Norway #7 July 5, 2025

Trondheim, founded in 997 AD, is the acknowledged Viking capital, and it is also the homeland of my paternal Norwegian family. This was my sixth journey to Europe, and I think I’ve visited my relatives here on five of those trips. Way back in 1986, on my first trip to Norway, my buddy Tim and I stayed with Herman and Gudrun (Rofstad) Moum. This adorable couple were the hosts for most Stensaas relatives visiting the homeland from the 1950s through the early 2000s. I really considered Gudrun and Herman as my “Norwegian grandmother and grandfather.” And we always visited their kids’ families as well: Jan and Liv, Kåre and Kirsti, also lived in Vikhamar (basically a suburb of Trondheim proper).

Wanting to be within walking distance of Trondheim’s main attractions, we opted to stay in the riverfront Scandic Bakklandet. I already had a Scandic membership from our stay in Oslo, so I searched for this brand’s hotels in Trondheim as well. It is located right on the River Nidelva and built to resemble the historic and colorful wharf warehouses from the 1700s-1900s that line the river.  And, wow, our room was overlooking the river with a stunning view towards the towering steeples of Nidaros Cathedral. Well, Bridget and I’s room anyway; the boys’ room was facing “inland.” But no matter, we all got to enjoy the massive (MASSIVE) breakfast buffet. It was my favorite of the entire trip, on a trip that was rife with breakfast buffets. I wish I would have taken a picture.

Trondheim is Norway’s third largest city with a population of 215,000. Originally named Kaupangen in 997AD by King Olaf Tryggvason, it was quickly changed to Nidaros (Nid = name of the river; oss = river mouth). The city’s name evolved to Trondheim during the late Middle Ages. Trondheim’s name was briefly changed back to Nidaros in 1930, but due to public outcry, changed back to Trondheim (“Home of the Trøndelagers”).

When in the bustling, hustling central plaza, you can’t miss the towering pedestal and statue of Olav Tryggvason, Viking king of Norway from 995 to 1000AD. Great Grandson of Norway’s first king, Harald Fairhair, he is credited with beginning Norway’s conversion to Christianity, often by brutal force, and founding the town of Trondheim in 997AD. The severed head at his feet is said to be that of an idol (some say Norse God Thor) and intended to symbolize his alleged defeat of paganism in Norway.  

We met Jan and Liv at a little nook of a café in the cute windy-road artsy neighborhood of Bakklandet. After a decent meal of Reindeer stew, in good Nordic fashion, we walked for several miles along the River Nidelva, just chatting and seeing the sites. It was so nice to have Jan and Liv as our own local guides, sharing the history and stories of Trondheim and the buildings we passed. We toured the new playhouse in an old renovated historic building, walked through the central plaza, and stopped for coffee and macarons.

We paused at a small green space with a sculpture of a schoolgirl sitting on a bench, Star of David on her lunchbox. Cissi Pera Klein was a Norwegian Jewish girl in Trondheim. In 1943 she was arrested at her school by the Nazis and deported to Auschwitz, where she was murdered the day she arrived. She was 13 years old.

You can’t visit Trondheim without pausing at the Old Town Bridge, more popularly known as the Portal of Happiness. Originally built in 1681, the bridge was rebuilt in 1861. The red portal gained its popular name from the lyrics of a romantic waltz written by Oskar Hoddø while at this scenic spot. Hoddø was a Resistance fighter during the Nazi occupation but was later executed by the Nazis in 1943. Today the Portal of Happiness is a popular spot for marriage proposals, and the backdrop for millions of selfies.

Vår Frue Church (Our Lady’s Church) is an impressive stone church near the city center that was built in the late 1100s AD to early 1200s but added on to over the centuries. The bell tower shows a date of 1739. It celebrated its 800^th(!) anniversary in 2007.

The landmark that dominates the city is Nidaros Cathedral. But can a Lutheran Church be called a cathedral? Though Nidaros is now a Lutheran Church, the original church was built at the end of the Viking Age, later becoming part of the Catholic Diocese from 1152 to 1537 AD when Martin Luther’s Reformation took hold and it transitioned to a Protestant church.

Arriving at Nidaros Cathedral, we first admired the gruesome and whimsical gargoyles that lace the exterior. But we were late for our guided tour and so had to hustle. The tour was with a massive group, and unfortunately it was hard to hear our guide due to all the other visitors and the echoey acoustics of the massive stone church.

