It was a big day in Voss, where I was hoping to do some para gliding from high above and the main reason I stayed in town for 1 night. I got in contact with a pilot that was going to take me up at a high altitude to launch off of but wasn't to sure with the conditions to fly even though the sky was clear. Since we were dealing with being in a valley, the winds were very unpredictable and the pilot was explaining to me that we needed certain type of clouds to project the type of wind we needed inorder to take off. I originally wanted to do hang gliding but nothing was offered in the region and I heard it is even more difficult process to go through because all the factors that have to be accounted for with the wind, sky and other items. We waited for 20 minutes with no luck to fly but at least I got a good view to see the region from at a high view point and took some photos and videos of Voss below. It was a big disappointment I didn't get to go para gliding but I still got the chance to walk around town alittle bit and also did some photography. Then I had to deal with the rain for how many hours before my train departed for Bergen.
From the down time waiting for my train to arrive to leave Voss, I spoke to a few people regarding why Norway in general is expensive and find out there is alot of history behind it and just like any other country, projects take forever to get done due to who's overlooking the country. As of right now the ratio of the currency from Norwegian Krone to US dollars is roughly about 5-1, meaning whatever price of an item you're going to pay for in Norwegian Krones you divide the amount by 5 inorder to get the price break down in US dollars. So for an example, if you want to eat at a decent restaurant you would be paying for at least 100 Norwegian Krones which is around $25 and from the American's perspective you're basically paying to dine in a nice restaurant that falls into quality food most of the time than quantity. I heard people would even do their grocery shopping by traveling to the border of Sweden to save money on meat, fruits, vegetables and other items. Don't get me wrong its still expensive to buy items in an Scandinavian country general though in Sweden it is alittle bit cheaper there to do your grocery shopping though making a 4 hour round trip car ride from Oslo might make anyone be hesitant for a brief moment.
Taking the train from Voss to Bergen was still worth to see the landscape passing by at different areas but the weather got into the way on and off and also had to deal with the rain in Bergen after arriving at the central station. I got to Bergen around 9pm and was trying to find the bus stop I needed to take to the hostel which was located up in the hills and 20 minutes away. I eventually found the specific bus stop but had to buy my bus fare from a ticket machine. This is where it got very irritating, the machine didn't take bills for some reason and credit card was the only option but the machine didn't want to process the transaction with my credit card. So I traveled to a convenient store that was close to the Bergen central station and paid $8 for a small bag of peanuts just to get change and I felt awkward telling the cashier to have my change in coins. The cashier gave me a look like what is he talking about and from there I headed back to the specific bus stop. I purchased a bus ticket from the ticket machine with the coins I got back and realized these coins were standard in high denomination which I was originally expecting in bills but that wasn't the case.
While on the bus to my hostel, I noticed the distance was very far from the downtown center and it was not really worth hiking there from the hills location because the roads opened in many directions and there was not one direct route to get there from the hostel. I met some some people from San Diego and Seattle on the bus while we walked to the hostel from the bus stop which was about a block away. Approaching the hostel I realized it was a good size building from the outside but not as a large as the one in Oslo. I checked in and got a four person dorm room and found it only had one wall outlet which was very ridiculous if I needed to recharged my phone or camera. The next day I was glad it didn't really rain, it was just foggy up in the hills and felt like Daly City south of San Francisco for people out there who never been around places near San Francisco. I specifically strategize my day by taking the bus toward the bus station and walk around that area toward southeastern region of the city and toward the west along the piers where the cruise ships dock at.
I loved the take on the buildings being constructed because there was alot of interesting approach behind the structures with alot of influences from different type of artists. Plus there were art sculptures and structures everywhere around the city so it was great observing them and try to understand what these artists were trying express with their compositions. One of the attractions I wish I went to see but was very far away from the city was to visit the the home of famous Norway composer Edvard Grieg. Now if you're curious which composition was used out there whether if it was in movies, tv shows, commercials, etc.. it was "In the hall of the mountain king". Everyone should be able to pick it out because the composition was very well known and usually it is implemented in scenes to build up tension and drama. He's very famous in Bergen so alot of statues and places are mentioned in his name in honor for his past accomplishments. After walking for a few hours around the city, I finally arrived at one the main attractions which was the fish market. I shot some time lapse videos of the area and it had the same feeling of Fisherman's Wharf/Pier 39 in San Francisco but more focused on the seafood booths/restaurants and also had alot of tourists roaming around the area. I was shooting a very intricate time lapse sequence that took about 45 minutes to 1 hour and people were just staring at me like what I was doing though not to the point of bothering me. I think a few American's identified me from being the states and asked me about what I was doing and was curious about how the end composition would turn out and if I was going to post it online. The city was not to enormous to not be able to travel around but enough for me to cover alot of ground to take a lot of photos and videos of of interesting items to shoot. It would be nice also to check out museums in general but the cost of them were expensive and I was still in the position of trying to justify my expenses of what to spend on and not spend which was mainly everything except for transportation and specific food.
The following day I literally had pretty much a whole day to eat up due to my overnight train ride leaving at 11pm in the evening. I focused on doing more exploration around other parts of the city I didn't get to see and continued with more photography. I also did some experimental time lapse filming of a specific water fountain stature that was near central park that got some attention from some of the locals and tourists from many different locations of shooting the same subject for a 30 minute period. After going around the city for a few hours, I wanted to try out something from the fish market and bought a smoked salmon sandwich that was high price but tasted very fresh and good. Later before I arrived at my hostel, I went to a local convenient store to buy 2 pieces of Nectar fruit and small bag of crackers. I think I payed about $7-8 dollars for those three items and got me thinking if I can stretch this out for 2-3 days without buying any other food for that duration even though I still had energy bars I stocked up on before my trip.
It was interesting the pilot that I was supposed to go para gliding with in Voss, supposedly knew someone in Bergen that could take me para gliding in the region but there was no point in doing it cause the sky was cloudy and it was raining majority of my time in the city. It would be awesome to do it but the weather in Bergen felt like I was in Seattle where it could be sunny in one instance and all of sudden you get downpour for no reason so it was not logical to go flying in the unpredictable weather. So I ended up staying at my hostel for the next several hours before my departure for Oslo due to the rain not intending to stop. It was a shame not to get a good shot of the city from my high vantage point during that time near my hostel.
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