Tag Archives: House sale

Trees, Trees, Trees – A Whistlestop Journey through Sweden

Blog, Holiday, In Darkness and In Light, Life in Norway, , ,

Sunrise/sunset: 05:10/20:22 Daylength: 15hr12min

This week started with dropping Andrew off at his new school. He has been updating me as the week has gone by and my opinion of the Nordic idea of Folk High School (already high) has gone up again. He’s ostensibly there to study film, but he only does that for eight hours a week. In addition, he has also to choose another subject. His first three choices were surfing, a walking group and racket sports. He got his first choice, so now he will learn to surf. In addition, he had to choose a second subject for Fridays and an activity. He chose learning the ukulele on Fridays and walking as his activity. It’s clear the intention is to get the students away from their screens and out and about, as well as socialising.

Half way through the week, they also had to make signs for their bedroom doors and Andrew and his roommate won a prize for “Most creative” signs. I was interested to see that Andrew’s was a Scottish saltire flag with his birth date in one of the four sections, and his birth place and the two significant places he’s lived in Norway in the other three, with an image representing each place. It’s a simple design and very attractive, despite the fact that he isn’t a natural at drawing. He’s spent the past couple of years studying communication and media and his creativity still surprises me. I was worried about leaving him there – what mother isn’t, when her child leaves home, but it seems like the school works really hard to make sure everyone is involved.

Andrew and Triar

I also left Triar behind. In two months, I am going to have to take him to the UK. I think I’ve mentioned before that I have to take him on a ferry, as I can’t accompany him on a plane. Logistically, the hardest part of the journey appeared to be getting Triar from Finnsnes to Kristiansand. There are no trains this far north, the Hurtigruten boat leaves Finnsnes at four in the morning, and arrives in Bodø (where I could get a train to Oslo) at two in the morning the day after, which was an unattractive start to a journey that will take several days. Taking a plane from here to Stavanger, followed by a much shorter train transfer to the ferry at Kristiansand is a much easier option. I had tentatively asked Charlie whether he might like to look after Triar for a couple of months and initially he thought he might not manage. It’s quite a long time and he travels a lot, so I wasn’t that surprised. It was a lot to ask. But when he saw Triar again, and how quickly Triar settled into his flat, and crucially, after he found a colleague was keen to help when he was away, he changed his mind.

So when I set off to drive back, the car seemed very empty. I had been trying to decide which route I should take as well, and with Triar gone, driving up through Sweden was a possibility, so that is what I did.

Getting out of Norway was the hardest part. Despite the fact that I set off on Sunday, there were long queues around Oslo, including half an hour stationary in a tunnel, with increasing signs of a carbon monoxide headache. The Google Maps lady then told me there were long queues ahead through the city centre motorway and tantalisingly offered to take me on a route that would cut twenty one minutes off my travel time. It all went well, until I came to the road block. I did a U-turn, turned on my car’s navigation system, which is well and truly out of date, then tried to work out at each junction, which system was likely to give the best advice. I suspect it actually took longer than the traffic jam in the end and was probably more stressful, but I finally emerged from Oslo, then started looking for somewhere to stay. After a failed attempt to get into a hotel (lots of small places have no manned reception, and phone numbers to contact that go unanswered) I finally found a campsite with very comfortable cabins, and ended the day watching bits of Hunger Games on the TV.

On the second day, I crossed the border into Norway. There was a customs toll on the Norwegian side, but no sign of anyone monitoring anything. The road changed from grey asphalt to older looking red, but otherwise there was no great fanfare that I was now in a different country.

As I drove up though, it was interesting to compare the scenery with the Norwegian landscape we experienced on the way down. Here, there were no mountains and twisting roads, only miles and miles of trees with long straight highways, often with a 100km/h speed limit. Periodically there would be a break in the trees, with an expanse of water behind it, but otherwise there was little change as I covered the long miles from south to north.