The story of the cathedral is centered around another Olav who was championing Christianity for Norway …Olav Haraldsson declared himself king of Norway in 1015, and though a typically brutal and violent Viking, he used Christianity as a political tool to wield power. This is the King Olav that was canonized to Saint Olaf after his death at the Battle of Stiklestad in 1030AD

Forty years after his death, his nephew funded the building of a stone church over the top of his gravesite. The original church, begun in 1070AD and completed in 1090AD was called Olav’s Kyrre. Nothing of this original stone cathedral is visible today.

Over the centuries many myths and legends have been attributed to his legacy. As with some saints, Saint Olaf was said to have the power to cure the sick, and folks would travel to his shrines for healing. He allegedly was also imbued with Goddess Freja’s fertility power. But it gets even better; it was said he inherited the strength of Thor, and was able to slay trolls and giants. That’s a battle I’d like to see! Trolls are HUGE!

Today the cathedral is the ending point of the Pilgrimage route called St. Olav’s Way. Recently revived, it twists and turns 400 miles from the ruins of Oslo’s old town past Lake Mjosa, over Dovrefjell mountain plateau, and down the Oppdal Valley to Nidaros Cathedral in Trondheim.

As an aside…St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota is named for Norway’s patron saint.

Birk and I popped down a set of stairs and entered the underground burial chamber. Hundreds of people were buried down here from medieval times up until the late 1700s when the smell on warm days, and the growing awareness of germs led to abandoning the practice in 1804. Excavations in the late 1800s turned up the largest collection of medieval gravestones in Norway, and the carved inscriptions and art are fascinating! I do love stained glass, but this part of the church was my favorite by far. It is very cool thinking that my “Norwegian grandparents, Gudrun and Herman, were married in this history-rich setting.

The following day, after one more massive breakfast buffet at the hotel, we were on a plane for Amsterdam!

NEXT—Netherlands #1 Houseboat living in Amsterdam

July 4, 2025

My Great Grandfather Anders Stensaas came from the Melhus/Kvål area of central Norway in the early 1900s and settled near Vermillion, South Dakota. After a few years, he went back to Norway to marry the girl from the neighboring farm, Anna Rofstad. Anna’s father Ivar was distraught and angry that Anders had taken his daughter away. It is hard to fathom these days how far Norway and South Dakota really were in the early 1900s; no planes, no phones, only a slow boat from Oslo and a long train ride to the prairie. Letters were his only connection to his daughter.

In the early 1930s, Anders and Anna (now Americanized to “Andrew and Anne”), returned to Melhus and had a homecoming with her father. They all made peace, and he soon died at age 99.

Our connection to our Norwegian family has always been through Anna’s family, the Rofstad side. That’s just how it goes sometimes…Connections shift from maternal to paternal and back and forth over time.

My father was stationed in Germany in 1957-58 with the highly prestigious “U.S. Army Accounting Corp,” a fearsome, highly-trained….okay, okay, I’ll stop now. Dad was drafted after graduating from Augustana College in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, and his main interest while stationed overseas was to see as much of the European continent as he could on Uncle Sam’s dime.

He made trips to Paris (Eiffel Tower, Louvre), London, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Holland, a cruise down the Rhine River, skiing in the Swiss Alps, and even attended the World’s Fair in Brussels. And then he contacted his second cousin Gudrun (Rofstad) Moum in Vikhamar near Trondheim to see if he could visit. He had a great time with Gudrun and Hermann, and they visited the Rofstad family dairy farm (see photos).

Fast forward to 2025, and I thought it would be neat if the boys could see the ancestral homeland. I had been there multiple times in the past, Bridget and I even visited on our Honeymoon, so I told Jan that we’d just have a short “stand-up” visit. Well, that is nearly impossible when visiting relatives in Norway!

The short “stand-up” visit went out the window when the phrase, “Why don’t we go in and have some coffee,” was offered. And the photo albums came out, and then here came the cakes. Don’t get me wrong, I loved it!

But almost none of the farm Rofstad relatives spoke English very well, but thankfully Jan, Liv and Anders did a lot of translating for us. Did I mention that there was cake(!) and more coffee, and lots of stories. Good fun! But my Bjorn was so tired that he fell asleep on Bridget’s shoulder.

Eventually the gathering migrated to the local Lutheran Church in Melhus where I thought we might see the gravestones of our common ancestor Ivar Rofstad (both Jan’s and My Great Great Grandfather). I had seen the grave marker on a trip in the 1980s and wanted to find it again. But I was told that after a gravestone had been in place for 20 years, the family must pay a maintenance fee for it to remain in the cemetery. And if they don’t pay, another, newer, gravestone is put in its place. This seems downright crazy to me, but then again, in the U.S. we don’t have many centuries of dead people in graveyards, and we have lots of space to make cemeteries bigger and bigger.

