on the road and tournament weekends out of state.  It is a ridiculously busy time from the time we leave the house in the morning until we finally get home 14 hours later.  Our careers, the kids’ schooling and their activities leave us dashing from place to place nine months out of the year.

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For the last eight years, the boys have spent the summers in Minnesota with their grandparents giving mom and dad a much needed respite from the madness.  This summer, however, is different.  There is no respite.  Since we’re taking a big family trip, they’re staying in FL for the summer, so again no rest for the weary.     Okay, I can’t complain to voraciously as we’re taking a once in a life time trip to retrace our roots.  It is a trip that I cannot wait to share with my kids, my husband, my parents and the rest of our family.

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It is an odd dynamic getting used to the craziness in the summer.  While my summer days and nights were once quite quiet, they are now loud and filled with silliness. I know get emergency calls at work from the boys for such emergencies as:

  • Can we bathe the guinea pig?
  • Why isn’t the Wi-Fi working?
  • Are you bringing home McDonalds for lunch?
  • Are you on your way home yet?
  • Where’s the Roku remote?
  • Why do I have to read?
  • Why can’t The Mayor do the dishes?
  • Why can’t Goalielocks vacuum the floor?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to have them home. It’s just that it has thrown me off my summer routine, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing.  Plus when they are gone for months every summer, I miss them terribly.   They’ll be back in Minny next summer to spend time with the family and enjoy sometime away from mom and dad and I’ll enjoy my brief respite from life’s mad dash.

P.S.  Tonight’s mad dash comprised of a quick run upstairs to watch the SpaceX rocket launch that was scrubbed for the second night in a row.