{"id":2696,"date":"2015-03-29T10:09:06","date_gmt":"2015-03-29T10:09:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/?p=2696"},"modified":"2015-03-29T10:09:06","modified_gmt":"2015-03-29T10:09:06","slug":"in-the-hall-of-the-mountain-king","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/?p=2696","title":{"rendered":"In the Hall of the Mountain King"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back home from our epic eclipse cruise on Boudicca<\/em><\/a>, to Norway and the Faeroes.\u00a0 We saw the Aurora Borealis and the total solar eclipse.\u00a0 We lined up in the ocean beside two other ships from the Fred. Olsen fleet, Braemar<\/em> and Black Watch<\/em>.\u00a0 \u00a0 We went to a concert in the\u00a0Ishavskatedralen <\/a>in Troms\u00f8 which was world class.\u00a0\u00a0 And while the eclipse itself eclipsed everything else in terms of excitement levels, the whole experience was rather good.\u00a0 Pictures below, hundreds more on my iPad.<\/p>\n

One place we visited was the Tirpitz museum near Alta – Tirpitz <\/a>was a German battleship which played hide and seek in the Norwegian fjords for a lot of the Second World War and was a constant threat to the Arctic Convoys.\u00a0\u00a0 The museum had a fascinating collection of German memorabilia.\u00a0 For all the films I have seen, and archive footage, it’s the first time I have come face to face with a real German uniform.\u00a0 The guide had taken her mother there, who had vowed never to return as it brought back so many bad memories of the occupation.\u00a0\u00a0 One item which touched me hugely was a folded paper bird, made by a captive Soviet soldier, to barter for food, because they had nothing.\u00a0\u00a0 The guide told us that the Germans used to turn a blind eye to Norwegians who left out food parcels for the POWs.\u00a0 I hope that’s true.<\/p>\n

But life moves on, inexorably; as we were queuing to leave the ship one of the entertainment staff (who work incredibly hard, 24\/7) asked us where we were going,. “Oh Tirpitz, what is that, like the Muppets?”\u00a0\u00a0 You had to laugh.<\/p>\n

\"Boudicca<\/a><\/p>\n

Boudicca in port, \u00c5lesund.<\/p>\n

\"Downtown<\/a>
Downtown \u00c5lesund, art nouveau town, very pretty.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"One<\/a>
One of a thousand mountains, Norwegian coastline.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"More<\/a>
More mountains.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Paul\"<\/a>
Paul<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"<\/a>

Ishavskatedralen (The Arctic Cathedral), Troms\u00f8<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Bench<\/a>
Bench in K\u00e5fjord. This was beside the Tirpitz Museum.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Nordlyskatedralen<\/a>
Nordlyskatedralen (Northern Lights Cathedral), Alta<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Statue<\/a>
Statue of Christ within the Nordlyskatedralen.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Interior<\/a>
Interior of Nordlyskatedralen, these lights are also acoustic devices.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Henningsv\u00e6r\"<\/a>
Henningsv\u00e6r<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Henningsv\u00e6r\"<\/a>
Henningsv\u00e6r<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Paul<\/a>
Paul and Rosemary on eclipse day, at sea, 64\u00b0 49 N – 006\u00b0 26W.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"My<\/a>
My photo of the eclipse. See Paul’s on the DB Astro page.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Paul<\/a>
Paul & Rosemary awaiting 4th contact, still really dark.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Two<\/a>
Two more ships from the Fred. Olsen fleet, the Braemar and the Black Watch, were also in the area.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"On<\/a>
On the Faroe islands, Kirkjob\u00f8ur. Birch bark gutters and turf roofs.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"St<\/a>
St Magnus’ Church, Kirkjob\u00f8ur.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Harbour<\/a>
Harbour and mountain, Kirkjob\u00f8ur.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Back home from our epic eclipse cruise on Boudicca, to Norway and the Faeroes.\u00a0 We saw the Aurora Borealis and the total solar eclipse.\u00a0 We lined up in the ocean beside two other ships from the Fred. Olsen fleet, Braemar and Black Watch.\u00a0 \u00a0 We went to a concert in the\u00a0Ishavskatedralen in Troms\u00f8 which was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29,13,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family","category-kirsty","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2696\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/banthewasp.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}