A lake near Vilhelmina

On the second night, having found the campsite I was aiming for closed, I took my second choice, which was accommodation at the ski centre in Åsarna. This was something of a revelation. I chose to stay in the vandrarhem (hostel) rather than a cabin. It felt rather comforting – a bit like being back in halls of residence at university. My room was basic, with two single beds and a small table, but there was a comfortable kitchen and sitting area. Rather than eating out, I decided to buy something from the supermarket. I got something that I assume is traditionally Swedish. Kåldomar seemed to be some kind of minced meat wrapped in cabbage leaves. It came with mashed potato and gravy, so I thought I’d give it a whirl. I went outside briefly after I had eaten it, and realised as I came back in that I had achieved the dubious feat of making the entire vandrarhem smell of boiled cabbage!

As I drove north, the trees began to thin out and it started to look more like the kind of arctic tundra-like landscape, with sparser, stunted looking trees. There were reindeer too, one of which was a wonderful chocolate brown colour from the tip of its nose to its tidy little hooves. Sadly I didn’t get a photo of that one, but I did take a snap of one I came across later.

A reindeer in Lapland. What could be more appropriate?

It was autumn up here too. The leaves were beginning to turn and the forest floor was ripe with berries and fungi.

Another cabin and two more days driving took me to Kiruna, which my phone told me was only four hours and twelve minutes from home. I stayed in Malmfältens folkhögskola, which was, in effect, another hostel, though this time there was breakfast thrown in and I didn’t have to make my own bed. It was a lovely little room with a peaceful view of trees (what else?) from the window.

So now I am back in Norway and wishing I had longer to visit Sweden, but there it is. On Monday, the estate agent is coming, hopefully to allow some people to look at the house. I should probably ask her how much interest there has been, but I guess I’ll find out soon enough. If there are people interested, there will probably be bidding within a couple of days, so then I will find out if the house is going to sell easily, or not. If it does sell, everything will be a lot clearer, if it doesn’t, then we’ll have to do it all over again.

And so, I’d better go. I have work to do, getting the house ready. I started staining the terrace yesterday and repainting the white paint on the balustrades. I need to finish that off, then tackle clearing the garage and cleaning the windows. Lovely views are all very well, but it’s much better if people can get a clear view of them.

So goodbye for now. I will leave you with another picture of a tree and a link to the estate agent’s listing for my house. Have a good week.

https://www.finn.no/realestate/homes/ad.html?finnkode=316713475

The Beginning of the End

Blog, In Darkness and In Light, Life in Norway, , ,

Sunrise/sunset: 02:12/23:29 Daylength: 21hr17min

You know, it’s odd. For the past few weeks, it’s been difficult to write this blog because there was something I wasn’t telling you. Starting this is actually hard as well, but it has to be done because this week, I handed in my notice at Mattilsynet. I guess some regular readers will be surprised. As you know, I love my job here, so it has been a difficult decision to make, but I am moving back to Scotland.

This decision has its roots in a number of factors. The main one is that I want to be nearer to Mum and Dad. Last winter, round about Christmas time, my dad was not well. He was having trouble breathing and they rang 111 for advice, only to find that an ambulance had been sent. Dad didn’t go to hospital in the end, but the most difficult thing for me was that I didn’t hear about it until several days afterwards. When I asked my mum why, she told me that they hadn’t wanted to worry me. That was understandable, but frustrating. In Norway, there is a lot of flexibility over time off in emergencies. Had I known, I might have been able to fly home, although it probably wasn’t necessary in this case. But if it had been more serious, I have no doubt my boss would have allowed me to go.

But the not telling threw up all kinds of complications. If I did have to go home without much warning, it could take than twenty four hours to get there. In winter, if the weather was really bad or there were no flights, it could be much longer. And anyway… it also crossed my mind that the not telling wasn’t going only in one direction. A long time ago, in my first years at university, before the age of mobile phones and easy communication, my mum joked that she knew things were going well when she didn’t hear from me. When I was intensely homesick at the start, I called them every day. I spent many hours on that little-known payphone in the basement of the halls of residence. When my social life took off, sometimes there could be days and weeks when she couldn’t get hold of me. But the situation is reversed now. Knowing that my parents are physically out of reach, when things are going badly, I don’t ring them, because I don’t want to worry them. In this age of communication, we are failing to communicate.

