Trondheim in a heat wave

Home of the midday and the midnight sun.

It seems to be a conspiracy, but when we travel to Europe in July to escape the Tasmanian winter, we get hit with a heatwave.  It happened in Croatia last year and now in Scandinavia.

Temperatures rose to 32 and we had dodged the worst of the heat by constantlydarting to the other side of the road seeking shade and devouring icypoles.

We were impressed with the 11pm sunset and 3:48 am sunrise, until we realised that without blockout curtains it still never gets dark.

Sleep didn’t come easy, an it certainly doesn’t help when the overnight temperature doesn’t drop below 19C. 

The flower bridge

One of the famous attractions in Trondheim is the flower bridge (Veftsbrua).

We walked across, but it seems to be one of those things where cities put a colourful feature on a building or street and everyone flocks to it.  We found something similar with the umbrella street.

The old city

We walked to the old part of the city. Lots of small vertical board houses, painted in the reds, whites and green that have become so familiar in Scandinavia.

We spent many hours walking around the rivers, bridges and canals of Trondiem.  It was a busier city that many we hav visited in Sweden, people were out and about – even at midnight!

Nidaros Cathedral

This catherdral that defines the city of Trondheim was first built in 1100 and rebuilt and extensded many times since then.  The latest restoration took over 20 years and involved recarving many statuses and decorative pieces.

Nidaros Catherdral is the end point and goal of the St Olav Pilgrimage. they have Pilgrams services every day at 6pm, so it was curious and a little disappointing to see two weary and heavily ladden walkers turned away because (you can’t bring big packs into the catherdral and there is nowhere to store them!)

We were lucky to be visiting in the midst of a craft fair, it gave kids (and some adults) the chance to practice being potters, stone masons and plasterers.

The Real Travellers of …

In the evening we kicked back on our beds, with a fan, wet towels, nibbbles and drinks. Some wine and sqaures of chocolate saved from the flight over.  You never know when you will need a soggy sticky treat.

The TV provided a limited number of channels and so for the first time in our lives watched the Real Housewives of Beverly Hills.  Appalling – but there were limited pickings!

After two days of exploring this city – we were ready to move on.  We had considered a range of options to get to Bergen and nearer the fijords, but they all took more time than we had. Trains are all routed via Oslo, so would take 19 hours. 

If we needed to spend this much time travelling we wanted a different form of transportation. We were going by sea.