Borderlands

On the road to Tromsø it is possible to take a left and drive instead to Finland. That's what we did last Monday. On the way, I bought two CDs from a petrol station: A Rock n Roll box-set and the second album by Norwegian band Harrys Gym. I had never before noticed how unbelievably middle aged and straight Bill Haley sounds on Rock Around the Clock. You can virtually hear the cardigan the man is wearing. Harrys Gym on the other hand, I recommend for any time you might be crossing a Nordic border. 

Driving into Finland really demonstrates the essential weirdness of national boarders. The road is long, the landscape doesn't change, but you drive past a large sign and a small cabin and suddenly the language on the signs is totally unintelligible and the notes and coins in your wallet are of no use to you. The speed limit suddenly goes up to 100, which is exciting for those of us who live in Norway and are usually supposed to drive at 80kmph. I put my foot down immediately.

To the right of the road there is a large, frozen lake and a flat expanse of snow. People ski across it to get to the point where three countries, Sweden, Norway and Finland, all meet. This meeting point is marked by a raised concrete circle which has been photographed many times for use on postcards.

A little way into Finland there is a tourist centre where they sell burgers, souvenirs and postcards. No such thing on the Norwegian side, I noticed. I think they make their money partly from the fact that snow-scooter regulation is much less strict on that side of the border, so people travel there to ride around in the mountains. It's also a good area for skiing and snowboarding. The man behind the counter spoke Finnish and English, but not Norwegian.

 

Outside, people took off in hang gliders from the frozen surface of the lake and flew off into the distance. We travelled further up the road to where there is a supermarket which is much cheaper than the ones in Norway, though I'm reliably informed that it is way more expensive than anywhere else in the country. We stocked up on a lot of frozen food and I bought Finnish chocolate and some mustard, which I hope is hotter than the stuff we get here. I also bought a Led Zeppelin CD for the journey home.

And then that was it. There was nothing more to do in Finland that day. We got back in the car and drove a few minutes until the ice, snow, rocks and trees around us were once again Norwegian ice, snow, rocks and trees, and the signs said we had to slow our speed right down to 50kmph.

All this just brings home to me the imaginary status of countries. How is it that I walk or drive past this little roadside house, and suddenly I'm in a completely different place? What about a fox crossing through the snow, or a bird flying overhead? Does this madness apply to them too? 

Arctic Safari

   

Last Thursday some friends arrived on the Hurtigruten from Trondheim. We met them when the boat came into the harbour in Skjervøy at about 11pm. Skjervøy is an island town, and connecting it to the mainland is a bridge with a long single-lane road across it. I remember being in the passenger seat across that bridge in high winds on the day we first set out to find our new home in North Norway. That day it seemed we were driving insanely high up. This time I was driving, and though the bridge isn't quite as altitudinous as I recalled, you certainly wouldn't want to fall from it.

The weather is getting warmer now. The road surface is turning from a layer of ice to a blanket of slush, so careful driving is required. The sun sets late, but by the time we left Skjervøy it was dark out. A little after the bridge, I was rounding a corner when I sensed some movement out of the corner of my eye. To the right of the road, on a snow-covered slope, some dark shape was heading downwards. I slowed the car as a massive animal loped into the road just metres ahead of us. It's difficult to be objective, but this thing seemed bigger than the car (and we drive a Chrysler). Its head was enormous. Where antlers would normally be it had a pair of stumpy horns.

This was the first moose I've seen since I moved here a year and a half ago. Marthe reckons it was a young male. I've been waiting impatiently to see a moose for some time now, so any shock I might have felt evaporated with gladness. There are loads of them up here. 16 have died in car accidents on one local stretch of road alone since the start of this year. Yet somehow, until last week, they had always avoided me among the trees and out in the darkness.

The moose turned away from us and looked around. It seemed confused to be in the middle of a road. It was perhaps a little lost. Then, clumsily, it clambered off the other side of the road and disappeared into the night. I drove on, unsure if the moose's mother, brother or friend might suddenly throw itself in front of the car.

Another 20 minutes down the road and we saw two more! One moose was waiting for the other to climb out of the road and join it in someone's garden. Then the northern lights grew visible in a patch of sky beyond us, and the closer we got to home, the larger they grew. On the long road to our house, I pulled the car over and we got out. Two shifting pools of green light were visible above us.

On the final stretch of road, a bright white arctic hare jumped out and ran through the light cast by the car. It was close enough to clearly see, but far enough away that we were in no danger of hitting it. I have been wondering recently when the hare would come back. He used to visit our garden last spring, and turned from white to brown to suit the summer when the snow was gone.

If I hadn't been there to experience it with them, I could almost have been jealous of our two visiting friends. It was as if this whole place woke that night to welcome them.