Norway!

After four days in Norway, we're back on board and back in class. Thankfully, the boat doesn't go too far off shore since we get to Russia in a few days, so the sea is really calm and I don't feel sick at all. 

Norway was amazing. Extremely expensive, but amazing. (Even though the dollar is worth 5 krones, everything costs exponentially more, so that even something as simple as a hamburger was 20 USD!) 

Bergen, the city we ported in, was so cute - very European, old, and with great architecture and lots of twisting alleyways. The first day we wandered around and explored the city and took the cable car up the mountain. Noway (especially the tourist shops) has an obsession with moose and trolls, so there were lots of random troll statues around. 

The next day we took a train to Voss, where it was the official Extreme Sports Week. These people are crazy. Seriously, who would parasail up (with the largest parasail in the world) 600ft and then bungy jump from the parasail (which is the highest bungy jump in Europe)? It's completely insane and I would never ever do it. 

On a completely unrelated note, it sometimes makes me sad that sarcasm isn't easy to transmit through the internet. ; ) 

Otherwise, there were a lot of paragliders floating around - we even saw one crash into the water! Then we went kayaking in the fjords, which are so gorgeous. (And cold! Even though we had the only blue sky in weeks!) I got to wear a wet suit and paddle in a single, closed-top kayak, which I hadn't done before. 

We got back to Bergen and wandered around some more, and then it was time to get back on the ship. It feels like we were there for so much longer than we were! I'm excited for Russia, but it's going to be a lot more of a culture shock because not everyone speaks English (which they did in Norway) and it's dirtier, less safe, and apparently you're not supposed to smile at people.