Day 13 Sunday

We awoke to another glorious sunrise at 7:30 am,there is no time for a lie in today as we are going on a tour of the Lofoten islands with a Lofoten Lights guide, Mauricio. An Italian who came to the islands 20 years ago and stayed. He picked us up from our hotel along with a Spanish couple and that was our group, very intimate. Opposite our hotel there are several wooden structures that look like roof shapes. It turns out they are huge fish drying racks. Svolvaer is a centre for catching cod, they have an annual cod festival at the end of march. The cod are hung in pairs by their tails over the wooden structures and are left for 4 or 5 months to dry.

To begin with the fishermen put nets over them to stop the seagulls eating them but after a few weeks when they begin to dry out the seagulls aren’t interested. Dried salt cod is part of the staple diet in Norway. The fish heads are cut off and used separately as fertiliser.

Mauricio took us to a few small villages where fishing is the only employment. Next we went to the beach.

Apparently the sand is white but today it was frozen solid and covered in snow the temperature is -5 degrees but it feels much colder because of the breeze from the Atlantic Ocean.

Straight ahead of us across the sea is Greenland. Some hardy Norwegians were in the sea surfing.

Although it was beautiful we were pleased to get back into the minibus out of the chill.

We then went to a village where we could warm up with coffee and cake. Once again it was a fishing village but with access to the ocean and fjord it hasn’t much wider fishing opportunities. (Mauricio is the one with the red jacket John is talking to him)