Eurotrip

Sweden E3.2 Vangern Wildlife reserve /  by Tom Glendinning

Vangern

Vangern

Reserved for Wild Life

 

Here we found a balance point of Sky, Rock and Sea. A moment outside our frame of time & motion.

Rocky lichenous outcroppings burning under the sky, dropping to deep crystal waters crinkled by coastal breezes. A landscape moulded by eons of pouring rain, trammelling downward to sea-level. Carving, falling, pooling into luxuriously sun warmed bathing shallows, or deep refreshing layered gradients of temperature.

 
 

However, even the August sun has little effect on the main event.

As locals tell us ...  "You have to go in with the whole body".

I'm even more in love with daily Cold water plunges and the things it does to your body than ever before.

No better place to do it than this still sea. This challenges even the mirror fjords and glacier melt torrents in Norway.

 
 

Exploring the outcroppings, tiny Rivendellian enclaves of greenery open unexpectedly at your feet, features you do well to remember when you boldly re-walk the rock, jumping the narrow gullies in blinding mist-rains.

 
 
 

The sun and wind dependant, shifting textual contrast of rock and sea inspired a great deal of meditation here.

Focus held for hours by a few square meters of lichen, cracks and rippling sky reflections, bare feet moulding to water smoothed contours of curving rock.  Pure experience.

 
 
 

Excellent virgin bouldering rock by calm sea. Climbing heaven.

 

Home.  Wherever you take it.

 

WILD LIVING - IN A VAN

For days and months we live outside practically for free. Hiding in our moving home or under tarps when it's cold and wet. Emerging to find local foods, spare parts, stories & crafts. Treading lightly on the land, foot off the gas. Giving wherever we can. Sharing whatever we have.

 

Go slow.  Experience your senses fully.  Live full and long.

Celebrate the landscape every day.

Take nothing but photographs.

Leave nothing but foot (and maybe hand) prints.

 
 

When we had to leave here by force of Sam&Chloe's onward flight schedule, I had never before felt a greater sense of thanks to a place, for holding and keeping me.  Nothing needed doing here. So much was done and felt.

Back to the road.

 
3.2 Vangern Wildlife Reserve Sweden-16.08.22-TGP.dng-16.08.22-TGP-28-72dpi.jpg
 
 
 

Norway E2.12 - Oslo Urban Soundscape /  by Tom Glendinning

When we walked around Oslo for one day I didn't take a camera, only a recorder.

Taking toddler steps into the world of microphones and audio editing, being such a lover of superbly crafted audio, is daunting. The resultant audio track is my most complex creation so far, a long way from the ambient nature soundscape I mostly made during our travels.

See my soundcloud account for the rest of my soundscapes so far.

A few photos from Bobbie's phone to accompany below...

More photos from Sweden soon.

Astrup Fearnley Museum

Astrup Fearnley Museum

Norway E2.11b Mortensrud Kirke /  by Tom Glendinning

This is a wonderful church built for a local community just south of Oslo.

Designed by Børre Skodvin & Jan Olav Jensen - Our tutor Martin Gledhill at Bath University often brought up this amazing place in his lectures.

 
 

The building fits simply and serenely into a peaceful landscape. It's a contemplative and connective space. We felt this even after a month in the wilds of Norwegian national parks, along with a sacred, temple aspect given by the structure.

 
 

There is actually a rough trail cut around the perimeter of the building through the vegetation, likely by architect pilgrims.

Sadly the time we managed to get there en-route to Sweden we couldn't go inside, except peering through the glass. The light was wonderful though.

Norway E2.10 Skydje Fossen at Eidfjord /  by Tom Glendinning

Far up the gulley North East of Eidfjord, tucked just away from the Westering gales driving inland up the Fjords, there is a waterfall.

It's marked on the tourist's guides as a good one, which is saying something. 

Norway has more waterfalls than it knows what to do with. It perplexes most arrivals however, who take the rutted gravel track through the woods to find it, as it lacks a carpark.

           "Sorry... Sky.. die? Fossen - We are looking for Skydjefossen... is it here?"

This all standing under the omnipresent, grumbling roar of glacier melt pouring from the mountain plateau over a lip, 400m or so directly above us, pounding a tattoo on your eardrums.