Long story, short…we couldn’t find his grave. But I did see the marker for Ingebrigt Rofstad. Such a nice man! I had met him here in 1986 I believe.

The current church itself dates to 1892 and is an impressive and imposing stone house of worship that holds 500 congregants. I could hear organ music coming from inside but did not go in.

Historically on this spot was the Medieval Church completed in 1190AD. It was torn down by Royal decree in the late 1800s to make room for the new church. But they did re-use some parts, including the portal. And in 1999 restorers found actual runic carvings in the portal. The best interpretation is “sea priest” or “male goat priest” or “Hafr (the) priest.” The Runic alphabet basically went extinct by the 1400s, so this inscription predates that time.

Next—Off to the Viking capitol, TRONDHEIM

July 3-4, 2025

Join the Stensaas famly as we travel from Lillehammer to the historic town of Røros.

Leaving Lillehammer in the afternoon, we wound our way north on the 3 ½ hour drive towards Røros. My natural magnetism to stave churches kicked in again as we stumbled upon yet another! The Ringebu Stavkyrkje. The family was not keen on waiting for me to tour it so I had to be satisfied with a photo from the driver’s seat.

But it was here that I became a bit confused. Google was trying to take us down a narrow dirt road as the fastest way to Røros. We stopped at a little roadside shed where a man was selling stave church souvenirs and Coke. He didn’t speak any English but I made out that, yes, we were on the right track. After a few miles the road widened and then was paved. It traversed a mountain plateau that had to be a preserve or park. How did I know that, you ask? Well, there were no hytte! There are cabins (hytte) scattered all over the mountains of Norway, even in the most remote locations. So if this was not a park, there would be hytte all over. Indeed, it turned out that this barren but beautiful landscape was Rondane National Park, Norway’s first national park designated in 1962. Wild Reindeer roam these mountains but we did not see hide nor hoof.

Dropping down into the Glomma River Valley we snaked along the waterway for a long way. The two-land road was excellent but we were stuck behind several vehicles that were stuck behind a very slow local…and no straightaways long enough to pass. That’s okay, it was lovely scenery and we noticed multiple trout fisherman (salmon?) out flyfishing in the river.

Jan met us in the tiny town Glåmos near his and Liv’s cabin, and we followed him up the narrow drive. Originally a tiny hytte, it is now a lovely spacious family retreat. It was so nice to connect with Jan and Liv after so many years! Bridget and I visited them on our honeymoon in July of 2006. Always gracious hosts

After a typical Norwegian buffet-style breakfast, we headed to Røros, and connected with Nora (“Noora” på Norsk), Jan & Liv’s 15-year old granddaughter, who was to be our guide. And, wow, she has a future in tourism (or acting or public relations) as she gave us an impressive running narrative about the historic town and its sites.

Røros is a very old mining town that was founded after a 1644 discovery of copper. The story goes that a hunter shot a deer and as it struggled in its death throes, it scraped the moss away to reveal the gleam of copper. Soon the Røros Copper Works was founded and mining began. Since Norway was ruled by Denmark at the time, 10 percent of all copper had to be given to the Danish king, most of which went to fund war efforts and make armour. [Interestingly, Røros Copper Works thrived and survived for over three centuries, only to go out of business in 1977.]

Though the town of Røros did burn several times, amazingly many log homes still stand, some dating from the 1600s but most from the late 1700s and 1800s. It is one of the oldest wood villages in Europe. In 1980 Old Røros was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Nora led us up the quaint curvy streets to the top of the slag heep. Now you don’t normally think of an unsightly pile of rocks as a historic site, but this mound of mine waste is part of the story of the town and it is now a tourist attraction.

I was especially taken by the variety and uniqueness of all the wood doors around town. So much so that I took photos of 20 different doors to turn into a poster/collage (see photo in post).

Prior to the discovery of copper, this remote and cold part of Norway (coldest area in the country due to it being far inland from the sea) was the traditional homerange of nomadic Sami (Lapplanders) Reindeer herders.

And nearby there still are Southern Sami Reindeer herders. Back home, I occasionally tell people that some of my Stensaas relatives run a Reindeer slaughterhouse in Norway…and that is mostly true. The “Stensaas Reindyrslakteri” has been in business just east of Røros since 1890, but the connection to my Melhus/Kvål Stensaas’s (my family) is thin at best.

