Before I came to Norway I was told the Lofoten islands were one of the must see areas in Norway. I was able to go through a trip ESN organized on April 23-28. It was a really long bus ride to get to our cabins. We left at 4:30 PM and arrived at our cabins in at 5:30 PM the next day with only stops for bathroom breaks, a stop at a grocery store, and a couple hours at the Lofotr Viking Museum. 25 hours of travel… I did get to see 3 moose during the drive though! One of them the bus driver had to hit the breaks pretty hard to avoid. The moose crossing signs should definitely be taken very seriously.

The Lofotr Viking museum is built near where an old Viking village dating back to around 900 AD was found. A farmer was tilling his field and hit some glass and pottery. After some excavation work the foundation of a huge longhouse was found. The museum has a replica of what they believe the longhouse looked like. We got to have lunch in the great hall! After the Viking museum it wasn’t supposed to be a very long drive to our cabins, but apparently there was an avalanche in a construction area on the other side of a tunnel so we had to wait around for that to be cleared. It was really warm so everyone just laid out in the sun on the shore. Our cabins were in Å. Å is the very last town that you can get to by driving on the Lofoten islands. There are a couple other towns that are only accessible by ferry.

The first full day in Lofoten we went to Bunes Beach. To get there we had to take a ferry from Reine and then hike across the island for about an hour. Bunes beach is a big valley with mountains on three sides and one side opening to the sea. It was another area that is deceptively huge. The beach looks small until you walk down to it and realize it is a long walk to get to the ocean. It is tradition that during each ESN Lofoten trip they have a “Viking Baptism”. We first had to try two staple products from fishing in Lofoten, fish oil and the dried fish found hanging throughout the islands. After that we had to go jump in the ocean. Luckily it was a really nice and sunny day so the swim was great! Most agreed the hardest part was eating on the chewy dried fish. When we got back to our cabins I still had a lot of energy so I went on a hiked up the stream running through Å to lake Ågvatnet in the middle of the island.

The next day we went on a guided hike through the mountains on the north side of the island. Unfortunately it was extremely foggy and it was raining a little bit. It was difficult to see anything past 50 feet. The midpoint of the hike was the location the documentary “North of the Sun” was filmed. “North of the Sun” is about two surfers who build a Hobbit hole-like house near the beach and spend the winter there surfing. They build the Hobbit hole completely out of drift wood and junk that washes up on shore. Part of the goal of the documentary was to raise awareness of how much garbage is in the ocean. There is trash from all over the world that ends up on that beach because of the currents that go to Lofoten. I haven’t had a chance to watch the documentary yet, but a few of my friends have and they really liked it.

On our last day we stopped by the fishing museum in Å and then began the long journey back to Trondheim. The journey home was a little bit shorter because we took a ferry that cut out a big portion of the drive, but it still was a long way. We did stop at a pizza restaurant for a buffet in Bodø and stopped at the edge of the arctic circle! We got back to Trondheim at 8 AM and then I pretty much just slept the rest of the day.