We found it by accident, using our ears and eyes.

To listen to the soundscape at the camp we made in the gulley beneath the waterfall, follow the Soundcloud link below. You can also find my other ambient recordings from this travel there, on Time&Space Audio Journal (TSAJ).

There are plenty more to come, with some designed as background nature soundscapes for meditating or relaxing to.

We made a half-day hike up the gulley wall and over the rocky moor tops - to explore the glacier, which fed the river, feeding the lake, which spilled over into Skydjefossen.

iPhone only so lower your quality standards.

High river valley above Skydje Fossen

View of the gulley to the campsite (just out of site downwards)

View of the gulley to the campsite (just out of site downwards)

 

Norway's nearly over, just Oslo left.

On the way there, further South East over the mountains, we found some timber, sod and grass roof huts built in traditional Scandinavian style, some over 60 years old.

Norway E2.5 Setesdal - Valle /  by Tom Glendinning

Eventually the rain, winds and cold 5º nights sent us back to sunny Setesdal valley. East of the mountain range that catches all the weather coming over the North Atlantic.

Just North of Byglandfjorden, near Valle we found one of our favourite wildcamps to date. A rocky river bed that must be an incredible sight running rapid with the spring thaw.

Still there were clouds, but importantly we weren't in them for a change.

Norway E2.3 Setesdal - Tjørhom /  by Tom Glendinning

Up out of the Setesdal valley and West over the mountains, reserved for reindeer (Elk also? We won't see them until later, just sheeps for now).

Water, water everywhere, and all of it good to drink.

All elements of the mountain roads here shown in roughly representational proportions.

Most of these photos come from the mid-level around 700-950m altitude, where I find my favourite landscape so far - the bushy, scrub, low birch woods with moss & lichen barely covering the granite. Overflowing with wild berries and fresh wind. 

Most mountains reach a tumbled, broken and boggy granite plateau at 900-1000m and peak not much higher than 1500m here. Up on these 

A lonely lakeside wildcamp... Until the 12 Poles, 2 Swiss, 6 German, 7(?) French and 4 canines nationality unknown turned up in the rain.

 

Norway E2.1 Kristiansand & E2.2 Setesdal- Byglandfjorden /  by Tom Glendinning

NORWAY!

Lakeside home on Byglandfjorden, Setesdal region, opposite Lauvdal

A long standing dream to explore here. The campervan, willingness to camp wild anywhere and the amazing accessibility of this sparsely populated natural wonder of a country makes travelling here remarkably affordable for us. These posts are not to tell our whole long story but only are snapshots, so I will let them speak for themselves. Already we miss this wonderful part of the world and felt instantly at home and welcomed here by the marvellous people and pristine nature.

Trout, Granite & Pine

Islands by the port of Kristiansand, from Odderøya island Nature Reserve

Åraksbo, Byglandfjorden

(where we meet Jenni and Alex, in the endless stream of happy German travellers who go everywhere)

Agriculture is cut from the forest on the low sloping sides of valleys.

European Campervan travels E1.1 (Intro; Denmark) /  by Tom Glendinning

Bobbie & Vin Diesel

(Due to website issues that went unnoticed while travelling all the posts made so far have not been sent as email, I am trying to correct this and re-send these old posts).

We (Bobbie and I) are making a 6 month trip in our campervan, wild camping through some of Europe's most spectacular national parks, wildernesses (if you can count a place with tarmac road wilderness) and general awesome places. Wifi for uploads is hard to come by but time out of being culture and nature-drunk to edit photos is proving even rarer... 

We are now stopped for a rest with our wonderful Polish friend Maria's family in Zory. The first short chapter comes from the trip heading North, starting from The Hague and driving swiftly up through a few spots in Denmark, culminating in finding unexpectedly good surf at Thy [Tí] National Park behind the dunes. I thought the board would stay on the roof until Portugal.

Thy National Park dunes

Also to be found will be soundscapes to accompany some of the landscapes - short, minimally edited vignettes of sound that we record on the way. To find these first forays into recording with my new Zoom go to Time&Space Diary's new Soundcloud page.

Denmark - land of Water, Wind and Rye

Bobbie begins her driving career with a 1.5 ton van with soft suspension. 

Next stop, South Norway.