Winter Came Late This Year, Revisited

Though the lingering winter was kicking my ass in March, spring started to show it’s warmer and softer side in April. The days got suddenly much longer after we switched to daylight savings time, the rain abated and there are touches of green in the landscape. It’s safe to say that spring is here and I’m a happy camper.

So what do we do for Easter? We do what every sane Norwegian does: we run to the mountains for one last hurrah on skis. To be perfectly honest, I couldn’t get my head around the idea of leaving the gorgeous weather in Oslo for the snow and ice. Still, the last time I did this four years ago, the sun shone brilliantly and the temperatures were high despite the 2½ feet of snow that was on the ground. I remembered that the Easter holiday was actually fun and I had a bit of tan when it was all over. It couldn’t be that bad, right?

Despite all of the advancements in transportation, there are still places that cars can’t reach in the winter. The locals switch to snow scooters and skis and continue on as usual. Since we don’t live up by the cabin, Anders’ family will load the heavy food stuff on to a rented scooter and ski up with their clothes in backpacks. It’s about 6km (ca. 4mi) from the nearest parking area to their cabin. To a Norwegian, anything less than 10km (ca. 6mi) is horseplay – a mere walk in the park. In fact, the Norwegian language doesn’t have the verb “to ski”. Literally translated, they say “to walk on skis” (å gå på ski) because it’s all really the same thing to them.


I should add here that I’m talking about cross-country or telemark skiing. These techniques are the only kind that you can use in the mountainous terrain. If you’re moving uphill you can “step” with your skis, using them as a kind of snowshoe. It’s amazing the places you can go on skis that other automated ground transport can’t reach. It’s also at these times that I marvel at the properties of snow. Whether you’re gliding or stepping over the snow, it appears deceptively solid. However, for all of the things that snow is, it is mostly air. If you take off your skis, you’ll sink up to your hips in the fluffy stuff and there is no graceful way out of the freezing quicksand trap. For someone who’s never really seen more than 30cm (12in) of snow at time, the phenomena of 1m+ (3ft+) of snow at go still fascinates me.

Having said that, can I just tell you what a pain in the ass this past Easter holiday was? Christ Almighty, when we got to the parking area up by the cabin Thursday afternoon, it was windy and overcast. The snow was blowing horizontally and stinging our faces. Even though it was overcast, I had to use sunglasses to keep the snow out of my eyes. We used about 2 hours to ski those 6km to the cabin because we were fighting the wind and poor skiing conditions. The temperatures were not that low, so the snow would clump up on the bottom of our skis, requiring us to stop frequently and scrape the snow off so we could glide. I was so tired and at times I wanted to take my skis off and walk up the steepest hills, but that was a no-go, as described above. When we finally got to the cabin, I was so exhausted that I started bawling after I changed into non-ski gear. Luckily, the cabin was warm, a fantastic dinner was waiting for us and my mood turned around quickly. The cabin is really very cozy and it’s hard to be in a bad mood when there’s a roaring fire and good company.

The weather didn’t get much better over the next three days. In fact, three feet of snow became four feet (1.2m), maybe five feet (1.5m) of snow, all told. We took short trips out when the wind wasn’t blowing too much or if the sun managed to shine. All of that suited me just fine, and I was wiped out by these short trips alone. There was, of course, great food to be had and the traditional Easter dinner of lamb’s ribs was served in all of its fanfare on Saturday. (Most holidays here are celebrated on the eve of the actual holiday, Lord knows why.) We skied out on Easter Monday and even though we had brilliant sunshine and good conditions, I was done done DONE with winter. We packed up the skis and I took some pleasure in knowing that we wouldn’t need them again for quite some time. I was so looking forward to the warm springtime in Oslo we had left only four days before.

And do you know what? As we drove towards Oslo the weather turned bad. God help me, it f¤&%ing snowed that night.