Header picture - fragility of winter in Ørsdalen river.
4 February - Saturday's activity was sorting through unsold jumble from the village hall and driving it (or at least, the first trailer-load of it) to the church's second-hand shop in Sandnes. Our trailer was filled to the brim (and rather over-loaded, given that many of the boxes were full of books).
(Photo, left). Another load to drive next week!
6 February - it's all right: here comes the sun -
The end of January is a time of minor celebration for us because even in the middle of a long cold lonely winter we get the sun back from behind the mountains.
The exact date depends on the thickness of snow on the mountaintops (a specially thick layer makes it a day or two later, so it does help if the ice is slowly melting)
and, of course, on the weather (when it's cloudy the sun returns but we don't get to see it — frustrating!).
This year, we had glimpses of sunshine on the mountaintops in January, but it wasn't until today that we had a welcome blast of sunshine around mid-day and another at 5pm as the sun was setting over the lake. Feels good: smiles can return to faces.
(Photo, right).
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7 February - Happy 17th birthday to Katie!
In Sandnes, snowdrops are flowering — at least a month early (photo of flowers outside Sandnes church today).
8 February - knitting for the zebra -
Snowdrops are not the only white patches on the ground in Sandnes.
When the local authority neglected to re-paint a zebra crossing in Sandnes, a local lady has taken the matter in hand the Norwegian way —
by knitting new stripes for it.
Here she is (photo, left: click for enlargement) doing a final fitting.
11 February - a day of contrasts -
This afternoon we had a small outing to a local cafe.
The February sunshine on the way was glorious and by the time we got back the sun was getting low in the west,
so the light on the mountains looked like an absurdly over-coloured illustration, as though someone had been throwing pots of orange paint all around
(click goat, right, for photo sequence).
On the third-from-the-last photo you might notice a little smoke rising well up the valley.
By nightfall, the colours were different again.
They seem to have been burning off a bit of grass right up at the top of the valley this afternoon (hence that smoke).
The fire has not died down.
In fact, it's spread rather. Here (click photo, left, for enlargements) is the view from our house this evening.
Tim is the official photographer for Ørsdalen stories for the local paper,
so the photo is already (within half an hour of being taken) on their front page.
Obviously a slow news day!
A little PS to this story: within minutes of the story appearing in the paper we received a phone call from the fire brigade in Egersund,
wanting to know what was going on.
The fire brigade people were actually a bit cross that these wretched people in Ørsdalen were creating large grass fires without telling them,
so Tim had to spend some time calming troubled waters: "fire's nearly out now ... probably just started accidentally, on its own, perhaps a hiker dropped a cigarette ... sure it wasn't one of us ... Whose land is it on? Impossible to say: we all own bits of the valley - real patchwork ... couldn't have gone anywhere in any case because of the river ... not one of us, honest Gov".
A couple of years ago, in some particularly disasterous floods, the footbridge over the river was swept away. The troll and us have been greatly inconvenienced by this, but we recently noticed that it's been rebuilt. As Tracy pointed out, it's lucky it didn't burn down again because the fire (above story) was right next to it. Pictures of the new bridge — and, while we're at it, of tonight's deluxe sunset, taken from a bedroom window.
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14 February -
It's hard not to do pictures of sunshine on the snow — even though we've done them previously it always looks more glorious than ever before.
I've restrained the temptation this time, but here, instead, is another seasonal phenomenon - the stripey lake (photo, left - click for enlargement).
Currents of warm water melt the snow that's lying over the ice, creating interesting patterns.
Stavanger doesn't get that same effect, but here, gaps in the ice prove popular with local wildlife, as we see from these
pictures of Katie's school today (photo, right - click for pictures).
15 February - Matt starts a new job today (in Sandnes) and is celebrating by moving into a larger flat. His new address (which of course is on the main information page) is Hoveveien 199, 4323 Sandnes.
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16 February -
The NRK news currently features one of its more obscure headlines: "Boat has collided with art".