Still, I thought the boys would get a kick out of visiting there and seeing the Stensaas name on a commercial business, and so we all drove out there to have a look. Stensaas Reindryslakteri produces wholesale and retail reindeer meats for groceries and specialty shops around Norway. Jan found the owner (4^th or 5^th generation?) who came out and chatted with us. And of course we took the mandatory photo of the boys in front of the emblazoned “Stensaas” delivery van 

A wonderful blue-sky day with family in Røros!

Now it was time to head up the road to my ancestral Stensaas/Rofstad homeland near Melhus/Kvål near Trondheim.

NEXT—Norway #7

ANCESTRAL STENSAAS-ROFSTAD FARMS

It was time to leave our cozy cabin on the Sognefjord and head north. I am quite positive that any search for directions in Norway via Google Maps results in a squiggly line that can’t possible be the quickest route…but, alas, due to intervening fjords and mountains, it usually is. This was such the case in our travels to Lillehammer.

But we had all day, so the circuitous route was no problem. We stopped by another stave church (post coming soon), which Birk and I explored. Bridget and Bjorn were “stave-churched-out” by now.

The boathouses of Vik are a colorful lot.

Our lodging for the night was adjacent to the downtown railroad station (in fact it was called the Stasjon Hotel), and this was my worst lodging decision of the trip. Not that it was noisy, it was not, but that it was basically a youth hostel with some marginally nicer private rooms. Tiny and spartan.

I had been to Lillehammer on two occasions before…both in winter. Once was for the 1994 Winter Olympics; a joyous and enthusiastic gathering. I don’t think the world has ever seen so many Norwegian flags and hand-knit sweaters in one spot! I was mesmerized by the whole spectacle, and took in ski jumping (Espen Bredeson!), the 4x10k Nordic Relay (Norwegian men losing by a hair to Italy…You’ve never heard such a loud silence), the downhill (Åmodt), speed skating (American Dan Jansen). Okay, enough reminiscing…back to 2025.

To celebrate that Olympic history we decided to try the Olympic bobsled run in nearby Hunderfoss. I guess we got to the site early as no one was around. The place looked abandoned. Finally some workers drifted in and we signed our lives away with waivers. A short van ride to the top I found out that our Bobsled driver was not actually a bobsledder himself. Okaaay.

After putting on heavy duty helmets, we were given instruction on how to enjoy the 65km per hour ride down a curvy track while pulling 3Gs of force! “Keep your chin up” was basically the only instructions.

I’m not going to lie…I did not enjoy the ride. It was 90 seconds of unpleasantness for me.  My helmeted head banging off the roll cage with every turn. Bridget and Birk really loved the experience though.

Later, while chatting with my relatives in Trondheim, Jan related that a couple of his work colleagues had done the same ride and both had gotten injured, resulting in a few months of chiropractic work. Yikes!

We made our way back to the outskirts of Lillehammer to visit Maihaugen, possibly Norway’s best outdoor folk museum. But first we had to take a spin through the Olympic Museum that is housed in the Maihaugen interpretive center. Being Olympic nerds and a skiing family, it was quite cool to see familiar names from past Olympics.

Maihaugen was the brainchild of Anders Sandvig a Lillehammer dentist who started buying up and preserving old farm buildings in the late 1800s. He was not a wealthy man, so he eventually gifted the buildings to the town.

Over 200 buildings dot the expansive and hilly site. Maihaugen is especially blessed with many early log farm buildings (1600s to 1800s). Laced with walking paths, you wander between a mountain farm to a fishing village to a blacksmith shop, even to a 1950s suburb. They have two historic “crown jewels” on the grounds: the 1200s Garmo stave church and Queen Sonia’s childhood home; both moved to the site from their original spots.

Bridget and the boys went off on their own as they knew I would linger far too long at the log barns.

We reconvened after a couple hours and all agreed it was well worth a half-day visit. I think we could have made a full day of Maihaugen! I even bought the book that contains details on most of the buildings because I didn’t have time to read all the signage.

NEXT—Norway #6

My Norwegian Family; Røros to Trondheim

Oslo the Magnificent—”DRAGON STYLE”

Thank you Icelandair for our layover in your beautiful country! An added “bonus” to flying out of Keflavik is that you get to load the plane from the tarmac….always fun when it’s raining . Then we found out that we had different seat assignment as they had to use a different plane, some rickety old thing.  It didn’t make us feel any better when two flight attendants had to try four times to shut the manual sliding door right by our seats. As I watched them struggle, I wondered why parachutes aren’t standard issue, like the life vests… “Simply pull the red rip cord to fully deploy your parachute…Please get sucked out of the plane before helping others deploy their chutes.” I stared at that door the whole flight….Kidding…Not kidding.

