Trip report : Norway in the truck camper
Well, we had done a lot of stuff in our own country in our truck camper the past couple of years, and a lot of foreign travel in rented campers, so time to get our little camper on a ferry and oversea...
Forum Discussion
Tuesday - Telemark
So, we've all seen "The Heroes of Telemark" - and this is where it happened in real life. Of course, that was a movie and there was a load of made up stuff in there too for added drama.
A basic summary is that during WWII the Nazi occupiers of Norway wished to produce heavy water at a hydro electric power plant up the valley to the west of the lake shown above. Norwegian saboteurs skied parachuted then skied in and climbed a ravine to plant changes and destroy the production facilities. A second raid was required later and this focused on the ferry "Hydro" - one of those ferries that carries train carriages. That sabotage attack sank the ferry destroying the heavy water stock being transferred from the plant.
We headed in the direction of the hydro plant, but on the way saw an old 1950s ferry - a slightly newer version of the one sunk above. We pulled in. It clearly wasn't open to the public yet - too early in the season. But a small school party had turned up. I asked one of the people who looked connected with the ferry and she said no problem, just walk on and have a look. It was fascinating.
I've never been on one of these rail ferries before - it was interesting to see how it attached securely to the dock leveller so the carriages could be loaded.
The railway is electric with overhead gantries, and a small diesel engine was used to push the carriages onto the ferry avoiding the need to continue the overhead electric supply all the way onto the ferry deck.
There were stairs to a saloon deck above the carriages, but I also found stairs at the side that curled down below the water line. Under here I found another saloon, which looked like a dining area:
On the way out we met the lady who let us on and started to talk to her. She said it was mainly maintained and run by volunteers. Before leaving we found the office and locked cash box. Sally took a post card from the rack and pinned a 200 Krona note (around £20) under the cash box as a donation. I love to see this sort of industrial heritage being restored so even though I had been able to look around it for free, I preferred to give them a donation anyway.
We headed on and dropped by a dump station I had marked in the GPS. It was completely free, had fresh water and facilities for dumping black and grey tanks and even had those screw-on adaptors on the taps so you could plug your hose in without finding your own adaptor. Almost anywhere else in the world such an adaptor would have been taken by a previous user, but the Norwegians don't do casual theft. Some of it might come from their extensive use of the outdoors and shared mountain huts where habits form of leaving things ready for the next occupant. During the trip we saw expensive trailers unsecured that would disappear in no time in other countries.
Now on to the hydro generating plant where the heavy water was made:
There was this bridge across to the plant. I considered driving over it (partly to wind Sally up), but 1) there was a parking area before the bridge and it occurred to me I would probably find staff parking and people staring at me if I crossed the bridge and drove up the switchbacks, and 2) I wanted to look over the bridge at the gorge and enjoy the walk. So we walked.
And this is what the heavy water plant looked like:
Inside the turbine hall:
After a picnic sat outside the hydro plant, we headed back down the valley, then turned left around the top end of the lake and up a small road following a mountain stream. Part way up we found the perfect boondocking spot, but it was too early to stop for the day:
We climbed up gaining altitude into alpine pastures:
Climbing further we reached the plateau, and snow for the first time:
I was hoping for somewhere to boondock on the top of the mountain, but there were a lot of what were I guess holiday cabins up there with a lot of no parking and no camping signs. So even though out of season we didn't really want to boondock obviously near someone's property.
We descended the switchbacks down the north side of the mountain, but before we turned onto the main road Sally noticed a dirt road running parallel with it our side of the river. "What about down there?" she asked, so we turned left. The dirt road followed the river and there were very few properties along it. After a couple of miles we found a spot where we could pull in off the track to camp:
We went for a short walk up to the nearest village and back. However, unlike in the UK we couldn't do much more than walk along the dirt road and back, since on one side was river, but the other was pretty impenetrable forest. While it was still warm Sally had a wash in the river. A few vehicles came past in the evening - locals returning home from work. No-one disturbed us though. Sally tried to convince me to play Scrabble with her. I hadn't played since I was a child and remembered why - I am useless at Scrabble. I can visualise designs and mechanisms in my head, but I can't manipulate words that way.
