I shall put down my weapon

I live in a little village called Bjørn on the island of Dønna (total population of island c. 1400). A short ferry ride away is the town of Sandnessjøen which I frequently visit for my weekly swim/ the cinema etc (population c. 6000). At the end of August, I decided that I needed to see some bright lights and enjoy some big city excitement so I booked a wee jaunt to the nearest “big” city which is Mosjøen (population a massive 10,000).

The main reason for the visit was to tick off one of the things I had added to my bucket list since coming to Norway, namely that of “conquering” the Helgelandstrappa.

According to their website, it is the world’s longest stone staircase and it rises 818m above the fjord. It is reasonably recent (work started in 2017) and uses natural stone taken from the route and Sherpas were hired from Nepal to do the work. Unsurprisingly a helicopter was also called in to help as well.

I took the early ferry from Bjørn and had a v pleasant drive (it’s about 80km) and plonked myself at my traditional charging point (I don’t trust my Nissan Leaf to make it there and back on one charge). I was unusually well prepared for the trip, plenty liquids, supplies and my ever faithful walking stick. I could have done the staircase quite quickly but as I couldn’t get in to the hotel until much later I wanted to take my time and enjoy the view/ exercise etc. So I did take unnecessarily frequent breaks to enjoy lovely sunny weather. There are apparently 4175 steps (although other sites claim 4055) but alas I unnecessarily added a couple of hundred steps to that total after one of my breaks. Confidently striding up the hill I couldn’t help but have a nagging suspicion that something wasn’t right - eventually I realised that it was my empty hand because I had left my walking stick behind. So back down I went…..

Eventually I made it to the top and had a v pleasant time surveying the surroundings and enjoying the sunshine and peace as well as my well earned latte. It is a lovely wee jaunt but unsurprisingly with the very uneven steps, ones knees take a fair hammering, particularly on the way back down. This was very solidly (and I use the word “solidly” advisedly!) demonstrated to me when I got back down to the bottom - my knees gave out and I immediately face-planted myself into the gravel. Wouldn’t have been so bad if somebody hadn’t been passing me at the exact moment. I had planned, and indeed had started, to go for a walk along the fjord to kill some more time before the hotel but becoming aware of the blood pouring from the aforementioned knees I decided to retire gracefully to the car. All the while holding my head up high and trying to ignore passersby who were staring at my blood stained body.

Once I eventually got into my room at the hotel I was v excited to discover that there were sachets of tea and coffee which is not v common here in Norway - certainly not in the hotels that I frequent. Alas my initial elation was somewhat dampened when I noted that they had neglected to give me a kettle. The big teases.

In the evening I treated myself to a trip to the cinema to see Life of Chuck. The main cinema in Mosjøen is over 3 times the size of the one in Sandnessjøen (396 seats compared to 103) but, as is not unusual here, I was the only person in the cinema. I have to say I’m really getting used to these private screenings - whether that says anything about my taste in films is of course a different question. I do feel bad regarding the economy of things though - there were 2 members of staff to cater to my whims (a coffee and a Twix).

Despite being the “big city”, very little opens before 10am - Sigrid recommended a wee cafe for breakfast which I graced with a visit. Though I did embarrass myself by choosing something from the selection offered and immediately regretting it. I’m up for trying many Norwegian specialities but I’m afraid I still draw the line at brown cheese. Sorry, it’s just the wrong colour.

Of course, now that I have a housemate ie Finrod the cat, one has to take him into account when planning these wee trips. I managed to train him (with the judicious placing of a dining chair) to use one of the kitchen windows as his personal entrance/exit. I just left this open the entire time and it seemed to work well - he certainly didn’t starve while I was away.

As mentioned in my last post, I have been v depressed about the standard of my organ playing despite the amount and indeed quality of practicing that I am doing. TBF, the bits in the service, ie hymns, the mass etc, I do tend to play reasonably well and it’s the voluntaries that I tend to mess up. Most of my practice is at home so that the hands are well under control before I add the pedals and I did wonder whether I was needing to spend more time at the church. We had one of our island jollies in August (where I managed to be on the correct island this time) to Sandvær where I had to play harmonium. I spent the 2 weeks leading up to Sandvær practicing my voluntaries every day and depressingly I got as far as beat 3 in the bar one

of the first voluntary before I made a mistake. It was a simple counting error in a middle part that nobody would have noticed but after all the work I had done (and on a not particularly difficult piece)……

As part of my practice regime, I have taken to playing each hymn in 3 different keys, the original and one tone up and one town down. Not unrelated to how I feel about my playing I haven’t had the confidence to do it in a service yet. That being said, at a service in the Dønna Omsorgsenter, I was struck by how strained the congregation sounded as we sang the first hymn. Half way through the first verse I noticed that I had obviously knocked against the transpose button on the Johannes One keyboard while setting up. And obviously not knocking against it just once! I rectified it for the next hymn but they had to strain their way though the rest of the first hymn.