Yet again, there's something a little Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy-ish about the way they put it,
though the reality is more prosaic: a pair of inflatable boats have run at high speed into an art installation (of a fountain)
that curiously has been set up in the middle of the harbour at Harstad.
(Photo of harbour with fountain).
Quite how two boats manage to hit the same object was not explained, but never mind.
17 February -
The BBC has today taken up the story (they follow this blog closely) because the boats contained British tourists,
some of whom needed medical treatment after being thrown into the water. Story here.
18 February - T, T & K are away for the weekend at a cabin on the south coast, together with a group of friends from church.
Two cabins, in fact — one traditional but still well-equipped and comfortable (where we are staying) and one super-sophisticated (where we're eating).
(Photos, above right).
19 February - For Tim, at least, it was back to Sandnes in time for the morning service. This was a family (children's) service with a costume theme (the theological point behind it was the day's text about the Transfiguration on the mountain). Church musician in action, left: click for enlargement and pictures of service.
25 February - Away again!
It's half term, or "winter holiday", in Norway, so most of Norway's population is in Ørsdalen, skiing.
We're not, however - we've escaped. Katie is on her way to England to visit her Uncle Bob and Auntie Pat,
while T&T are — well, you can guess from the photo (right).
We're back in Neustrelitz, half-way between Berlin and Rostock, in the heart of
the Müritz National Park.
Why have we taken to coming here so often? We probably owe you an explanation.
For quite some years, Tim has played many concerts in Germany and has been looking out for a permanent base to stay at, keep music in and so on.
In addition, the whole family enjoys holidays exploring Germany and especially boating on the beautiful lakes and rivers of this region.
Last year we found and bought a comfortable flat (2 bedrooms, lounge, kitchen and bathroom) on the edge of Neustrelitz.
This is ideal for us because it's an easy drive (down through Denmark and then just around the coast) and an even easier flight
(direct flight from Stavanger to Berlin, followed by an hour and a half on the train or hire car to Neustrelitz).
Meanwhile, back in Norway, there's trouble in Vikeså, where the area's big sports and exhibition hall (which is also used as the school gymn, site of the annual agricultural show, and even occasional theatre) burned to the ground yesterday.
There's also trouble in parliament, where a vote went wrong. A bill concerning overseas medical treatment was due to be defeated; unexpectedly, though, it was accidentally passed — because so many MPs pressed the wrong voting button while watching the world skiing championships on their mobile phones and tablets at the same time. According to the news, the Speaker of the House had to keep telling them to "stop watching the skiing and pay attention" (sounds more like a school class than parliament), but seemingly to no avail.
Thomas Andrew points out an advert on Norway's main "buying and selling" website, for this object. A snip at only £2800, especially as the seller points out that "according to experts", similar objects can be sold in Germany for up to £5000. So there we are: we have dozens of the things at home in our garden — much bigger ones, in fact — so if we just bring one or two each time we come to our flat, we will soon have made enough to retire on.
27 February - to the castle -
Today's outing was just down the road to the nearby 12th-century Burg Stargard, which is Germany's most northerly high castle and the oldest secular building in this state (Mecklenburg-Vorpommern). More importantly, the sun was shining warmly and there was no-one collecting money for parking tickets.
(Click photo, left, for pictures).
As well as a very posh hotel and a chapel at which you can get married (we couldn't because we already are),
they apparently have all kinds of events during the summer (such as jousting tournaments) —
which were enticingly illustrated on the photo sequence on their website, but the day after we provided the link, it seems to have been taken down.
I'll provide the link again when the site re-appears.
28 February - Today's newspaper comments that the recent fire in Vikeså is a short-term "tragedy" for the local community — but that in the long term it might be anything but. The newspaper points out that the insurance-funded reconstruction may add extra features to the building such as a swimming pool. Even so, I don't think the caption and picture was entirely intentional; "Fire can give Bjerkreim new swimming pool", it says below a picture of two fire engines pouring water into the ruined building.
