Thursday, 31st July – Kristiansund to Hell

Today we continued our journey in Norway making our way to Hell. Of course we went there, Keith was very excited and for those of you that know him I’m sure you can well imagine how many puns/jokes and references I endured today! Driving out of Kristiansund was so pretty even if the clouds looked a little ominous.

To head in the direction we needed to go without taking all day we had to take a ferry. It was so well organised that everyone was loaded on the boat – cars, trucks, caravans, passengers and dogs so quickly, that before we knew it, we left the dock and hadn’t yet found our seats on board! It was only a quick 20 minute ride and then off we drove toward our first stop of the day, Trondheim.

We had shortlisted a few things to see in Trondheim, it’s a pretty interesting place. Our pre trip research had taught us that it was once the capital of Norway during the Viking Age, and during World War II it was occupied by Nazi Germany for five years. What we didn’t realise was that the annual festival in honour of the Viking King Olav Tryggvason was taking place! We had an awesome time wondering around the medieval market place and had pulled pork and salad for lunch – tough gig!

There was also a massive cathedral in Trondheim which was where the medieval marketplace was. Huge and impressive!

Now AC/DC sang about the highway to get there, but taking the normal route (avoiding highways) to Hell, the view is fantastic.

Hell is actually the suburb next to the Trondheim airport so it wasn’t a very long drive. The hotel there was excellent and the service was great. We had a couple of drinks in the hotel bar and then that night we slept in Hell.

By the way, the name Hell was originally derived from “hellir” which is an old word for a cave under a cliff. Every year they have a festival – Blues in Hell, that is world famous. If you ask Keith, the town needs more Heavy Metal. Oh, and the temperatures were quite nice, but in the morning it got down to around 14 degrees, so we experienced a cold day in Hell. (And none of those promised things actually happened).