ONE DAY IN ALESUND

 A few years ago I read a magazine article about the city voted Norway's most beautiful & thought  "Ooooo, I'd like to go there!".
Yesterday we arrived 'there' in a sunlit blue skied afternoon & started to become familiar with the streets of Alesund, a town amidst islands on the west coast of Norway.
Before the sun had risen to be too warm this morning, we found our way to a wooded park, where we climbed the 418 steps to look out over this art nouveau town.
What an amazing view!

 And what an incredible walk!
Climbing is not my thing, but I have to say that, even though rather steep & uneven at times, this is the kindest climb I've ever done.  The creators.... knowing that some of us get puffed... have placed multiple seating areas along the path, as well as fabulous look outs where we are encouraged to stop & take in the view. There are strong iron hand rails for the time when one needs to pull oneself up the next step &  they also randomly placed what number of the 418 steps you are on, which is psychologically encouraging. I was soooooo impressed!

 Alesund is an 'Art Nouveau' town for a very sad reason. In 1904 there was a terrible storm here & during it a fire started in the township.  With most buildings made of wood, the fire consumed the whole town & within 24 hours there were 10,000 people made homeless.  As this was a major fishing port, exporting fish all over Europe, news spread of the catastrophe & help came.  Alongside their fellow Norwegians, Germany & other European nations not only came to their aid, but contributed a huge amount of money to the rebuilding & to the people.
It was essential that Alesund be rebuilt & soon, so in 1905 building work began.  It so happened that there were a lot of craft & tradesmen out of work in Oslo, so they flocked to Alesund for employment.  It was decided that the new buildings should be made of brick, so that this disaster never happened again.  The designer of the project, chose the art nouveau style & added a Norwegian twist, so that the buildings would be functional & beautiful.  The design was determined by the purpose & there was a regulated height.
Art nouveau is nature inspired, but the Norwegian variation included a nod to their Viking ancestry  & we had a thoroughly enjoyable time walking around admiring the buildings & in particular, the decorative features.
Here are a few examples...

 There were interesting turrets, roof tiles, lamps, door & window frames, even the multi storey car park , which was clearly originally a couple of buildings next to each other, was given the beauty treatment.

 Our next stop was to the city museum where, naturally, we learnt a bit about the fishing culture here. The sea has been this city's source of income for years, so they know it's treacherous personality well.  It didn't really come as a shock then, to learn that the first person to design an enclosed life boat was from Alesund. Ole Brude invented 'Uraed' (the egg), it was 18 feet long, wide & deep.

 In 1904 he & 3 companions sailed Uraed from Alesund to just north of Boston in America.  It took them 5 months, & was meant to prove that enclosed lifeboats were the only way to save the lives of sailors.
Sadly, the world was a bit slow (!) & it was another 60 years before his idea was accepted. There were 23 of these 'eggs' made & this is the only remaining one. We were allowed inside & although cleverly & carefully designed, this would have been a very rough way to endure 5 months!

 From one museum we went to another.
The Jugendstilsenteret is the Art Nouveau Centre of Norway & so was very much focussed on what had happened here in Alesund & how the town was rebuilt.
One of the galleries honoured the skills of the artisans & crafts people who made this place so beautiful, as well as the skilled tradesmen who literally built this city in difficult circumstances. They had a fabulous 'time capsule', which focussed on the fire & it's aftermath, which was a celevr & entertaining way to learn about the history.
Another series of galleries showcased the interior design of some of the wealthier homes.

There were a lot of beautiful furnishings & both functional & decorative items.  Beautiful flowing lines, stylised plantlife & the odd dragon head or two greeted us at every glance.

 Our third museum of the day was right next door at Kube.
This is a contemporary art gallery & their current exhibition, occupying several rooms, explores perceptions of the religious concept of paradise.
Most of the art was very confronting & disturbing.  However, this interactive installation by Elin Melberg, was fun.
First we were required to remove our shoes & put on these wild pompom slippers!  They were not very easy to walk in, especially when entering her gallery space where the floor was all mirror!

 Some of the walls were lined with mosaic mirror tiles & other walls with voluminous pale blue satin curtains. We had quite a bit of fun with our reflections, but it wasn't really meant to be like a fun fair.  She was hoping we'd "step out of our everyday life and enter into a meditative, sensory universe" that would invite our own ideas of paradise. 
I must be honest, we were giggling too much to think about the deeper meaning!

 

Our last stop of the day was the church.

Wouldn't you know it... it closed at 3pm.  We were 10 minutes late! ARGHHHHHH! And there were supposed to be frescoes! Sigh....... such is life!

We had an interesting look around the accompanying cemetery, where we had read that during the heyday of exporting & importing, Spanish ships often arrived with nothing to trade for the fish that they wanted to buy.  They did, however, have a lot of soil on board which they used as ballast.  This soil was then offloaded to the cemetery for the graves to be dug in, as the soil here is so bad!  That means that the graves in this cemetery are all buried in Spanish soil!

 

Once again we have been blessed with outstanding weather, which has contributed to a very enjoyable day in Alesund. Tomorrow we take to the road for our 'Norwegian Road Trip', and we will have to become acquainted with another GPS. Hmmm.  I wonder what we'll end up naming this one!!