But my parents aren’t the only factor. Anyone who has been through the last half year with me on this blog will know that last winter was just too much. And (final straw time) it would all have been bearable if Mr Abusive and Husleietvistutvalget (HTU) hadn’t done their worst. The (to me) incomprehensible decision taken by HTU, to believe him when he was exaggerating and actually lying, even though I pointed out some very obviously fraudulent behaviour, has made me feel differently about how well protected I am in Norway. I always thought that the system here would protect me and it didn’t. There’s no doubt their decision has been significant in the north of Norway losing someone who was performing a useful function.

So what happens now? I have three months notice to work, so I will be here through much of the busy season in the abattoir. And then after that, I have to get some of the contents of the house over to the UK, as well as Triar and myself. It is unexpectedly difficult, importing a dog into the UK. Given that pet passports have made quarantine largely a thing of the past, I thought he and I would just bob on a plane and would go together. But it seems that dogs entering the UK on planes have to go as cargo. You actually have to hand them over to a carrier who puts him on a plane you can’t travel on and they have to be met at the other end by someone else. From here it would be at least two flights and I can’t be at both ends. The idea of Triar, on his own, through two flights, and being met at the end with people he’s never met just seems unbearable. And so he and I will go together to the UK on trains and boats.

And where are we going? I am moving to Dumfries. Back in the nineties, I worked in both Stranraer and Castle Douglas, so the area is quite familiar. I have already been in contact with a friend who lives there and I know I have other friends who are not far away. And I keep looking things up and feeling excited about things that I would have taken for granted before. For example, Dumfries has a hospital and it has an accident and emergency department. It has always concerned me, living here, that the nearest hospital is a two hour drive away. There is a library in Dumfries as well. I mean, there are libraries here, of course, but they are full of books in Norwegian. I read to relax, and despite being fluent in Norwegian, reading anything still requires a fully switched on brain. It’s not the same.

And of course all those laws and instructions I have to read at work and all the reports I have to write… all of it is hard for me. I write in English with a fluency that has allowed me to have books published. I told one of my new colleagues that the very idea of doing it all in English instead is just amazing and she made a face, but she just has no idea. I guess I should add here, that the new job I will be doing is, on paper at least, almost the same job I was doing in Finnsnes when I arrived here. There will be welfare visits on farms and monitoring and dealing with any outbreaks of notifiable diseases. As I said at the start, I love my job. I have long thought I would love it even more if I could only do it in English, so now I’m going to give it a try.

So here I am. The house is being prepared for sale. Selling after only a year isn’t necessarily going to be plain sailing. I bought it for less than the asking price because it wasn’t selling. I had really thought I would be here for years and years and could sort out all kinds of things and grow bushes to hide the sound of the cars passing on the road nearby, but it hasn’t worked out that way.

So now, I am preparing everything, and just hoping someone likes it enough. We’ve done a lot of work in the last year, building a fence, fixing the hole in the roof and so on. The estate agent put me in touch with a plumber, so now that job has been done at least. But other faults have cropped up. We discovered a cracked plank on the edge of the roof a couple of weeks back when the gutters were being checked. I got a quotation, thinking I could fix it, but it’s too expensive. And having done that, I will have to let the surveyor know. If I know about a fault, it’s fraudulent not to declare it. I just have to hope that the surveyor doesn’t hit me too hard. And there are other things that weren’t checked because of the snow. He’s coming out on Wednesday, so once he’s been, I will have a better idea of the value of the house.

So a large chunk of this weekend will probably be taken up painting the garage. I have also bought mouse brushes to put in the gap underneath the wood on the sides of the house. I will try to take pictures to explain that for next week. The day after I put everything in motion, I had to finish painting the ceiling in the hall. We took down a wooden partition and it had left a mess and I had been putting it off for weeks, but now it’s done and it looks great. I don’t know if you have watched Dexter, but I really felt like I was in Dexter territory once I had the hallway prepared!

And after the garage is painted and the mouse brushes are in place, there’s just the front steps and the veranda to clean and stain. At least, if I buy a house in Scotland, I know how to do a lot more DIY than I used to!

Outdoors, it’s still very beautiful. Here are some photos from the last week.

And finally, for the foodies amongst you, John was on holiday in Paris for a few days. Obviously he’s becoming a chip off the old block, because the only photo he’s sent, as evidence that he was having a good time, was of some pastries from a lovely bakery they found for breakfast. So here you go fellow foodies. Feast your eyes on this.

See you next week!