Changes in Latitudes

This survey that I'm on is very relaxed. There is not much to do and I am itching to get off the boat. Four more days and then I'm home again. Since I'm the youngest I am always given the night shift (midnight - 6AM; noon - 6PM). It's pretty quiet in the middle of the night. Normally I would take advantage of not much to do and go work out in the training room on board, but the weather has been pretty bad since I got on board and that makes it a little iffy to try to work out. I'm currently reading a book about running by ultra running legend Scott Jurek. He talks a lot about his support crew during his races. And it made me reflect a lot on my recent race. The Eco Trail Oslo was a big achievement, but finishing wasn't the highlight. It was seeing my family there cheering me on as many places as they could manage while I shuffled along the course. They stood there and waited for me, cheered me on and gave words of encouragement. They even tried to run a l...

I'M AN ULTRA RUNNER!  Saturday was the EcoTrail Oslo race. The race this year includes five distances: 10k, 20k, 30k, 45k, and 80k. Marius ran the 20k and I ran the 45, but I'm going to say 45+ because my two gps devices both calculated at least 47km. It started out chilly at Holmenkollen. Some of the 80km runners were passing through as we lined up to start. There they could get bananas and waffles and fill up on water. The whole first half was lots of uphill on gravel roads and some technical terrain. I really enjoy the technical terrain, as it feels more like I can take little pauses and hop around. I have to concentrate a lot more on where my feet land, so I don't have much time to conjure up negative thoughts. There was supposed to be an aid station after 15 kms (the first hill), but a mile after that I finally came to the aid station. All of the stations were off by at least a mile. It was hard to estimate how much water I was able to drink and if I reall...

[Sightseeing in Oslo: Sørenga and botanical garden] Mom and Dad usually come in July/August, but this year we convinced them to com in May. Many people believe that May/June is the best time to visit Bergen. I don't think they were disappointed. We were really lucky with the weather, with just a couple of grey days. We even had a fantastic 17th of May (Norway's constitution day!). Thank you for visiting us and helping with our projects around the house! We are already counting down til our Christmas visit: 206 days til I land stateside. [Hiking with Kjetil, Knut and Silje at Øygarden] [Pancho got his summer haircut on Monday - it took 2 1/2 hours] [Pancho? Is that you?!]  [Poor thing] [2 1/2 hours later] [Great weather in Bergen] [Took a short hike behind the house] [Knut might also need a haircut] [Gratulerer med dagen! | Norway's constitution day] [Packed with flags, bunads, Norwegians, and tourists enj...

On Wednesday I joined Marius, Pancho, Rigmor, Tron and Katrine at the cabin for typical Norwegian Easter festivities: skiing, lots of eating and more skiing. We don't have typical Easter weather (warm and sunshine), rather we have been getting more snow and it is a chilly 15 degrees C. Mom and Dad have given me a couple of my own Easter traditions: listening to Handel's Messiah and eventually watching Life of Brian. Katrine treated us to some Icelandic Easter candy (a large chocolate egg filled with chocolate and licorice) and Icelandic white ale. We hunted for our Easter egg yesterday which Tron really enjoyed. It's a scavenger hunt of sorts and the egg is filled with candy. Pancho has been getting plenty of exercise, attention and sleep. Struggling with snow sticking to our skis. We chose the wrong wax. Pancho rolling in the snow  Sleepy puppy More struggle with the snow conditions  Marius preparing his skis

We drove out from Lake Wanaka and past Lake Hawea towards Tarras. Tarras was put on the map in 2004 when " Shrek the Sheep " was found in a cave, having avoided being sheared for six years! He became quite the sensation, being taken on tour before eventually being sheared in front of 200 people and on live television. There we stopped in the little store for some small souvenirs and an ice cream. Continuing on we stopped at a town called Twizel to get some information on Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park and the dark sky reserve. This part of New Zealand has the world's largest dark sky reserve, which boasts the best stargazing...we decided to not stay the night though since we had some amazing nights before that. When we got to Aoraki/Mount Cook National Park we got some advice on how to not take too long of a hike but also get some great views. The little known trail, Red Tarns, was recommended to us and we were happy we did it. From the top we had a great view of A...

From Greymouth we drove south along the west coast of New Zealand. This was the only day we had bad weather. The rain poured pretty hard, and I was a little bummed because Mount Aspiring National Park was what I was really excited to see and get in some nice hiking, but we still stopped along the way through the park for short (30 min) walks in the rain. The road that goes through the park is called the Haast Highway ...our stops included Fantail Falls, Blue Pools (not pictured), and Makaroa before we called it a day. [Rain on the GoPro ...looking at Franz Josef glacier] [cairns in front of Fantail Falls] [Marius adding his cairn] [We are big fans of picnic lunches when we're on a road trip] [soup, bread, cheese, rice crackers, hummus and coffee] [Entering Mount Aspiring National Park] [We were supposed to see Aoraki/Mount Cook really well from this side, but the clouds did not let us] [Cell phone service is really spotty and often nonexist...