Oslo to Elvesæter - August 15

Today was a long bus day broken up by a visit to Lillehammer and the Nordic Folk Museum. This is an indoor/outdoor museum with beautiful old buildings brought here to form a huge farm complex with five tenant farms. We saw the main family house which was rustic but well appointed with carving. The owner was a rich farmer, circa 1750. It was raining off-and-on as we toured the buildings.

The Maihaugen Museum interior featured craft and hobby displays including a dentist’s office circa 1890’s. The dentists was the museum’s founder who practiced here.

Later in Lom, we visited one of the remaining stave churches from the 12th century. It was a beautiful wood construction and decoration.


Stave Church in Lom

Our final destination was the Elvesæter Inn for a quiet overnight. There were wood buildings with painted and carved details from the 16th century. The inn started out as a farm, but was converted to an inn in the 1800’s. We stayed in the building of the giants. We were now in the mountains of Norway, so the weather was cool as were the rooms. We could have used the room’s heater, but we couldn’t figure out how to turn it on.

Dinner was in the main house on the second floor. The views from it were spectacular - a ranging river beneath steep, wooded hills. We had a three-course dinner - potato and leek soup, prime rib with potatoes and green vegetables, and crème caramel.

The weather was still drizzly after dinner. This didn’t discourage Ann as she made a tour around the grounds. The river looked like it was near flood stage, but the locals said it wouldn’t happen.