August 27 To Jessheim (Day 335)
We had a late morning, not needing to get to the train station until after 11. We walked through town, past the unassuming entrance to Fjellhallen, behind construction fences.
Hard to believe this is the entrance to the largest subterranean auditorium in the world!
We took our last train ride on our Eurail Pass today. We traveled 2 hours from Gjøvik south to Oslo, then caught a train for a 36 minute ride back north to Jessheim. The trip was through beautiful country, lush green Norwegian woods, following rushing rivers, past glacial lakes, but the scenery was rushing by so fast, and the train windows were dirty. Pictures would not do justice to the beauty. It must be a winter wonderland covered in snow! It got me thinking about the statue we saw in Lillehammer.
Outside the library in Lillehammer is this statue. Is it a Viking ‘berserker’ kidnapping a child? Is it a Norse God delivering a baby?
Translating the information provided, it is a ‘Birkebeiner’ known for transporting “the one-year-old Haakon Haakonsson, an heir to the Norwegian throne, safely from Lillehammer to Østerdalen to Trondheim, a long and perilous journey through treacherous mountains and forests” to save him from the opposing contender to the throne.
The Birkebeiners were a rebellious political party during the 110 year long civil war era in Norway, from to 1130 to 1240. The name has its origins in propaganda from the established party that the rebels were so poor that they made their shoes of birch bark, ‘birkebeiner’ translating to ‘birch bones’. Although originally derogatory, the opposition adopted the Birkebeiner name for themselves, and continued using it after they came to power in 1184. The rescue of the infant Prince is commemorated now in cross country ski races around the country, and even in the US, occurring in Wisconsin, home to many Norwegian immigrants and their descendants! The American Birkebeiner is held in February in Hayward, WI.