Stay tuned for Aurland...
So, we've all seen "The Heroes of Telemark" - and this is where it happened in real life. Of course, that was a movie and there was a load of made up stuff in there too for added drama.
A basic summary is that during WWII the Nazi occupiers of Norway wished to produce heavy water at a hydro electric power plant up the valley to the west of the lake shown above. Norwegian saboteurs skied parachuted then skied in and climbed a ravine to plant changes and destroy the production facilities. A second raid was required later and this focused on the ferry "Hydro" - one of those ferries that carries train carriages. That sabotage attack sank the ferry destroying the heavy water stock being transferred from the plant.
We headed in the direction of the hydro plant, but on the way saw an old 1950s ferry - a slightly newer version of the one sunk above. We pulled in. It clearly wasn't open to the public yet - too early in the season. But a small school party had turned up. I asked one of the people who looked connected with the ferry and she said no problem, just walk on and have a look. It was fascinating.
I've never been on one of these rail ferries before - it was interesting to see how it attached securely to the dock leveller so the carriages could be loaded.
The railway is electric with overhead gantries, and a small diesel engine was used to push the carriages onto the ferry avoiding the need to continue the overhead electric supply all the way onto the ferry deck.
There were stairs to a saloon deck above the carriages, but I also found stairs at the side that curled down below the water line. Under here I found another saloon, which looked like a dining area:
On the way out we met the lady who let us on and started to talk to her. She said it was mainly maintained and run by volunteers. Before leaving we found the office and locked cash box. Sally took a post card from the rack and pinned a 200 Krona note (around £20) under the cash box as a donation. I love to see this sort of industrial heritage being restored so even though I had been able to look around it for free, I preferred to give them a donation anyway.
We headed on and dropped by a dump station I had marked in the GPS. It was completely free, had fresh water and facilities for dumping black and grey tanks and even had those screw-on adaptors on the taps so you could plug your hose in without finding your own adaptor. Almost anywhere else in the world such an adaptor would have been taken by a previous user, but the Norwegians don't do casual theft. Some of it might come from their extensive use of the outdoors and shared mountain huts where habits form of leaving things ready for the next occupant. During the trip we saw expensive trailers unsecured that would disappear in no time in other countries.
Now on to the hydro generating plant where the heavy water was made:
There was this bridge across to the plant. I considered driving over it (partly to wind Sally up), but 1) there was a parking area before the bridge and it occurred to me I would probably find staff parking and people staring at me if I crossed the bridge and drove up the switchbacks, and 2) I wanted to look over the bridge at the gorge and enjoy the walk. So we walked.
And this is what the heavy water plant looked like:
Inside the turbine hall:
After a picnic sat outside the hydro plant, we headed back down the valley, then turned left around the top end of the lake and up a small road following a mountain stream. Part way up we found the perfect boondocking spot, but it was too early to stop for the day:
We climbed up gaining altitude into alpine pastures:
Climbing further we reached the plateau, and snow for the first time:
I was hoping for somewhere to boondock on the top of the mountain, but there were a lot of what were I guess holiday cabins up there with a lot of no parking and no camping signs. So even though out of season we didn't really want to boondock obviously near someone's property.
We descended the switchbacks down the north side of the mountain, but before we turned onto the main road Sally noticed a dirt road running parallel with it our side of the river. "What about down there?" she asked, so we turned left. The dirt road followed the river and there were very few properties along it. After a couple of miles we found a spot where we could pull in off the track to camp:
We went for a short walk up to the nearest village and back. However, unlike in the UK we couldn't do much more than walk along the dirt road and back, since on one side was river, but the other was pretty impenetrable forest. While it was still warm Sally had a wash in the river. A few vehicles came past in the evening - locals returning home from work. No-one disturbed us though. Sally tried to convince me to play Scrabble with her. I hadn't played since I was a child and remembered why - I am useless at Scrabble. I can visualise designs and mechanisms in my head, but I can't manipulate words that way.
Stay tuned for Aurland...
