SEVEN DAYS IN NORWAY: DAY 7 Saying goodbye

It was another perfect day. At breakfast we watched battalions of swifts swim across the sky. After breakfast Frog and my aunt went to a DIY store to buy an Allen key so that Frog could mend a light. I finished my packing and then went to the summerhouse.

The summerhouse was a miniature version of the main house, hidden in trees at the top of the garden and used as a writer’s retreat and spare bedroom. I sat on the squishy white sofa and studied the bookshelves, the woodburner, the blue and white china.
     As a child I’d found Norway tough.
    Even though at home we lived in the country and spent most of our spare time outdoors, the Norwegian children were tougher than us, both mentally and physically. They would leap off rocks into deep ice-cold water without a qualm. They skied as soon as they could walk, up steep hills and down precipitous slopes.
    None of the houses we stayed in had flush loos. Some didn’t even have running water. Food was limited and often strange to our English palate.
    As a teenager I’d found the boys boorish. I preferred the romantic Mediterraneans.

    Now either things had changed or I had, or both. I’d fallen in love with this beautiful country - that was a quarter of my heritage.

I’d said we had to leave at 2pm, even though I knew it was much too early. I didn’t want to outstay our welcome. I wanted to allow my aunt time to have her afternoon rest. So after a sumptuous lunch on the verandah of the summerhouse (yet another place for eating out) – smoked salmon, smoked mackerel and the remains of the cake my aunt had made for the birthday party the night before (blurtcarker – a Norwegian speciality consisting of sponge, fresh fruit and cream) - we loaded our hire car and climbed in.

    I could see my aunt was trying not cry, just as my mother always did when I took my leave, so at the last minute I jumped out and said, ‘I feel more at home here than I do in England.’

    ‘So do I,’ answered my aunt. ‘That’s why I live here.’

The journey to the airport took half an hour, returning the hire car ten minutes, check-in two minutes. We had three hours to wait for our plane.

Ours was the next flight and no one else had arrived as early as us, so the airport was deserted. We whisked round the one shop without buying anything then found a seat next to the window and rummaged for our books. The other side of the glass the sky was clear blue as it had been all week and the line of trees beyond the runway a deep rich green. I wanted to be out there.

Eventually people began to arrive and go through to the gate waiting area so we followed them. The waiting area was a strange silent place, watched over by humanoid granite statues. Nearly everyone was plugged into a computer.

The gate waiting area at Kristiansand airport

Frog and I shared his emergency rations - a smoked salmon and cucumber sandwich he’d made after lunch – and then I texted my aunt to tell her what stage we were at. (She’d refused to let me strip our bed, in case we had to return. I wanted to reassure her that we nearly on the plane.) We felt embarrassed to be showing such signs of life.

This way round we had only a two-hour stopover at Amsterdam's Schipol. We were old hands at the airport so didn’t need to explore and Frog had a bad foot (as he sometimes does) so we sat quietly by a window again and tried to read.

At 11pm I stood in Bristol Airport carpark in the dark with the luggage, waiting for Frog to find the car. A chill wind whipped round the corner of the building from which we’d picked up our key and I rummaged in my bag for the fleece and quilted gilet that I hadn’t touched all week.

    We’d made to Norway and we’d made it back. Now I had to work out what it all meant.

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