The Road to Trondheim

We left Molde heading in a southeasterly direction. One of the folks, Atle, from the Torvik adventure suggested this route. He guaranteed that we would encounter some great scenery. This route would not be dominated by more fjords; it would be a drive through the mountains. Leaving Molde, we took the tunnel under a fjord then drove to Sølsnes to catch the ferry across the fjord to Åfarnes. I was beginning to question the idea that this was a mountain route. It is difficult to leave the fjords behind.

A bridge across another fjord near Åro

The queue for the Sølsnes to Åfarnes ferry; there is a traffic jam heading toward the ferry and a short but dense stream leaving the ferry at regular intervals

The magnificent Trollveggen, we've been told

Our first mountain sight was Trollveggen. It is said to be spectacular as it is more than 1000 meters of vertical and overhanging cliffs. When we arrived, we experienced the "scaffolding effect". This time the "scaffolding" blocking our view was clouds or fog that had shrouded most of the alleged-to-be spectacular, not-to-be-missed sight. The photo above was our best view of Trollveggen.

We considered the option of extending our drive to Trondheim by driving to Trollstigen, but more rational minds prevailed. We felt that we could pass off the photo of Trollveggen as Trollstigen and none would be the wiser. Instead, we opted to go to Jenstadjuvet. This is a point where 5 valleys come together and their watercourses form 2 furious waterfalls. The beauty of this side trip was that it was only about 1/2 inch from Oppdal. A half inch on the map is never as short a trip as it looks. The trip turned out to be about 40 kilometers of paved and unpaved roads. The unpaved portion of the trip added the interesting dimension of being about 1 car wide. This made it easier to focus on the road as there was less of it. Coming to a fork in the road, we chose the high road as the other looked like the driveway to a farm. Much later in the evening, we were advised that the high road was not the correct option and that farms don't have driveways in Norway.

We did manage to get to a point in the road where there was a place to pull over and an obstructed view of a waterfall. We decided that there must be a better view. After all it was listed in a guide book that cost in excess of $20. After a few more kilometers, we turned around and started back in the direction of Trondheim.

Arriving to our hostel in Trondheim, we found a phone message from Atle (as a reminder, Atle is married to Kirsten Solem from the second branch of the family tree - go back and check if will make you feel better). Atle and Kirsten invited us to dinner at their place about 30 kilometers south of Trondheim. We were familiar with the area as we had driven through it less than an hour before. We enjoyed dinner and a beer as we designated a driver to get us back to the hostel. We promised to stay in touch and pointed the car to Trondheim.

Trondheim was interesting, but our thoughts were drifting toward our trip home. If you have read Steinbeck's Travels With Charlie, you may remember his musing about how one's desire to get home increases as a planned trip nears its end. This may have been happening to us.

We did manage to tour the main church in Trondheim. I was less than surprised to find scaffolding nestled closely to areas of the exterior.

The scaffolding in this image shows scaffolding ready for winter

We had one last pølse, maybe Jay and I were the only ones who had that last C+ pølse

We dined at an Italian place along the fjord (where else?). We enjoyed a good meal and walked back to our hostel with thoughts of a 3:15 AM alarm awakening us to go to the airport.