But the slightly-less-than-three-hour flight went well. We left Iceland at 10:45 and arrived in Oslo at 3:45pm…wait…that math doesn’t add up. Turns out that not only is Norway in a different time zone, but they are also on daylight savings time, unlike Iceland. After collecting our luggage. We check bags instead of carry-ons even though all our bags are carry-on size compliant. To us it is worth going to the luggage carousel and risking a lost or delayed bag versus hauling them around the terminal and struggling to find a spot in the overhead bins.

SCANDIA HOLMENKOLLEN HOTEL

Now it was late afternoon, but fortunately sunset isn’t until nearly 11pm. We grabbed a high-speed tram that took us up towards the Holmenkollen just a half-hour northwest of downtown. “Mind the gap,” is now a phrase that is engrained in our heads, since the tram recording belted it out at nearly every stop…and there were a lot of stops.

From the tram stop it was about a 1.3 mile walk to our Scandic Holmenkollen Park hotel. And did I mention that the walk was nearly vertical? Great anaerobic workout for these American tourists! If it weren’t for the incessant and loud chattering of the broken wheel on my rolling luggage wobbling and hobbling over the pavement, steps, curbs and cobble, it would have been a very pleasant hike!

I chose our hotel for three reasons…1. It was near the famous Holmenkollen Ski Jump and Ski Museum, which I wanted to show the kids. 2. It was a Scandic Hotel chain of which I am a member. 3. It had a family-size suite so all four of us could share a room, plus an outstanding breakfast buffet. Oh, and finally, maybe most importantly?, on social media it simply looked like the coolest old wood “Viking-esque” hotel I’d ever seen. And the view overlooking the city and harbor wasn’t too shabby either.

And did I mention the all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet? Not even a sliver of resemblance to an American hotel included breakfast, this massive spread included freshly-baked croissants and crusty breads, multiple cheeses, meats, yougurts, Musli, veggies, waffles, eggs, sausages and about 100 other things…plus really, really good coffee.

The wooden part of the hotel was designed by Balthazar Lange and completed in 1894 in the Dragestil style of Norwegian Romantic period architecture (1880-1910). Literally translated to “Dragon Style,” Dragestil buildings draw their inspiration from Viking-era folklore (dragons) and medieval Stavkyrkke (stave churches). Stylized dragon heads arc from the multiple peaked roofs, overhanging levels, timber walls are often stained dark brown or tarred, tall steep-pitched spires add height and drama; all these features make for a dramatic and imposing building. Later in this post we go to yet another world-class Dragestil building just up the road at Frognerseteren.

The Hotel was commandeered by the Nazis during WWII as a base of operations for  the German Airforce Luftwaffe headquarters. I picked this up from Wikipedia but can’t find any other collaboration of this bit of history.

HOLMENKOLLEN SKI JUMP & MUSEUM

Just a short walk from the hotel is the world famous (and massive) Holmenkollen Ski Jump. I had been here for a World Cup cross-country ski race back in the 1980s (you might be surprised that I was a spectator, and not a participant ). It looked completely different then, and I also approached from below, then and now we were above, so it all seemed foreign to me. But then I realized that the jump tower itself was all new; a gleaming (literally glowing in the setting sun) piece of art masquerading as a world-class ski jump.

Built into the base of the ski jump is an engaging Ski Museum that engages most of your senses. If you are a fanatical Nordic skier/ski fan, you will love this museum (we knew many of the skiers and explorers celebrated within), if not, well, you will definitely enjoy the gift shop!

One cool connection to home was the listing of Duluth, Minnesota ski jumper Gene Kotlarek who set the distance record for the new Holmenkollen Ski Jump in 1963. He went on to compete in the 1964 Innsbruck Winter Olympics.

FROGNERSETEREN

Further up the hill, at the end of the tram line, is Frognerseteren (“The Frogner’s mountain pasture”), a wild, “city park” densely forested and laced with trails for hiking, roller-skiing (yes, that’s a thing there!) and mountain biking. [It is a major cross-country skiing area in winter.] We did a nice hike (giant slugs!) followed by a snack from the dramatic Dragestil-style Frognerseteren designed by Holm Munthe and completed in 1891. Formerly a sports center, today inside you can find Café Seterstua and Restaurant Finstua, and much of the original interior décor.

Interesting fact…The elevation difference between the start of the tram in Oslo Central and the Frognerseteren Station is 1,568 feet. The largest elevation gain of any city metro system in the World!