Sail with the Seagulls, Run from the Wild Dogs

GUDVANGEN TO VOSS, NORWAY -- June 20, 2006

(continued) We laughed together as the gaggle of children clustered near our deck chairs threw bits of bread at the sea gulls trailing alongside the ferry. The gulls swooped to catch their meal-with-wings and then zipped up through the air as if propelled by some inner rocket. We oohed and ahhed as we cruised past cascading waterfalls, story-book cute villages, and mountain-framed fjord vistas that just left our jaws hanging open.

When I started shivering, she loaned me her thick woolly blanket to wrap up in, and I couldn?t help but feel comforted slightly by this stranger that had become a friend that couldn't help doing what moms just do without thinking. It made me realize how much I miss mine. Because I know she'd do the same -- give me her blanket and tuck it up around my shoulders and bring me something hot to warm my insides with.

At the end of the fjord adventures, we boarded a bus together to continue on from Gudvangen to Voss, from where Mary Kay was taking a train immediately on to Oslo. I, on the other hand, was sticking around Voss for the evening, when I would board for my midnight run to Oslo as well. As our bus snaked upward from the valley floor to the mountains, we looked over mountain vistas so dramatic, they reminded us both of Machu Picchu, Peru, and we both vowed that one day, we would be there, climbing among the ancient trails of the Andes. A few peppermints and ear pops later, we had exchanged emails and phone numbers and wished each other well as our journeys separated.

I left the station and walked toward the lake I had seen as we had pulled in to town. Since I had about seven hours to kill, I decided I should have plenty of time to circle the lake with my full pack. It would be good exercise, I told myself. Besides, I-ve been more or less sitting all day, and a good, strenuous walk will at least help me get some decent sleep on my overnight train ride to Oslo.

So off I went, strolling along the path running around the lake. It dead-ended forty minutes later, after leading me across a rickety bridge spanning a wide, rushing river several meters below, and taking me through a rather smelly part of town that I could only surmise was some kind of landfill or toxic dump. By the time I figured I had no alternative but to turn around, I was nearly knocked off my feet by a mangy, spaghetti-thin, soaking-wet flea pit of a dog that came out of the bushes and stood dead-center in the middle of the trail.

Remembering that dogs can smell fear, and realizing that was the last thing I wanted this animal thinking about me, I mustered all my anger and spat out, Get out of here! He seemed to understand, and took off, back into the shadowy overgrowth of the woods. I left out a sigh of relief and picked up my pace as I began walking back to town. But not ten minutes later, he emerged again, this time so close, I could see the foam dripping from his partially open mouth. Rabies. Now was the moment I regretted not getting that expensive three-shot series before leaving home.

With even more aggression than before, I barked at him again, and I levelled my eyes on him as he slowly backed up towards the woods again. He didn?t disappear completely, but with each purposeful step I took, I could tell he was keeping his distance. I was beyond relieved the lose him completely and continue the rest of the way back to the train station alone. Of all countries in which to encounter a rabid dog, I didn't think it would be Norway.
After such a warm encounter with Voss's welcoming committee, I thought it best to stay put in the waiting room at the train station, where I stuck my nose back in the quasi-romance novel I had traded in my Amy Tan book for back in Flam. It wasn't all that entertaining, but it had been the only English book on offer, and for the moment, at least, I was glad to have something to take my mind off of the slowly moving hand of the clock near the entrance. But try as I might, I was having some difficulty getting wrapped up in the pages of this book, as I had in The Bonesetter's Daughter and The DaVinci Code and Swahili for the Broken-Hearted. Reading, one of my childhood loves left long-forgotten, was quickly becoming again one of my favourite pastimes.

~Melanie