Day 10, 3 flights home

We woke up early to see if sunrise was worth shooting and again, though it was beautiful, there were no clouds! I woke up early anyway, showered and finished packing and then we all went to breakfast at 8, said our goodbyes and thank you to the guides and the owners, and packed up the car and headed out to the airport. Leknes was about an hour away, so we arrived around 10:45 am for our 11:40 flight on our tiny plane. Checked in, went through security, where they made us take out all of our cameras and lenses. What a pita. Our first flight was open seating so we tried to get in line early to get decent seats and room for our large, overweight camera bags. It was a quick 20 minute flight to Bodo where we had a 25 minute layover before our next flight to Oslo. An hour and 45 minutes later we were in Oslo, where we had to get our duffels, check in for our JFK flight and go through security again. It took a while. When we checked in, there was one gate agent who was weighing everyone's carry on bags and we knew that our camera bags were very overweight, so as soon as the woman whom we saw was not doing that was free, we rushed over to her to check in and not have to deal with any consequences of our packs. Whoops! Lol. At security, all of our bags were flagged and they had to be hand screened. All for different reasons which was actually quite funny. I went through with some water in my purse and they didn't even notice that. However in my camera bag, something looked like liquid in the top of my bag and it was a nut bar. Weird!

We had a fairly long three hour layover so we went to Jamie Oliver's restaurant and had a wrap and some pizza, caught up on internet stuff and then proceeded through passport control to our gate right before we were to board. Boarding was free for all and they just announced ok, time for everyone to board and it was a rush! We flew a 787 Dreamliner home. Pretty cool plane part of the Norwegian Air fleet. When our meal came, it was fish or chicken. I'm sure by now you can guess which meal all three of us chose. We had some red wine with the meal too!

We currently have two hours left on our seven hour flight home, but we've just flown over Greenland which was gorgeous to see from above. The few times I've flown over before, it's been dark or cloudy so I haven't been able to see too much! We are close to new foundland now and almost back to the states! We are excited to come home and also sad to leave a wonderful country and end our trip.

More photo adventures will have to occur in the future! :)

Day 9, Skiing and Aurora!

I wasn't sure what to expect with backcountry ski touring in Norway, but it has completely exceeded my expectations and blown me away. So much so that I would love to go ski touring anywhere in the world now. Today will be hard to beat. We drove about half an hour from the lodge today near a fishing village in a fjord. Our skin started with an amazing view and every turn became more magnificent than the next. Let me back up too. We went to breakfast in the morning, had yogurt and granola, and the owner of the lodge came over to us to ask if it was okay if a ski photographer joined us for our skin today to photograph us. We all said, sure. She was really nice and it was fun having her along for the ski.

We skinned for almost five hours today, about 3800 feet total. Aaron was unhappy and in a lot of pain from his blisters, but somehow we helped him push through. This was a first ascent for our guide from this angle so it was fun to explore and learn how he figures out the best way to go. There were steep avalanche parts that we had to spread out just in case, a bit of crusty snow, lots of cliffs, and some areas where my stomach just dropped and I couldn't look down. We skinned over a lake, up couloirs, down little sections, and when we reached the summit were greeted with the most amazing view I've ever experienced in my life. There are just not enough words to describe the view. Breath taking mountains, fjords, ocean, cliffs, little red and yellow cabins below and peace and quiet. Majestic. We stayed on top for a while and refueled, took lots of photos, flew the drone; and I sent mom and pj photos from the top!

It took us about 45 minutes to get down and the bottom was tricky with rocks and rivers. Aaron got stuck in a rock hole and at the very end we had to cross a river with rocks and hike through them. Of course, I recorded all the fun on my go pro.

We were greeted with a gorgeous sunset and reflection on the fjord when we reached the bottom and got to our car. Then back to the ski lodge for waffles, returning gear, sauna and dinner! And would you believe it, whale steak for dinner. WOW. I need a salad. I ate a tiny little bite, but had lots of roasted veggies instead!

After dinner, we helped one of the guides girlfriends with her phantom drone that was new and wasn't syncing for you. Unfortunately we weren't able to help either but hopefully she will get it to work and then the lodge will be able to have one to fly around their beautiful spot! We asked for some wood for our wood stove so we wouldn't be freezing again as the night before, we were all really cold in the cabin. As we were leaving the lodge to go back to the cabin, the Aurora started appearing! Aaron and I were so excited. We got back, grabbed our gear and just ran down to the beach outside our cabin and started shooting. Andy made the fire inside. I thought we were only out for about fifteen minutes shooting, but when things had died down a bit and Aaron and I decided to head back inside, he said we were out for over an hour! It's easy to get enthralled and lost in watching the lights dance across the sky. A magical experience and a wonderful natural phenomenon. It was a great way to spend our last evening in Norway.

Then we organized, packed and went to sleep!

