SEVEN DAYS IN NORWAY: DAY 5/2 A city built on rock and water

It was hard to believe you were in the middle of a city. From the bottom of my aunt’s garden all I could see was trees.

The view from the bottom of the garden

Even when I climbed to the top to find out what lay beyond, only a couple of roofs peeped through the greenery.

The view from the top of the garden

The garden clung precariously to the underlying granite and formed itself around it . . .

A garden on top of rock

 . . . the grass being in an even worse state than ours at home because of the thinness of the soil.

Drought-ridden grass

Still, there were currant bushes full of fruit, black and red, and a cherry tree dripping ripe cherries. I ate three and saved the stones, wondering if I could grow a similar tree back in England.

The house too was built around the rock, with a basement at the bottom of a rock face and the next two storeys starting at its top. This was also where the main area of garden was to be found.

We ate outside – a fish whose English name my aunt had forgotten, roast potatoes and salad – and both Frog and I had second helpings. It had been a long time since our breakfast and all was scrumptious.

Supper outside. (Note photographer just visible in one of the window-panes.)

My aunt then sent us down to have a look at the waterfront. In a tunnel under the road some black children were making whooping noises and listening to the echoes. Frog added some noises of his own and the children’s father smiled at us. Frog had found a common language even if I hadn’t.

The first thing we saw when we got to the water was a large grey and white duck. I wonder if that’s an eider duck, I thought, native only to the north and provider of filling for eiderdowns (as duvets used to be called). We always slept under eiderdowns (dewner) as children, bought during our visits to Norway as they weren’t yet available in England. Until recently - when it went on the compost heap - I still had my childhood one with its Norwegian label.

The duck, which took off at speed when it saw me get my camera out, so this is a fuzzy distance shot

Houses on Kristiansand's waterfront

Frog and I were pretty tired by now so, after marvelling at some waterfront houses – so secluded, so countrified, we hastened back and helped my aunt with the watering. This was a laborious process, involving a watering-can over uneven flagstones and up and down steps, lots of pots, some prize shrubs and some flowerbeds. I couldn’t bear thinking of my aunt with her knees struggling over it every day (although she’ll be furious with me for saying that) and Frog promised to try and get her hose sorted ASAP.

Inside, the house brimmed with the relaxed Scandinavian prettiness that we try so hard to imitate in the UK and never quite manage – white-painted wooden floors and walls, a white porcelain woodburning stove, candles, rugs, books, pictures. My aunt seemed to be travelling around it trying out different rooms for sleeping – she said it was because of the heat - so we had a choice of bedrooms. We chose a sloping-ceilinged skylighted one on the top floor, aired by a through-draught from the room opposite.

Since making Norway her home my aunt had made repeated visits to the UK, particularly recently during the final two years of my mother's life, helping us children with her care, but it had taken me fifty years to return to Norway. I’d only ever travelled to escape my family. But now something had brought me back.

I slipped between my aunt’s pristine white sheets and fell into a deep sleep.

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