8th
I Got Lost
Trying to walk to my hotel was not such a great idea. I got off the bus in the center of Tromsø and saw the tourist info center was closed, so the plan for getting a map failed. Then I tried deciphering the bus map at one of the stops. Very few labels. No luck. I took out my GPS, but the battery died before it could finish starting up. I tried to orient myself with a compass, knowing that I needed to go to the south of the island. That worked… for a time. I found the right bus route but saw that it was only running every 35 minutes. It still seemed like a good idea to walk. I followed the route for probably a half hour and then lost it. Eventually I came to a supermarket, where I talked with a woman waiting at the nearby bus stop. She suggested I use a phone inside, but I didn’t have the number. I stood by the store trying to get internet, no luck there. I decided to walk some more. Since I was at the top of the island it would be all down hill anyway. This time I concentrated on heading south. I made it to the Tromsø Museum, which I could place in relation to where I needed to go. I walked uphill again (which seemed wrong) and reached another bus stop. It happened to be on the right route, so I thought it would be a good place to rest and figure out what to do. Suddenly in the corner of my eye I see the sign… “Homesleep”! I made it!! I think I walked for around two hours, with the weight of all my stuff on my back. I never want to do that again!
The owner of the place is very friendly. She’s Danish, which is pretty cool. I put a pin on her big world map, marking my home in Western Mass. She doesn’t get many visitors from the USA and I am the first from New England. I asked how she ended up in Tromsø, to which she replied that she got a scholarship from the Danish Cultural Ministry to study here for one year… then she met her husband. How cute! She insists that I marry a Dane or Norwegian, or at least someone from Europe. hahaha.
I love the style of the place here. It’s modern but warm. I may end up spending a lot of time here if most everything is closed tomorrow and Friday. The Norwegians get this time off for Easter. The holiday is a much bigger deal here than back home. Even if the shops and museums are locked up, nature is never closed! OK, maybe in America it can be… we place a lot of importance in private property, even if it’s just a wooded area. However, everyone in Norway has a right of access to and passage through uncultivated land in the countryside (and cultivated land if it is frozen and snow-covered), regardless of who owns it.