Day 8, Norway backcountry skiing

Today was a truly incredible day. We had checkout the ski lodge yesterday just to make sure we knew where to go today and timing and such, so we arrived a little after 8am, walked in and went upstairs to have breakfast and make some lunch for our day. We met our ski guide, Sami and Fredrick, both from Finland. They brought us to the back and gave us skis and adjusted our boots to them, gave us skins and poles and we were set to go. Andy and I had brought our own avalanche gear, but Aaron is renting some avi gear for the couple of days. Then we were off on about an hour and 20 minute drive north to a mountain in an area with a V, that I can't for the life of me remember or pronounce. We put our skins on our skis, got all ready to go and started our climb. It was 8 degrees F and quite cold! Within five minutes I was so hot, I needed to shed a layer! Of course, I had on at least six layers, so I was toasty. We skinned up for about three hours, stopping every now and then for water and snacks and food. I ran out of water before we got to the top and started having snow. I had no choice!

The skin was not too challenging, it just took a while! They taught us all the proper techniques for skinning up and turning steep corners, which the boys had more trouble with than I, just because of flexibility. It was quite amusing to watch and frustrating for them. If it were not for Starbursts, I would not have made it up. They are a lifesaver and the only thing I use for quick energy when I'm normally skiing. They really helped here too. Aaron got a huge blister on one of his feet and luckily Frederick had some second skin that Aaron could put on his blisters so he could continue up. When we reached the top, the view was incredible. It was also freezing! So we stayed up for a little bit, flew the drone, ate some food and then skied down!

We were all pretty exhausted when we got to the bottom, and not looking forward to the long drive back to the ski lodge. We were sore and like old people aching every time we got out of the car, which ended up being a few times because we just couldn't resist stopping to take photos! When we got back to the lodge, they had a make your own waffle station which was heaven. We all made heart waffles and put chocolate spread on them. They were so good... or we were all starving! Then we went back to our cabin, grabbed our bathing suits and a change of clothes and headed to the sauna and showers!

Dinner was family style at the lodge and very nice. Unfortunately it was fish, again. Lol. Seriously, I cannot eat any more fish! However, I did since I knew I needed some energy for skiing and to replenish the thousands of calories we burned. We ended up going up about a 1000 meter mountain; my Fitbit claimed about ten miles, though my Fitbit does not do well with elipticals so skinning is very similar to that.

We stayed and talked with some of the ski guides until almost 10 and wanted to go and shoot Aurora, but there wasn't any at that time and we were so tired, we came back to the cabin and all passed out!

Day 7, Norway, Reine to Svolvaer

3:15am wake up call hoping for Aurora. It was cloudy but we had high hopes that the clouds would clear enough for us to see Aurora, so we ventured out to Hamnoy to try and photograph the Toppoy mountain. Unfortunately for us, the clouds never cleared and a stormy, moody sky with mountain and water ended up being out shot. At this point, it was almost 6 am and we were freezing (luckily I have my north face long down coat that's the equivalent to wearing a sleeping bag, so only my toes and fingers were numb!) so we got into the car and drove back to Reine, about ten minutes, to see if things would light up a bit for sunrise. We stood on the bridge in Reine for a couple of hours and saw a tiny bit of pink on the horizon, but nothing on the clouds for us! We have not had any good sunrises or sunsets thus far!

We had to check out of our cabin today, so we all decided we needed a quick nap first, then packed and then got on our way. We took our time heading up north and explored various spots along the way and also scouted a few locations for Aurora which we knew would be strong tonight. It took us about 4.5 hours to get north and when we arrived, our hotel was situated on the water with gorgeous mountains surrounding it. None of us knew what to expect up north and it is more beautiful than we could have ever imagined. Ever turn we had to stop and our jaws just dropped. One more beautiful scene after the next. It's hard to fully describe but if you can picture huge fjords, massive lakes and waterways, bridges, trees, and happy people, then that would be my description of Norway.

Our cabin was super cute and large with a downstairs of a kitchen and living room and upstairs two bedrooms, with an extremely steep staircase! We went to dinner in the main lodge and our waiter was great. He was chatty and said that he had to moved to Norway for the fish and that he loved fish and fishing and had a boat that was in Sweden with his girlfriend and that he could eat fish seven days a week. We had fish. Lol. There is literally no other option! I am so over fish right now. The first meal I want when I get home is a salad!

Toward the end of our meal, while watching the sunset as we were eating (it was perfectly clear skies, so a beautiful sunset but not good for photos since there were no clouds), Aaron went to check if the Aurora had started. Sure enough, it had! Yippee! So we paid for our dinner, ran out the door, grabbed our gear and started shooting. We drove around and photographed many spots up to over an hour away until 2am. It started to die down by then, but we had some good shots and were happy so we made the trek back to the hotel to sleep for a few hours!