Ålesund, another travelogue

I'm sorry it has taken this long to post about the second half of Cris' and my Norway vacation! WiFi has been an issue. I may have been having too much fun to write, but I'm sticking to the WiFi excuse.

Cris and I boarded the Havila Castor ship to travel north up the coast. We left Bergen at 8:30 pm and spent the night traveling up to Ålesund. In 15 years here in Norway, I have never managed to visit the Art Nouveau City. I saw a picture in a Norwegian language book when I began lessons, and decided I had to go there. Then I didn't. Until now. I disembarked from the Castor at 9:45 am and met Reidun, the friend I met on the trip to Madeira in January. It was great to spend some hours climbing "the Thousand Steps" up Aksla to the viewpoint over the whole city. A thousand is definitely an exaggeration! There were numbers on many of the stairs, and there were actually less than 500 steps. Reidun and I had coffee up at the top, while catching up with each other, and admiring the view of the city snaking between two fjords.

We walked back to the center of town, to the bit of fjord that I saw in my Norwegian book. Perfect! We had lunch right beside it. Then Reidun had to get back home in time to watch the Norwegian version of Tour de France come through her town. She was so thoughtful to drive here to get together. Takk skal du ha, Reidun!

I followed a walking tour from Lonely Planet. It explained why a whole town could be built in one style. In 1904, the whole town burned down. The whole place! Only one person died, but 14,000 people were left with no place to live. What happened next? Kaiser Wilhem of Germany sent 4 warships full of supplies and temorary shelters, and builders from all over Norway traveled to Ålesund. In only two years, they built a complete town in Jugendstil, the architectural style of the time. It focused on curves, materials, and patterns. I absolutely love it.

The Jugendstil Museum had a 'time machine' to tell the story of Ålesund. It also ha a temporary exhibit of enamel, and I fell in love with this artistic beauty. The colors changed as you changed the angle of viewing. The collection was donated after a lifetime of collecting Norwegian enamel by Per Bredo Østby, 3rd generation goldsmith. Photographing them would be a problem, so I recommend looking at Antique Jewelry University's page. Focus on 'Art Nouveau'.

After "The Best Fish & Chips in Ålesund", I boarded the Castor again for the overnight trip to Trondheim. Castor had spent the day sailing the world's longest fjord, Sognefjord, to Geiranger fjord. It was cloudy, but not rainy, and the waterfalls were flowing in all their splendor. But I have been there, done that, and it was time for me to explore Jugendstilby.