May 17th - Ålesund

 Today is Norway’s ‘National Day’, a celebration of the signing of the ‘Constitution of Norway’ in 1814. This declared Norway to be an independent kingdom and in an attempt to avoid being ceded to Sweden after the Napoleonic Wars. 

The major celebrations today included children’s parades through the city with marching bands parading between each school, and with the rest of the town lining the streets watching. The Norwegian flag and colours are also a major part of the celebrations while at the same time thousands of Norwegians wear their national costume, with each local district having their own version.


After a great ‘National Day’ breakfast, supplied by our hosts, and with flags, banners, and balloons, we watched the parade as they marched pass our accommodation. It really was impressive and obviously so many people go to a lot of effort to make it happen. 

On the left: Our host in her Icelandic National Dress



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Aug 28th - Kotor to Tirana, Albania

Image
  A real slow day today as it took nearly 7 seven hours driving time to cover the 200 kms (125 miles) to Tirana!   We did have stop on the way however, a break to visit Roxafa Castle, the remnants of a 15th century fortress.  From the castle there were some really nice views of the surrounding countryside but sadly very little information about the castle and its history.      A little bit of amusement on our long journey today was the name of the company at the servo when we filled up with petrol.   With a name like that we wondered if they had the correct logo! 😆
Read more

Jul 30th - Bath

Image
There’s a lot of things to do and see in the lovely city of Bath but the one ‘un-missable’ attraction is a visit to the thermae, the city’s Roman baths.   Taking advantage of the natural hot springs in the area, from water fed from the local Mendip Hills, the Romans constructed a temple and public baths here dedicated to the Goddess Minerva.  The presence of these baths led to the development of a small urban settlement and hence the birth of the town of Bath.  In constant use up until the end of Roman rule in the 5th century, the temple and baths nonetheless fell into a state of disrepair on their departure.  However, on being ‘rediscovered’ during the reign of Queen Victoria, and with the supposedly healing qualities of the water, it once again became a ‘health spa’.  Today the site’s use is as a museum that, not only includes the Great Bath, but also presents the history of the baths and temple.  In addition, it’s also home to the many archaeological artefacts that have been foun
Read more

Jul 28th - Cold Ashton to Bath

Image
Celebration day today on our very last hike walking from Cold Ashton into the Roman Spa town of Bath where we’re going to spend a couple of days. Mostly a lovely walk and, although the Cotswold Way was taking us into a large city, we were quite lucky as the path generally missed any industrial suburbs and took us straight to the River Avon and then into the centre of town.  Last steps off the dirt track into town! Yay! 😅🥳
Read more