Vangshylla – Page 2 – Patricia McLellan's Blog

2020-11-11

Inderøy Walk – Fog and Øyna

Wednesday is my usual day to go for a walk with a girlfriend. The weather forecast was for sunshine so I was looking forward to today’s walk. As I went out to the car, I noticed fog rolling across the water, coming out of Skarnsund. As I stood watching for a few minutes, the fog rapidly moved out over Trondheim Fjord.

Picture taken at 9:38 looking towards Skarnsund Bridge.

I had agreed to meet my friend at her house in Straumen and I was anxious to see where there was fog and where there wasn’t fog. As I had hoped, the fog was mostly on the water and if we walked uphill, we would be in the sunshine.

We choose to walk up to Øyna, a hotel and restaurant located near the top of a hill in Straumen. (See their website for more information about them. You can also get information about them in English here.)

Øyna, a commercial enterprise having hotel accommodation and a restaurant serving locally produced food. It lies at the top of a hill and lies low in the terrain.

The newest hotel units also lie low in the landscape but each room has a beautiful view over Straumen, Trondheim Fjord and the surrounding area.

Even on a foggy day, the views from here were good though, of course, not as good as on a sunny day. In the picture below you can just see the top of the spire of Sakshaug Church, sticking up from the fog. This picture is taken looking between two of the new units of the hotel, so this is the sort of view there would be from the hotel rooms themselves.

Looking down the hill from Øyna towards Straumen, most of which is hidden in the fog. In the background are the hills of Levanger.

Looking westwards towards Trondheim. We are now high enough above the fog to get an interesting picture of how the fog covers the fjord. Where you see white, it should be mostly fjord underneath the fog.

I always find it interesting how patchy fog can be, especially when looking at it from above. Here I am looking eastwards towards two of the housing areas of Straumen. Not everybody has sunshine.

Back home and this picture was taken at 12:00. There is more fog on Skarnsund, but it is still lying low over the water.

The fog is wispy over the water, but not rising particularly high above the water, so I am still in the sunshine.

Looking towards Ytterøy with the small boat harbour at Vangshylla in the center. The sun is low in the sky, even at noon.

I had a most enjoyable walk, including a good climb up the hill in Straumen, an exploration of an area I hadn’t seen for several years, and lots of sunshine. We used about 75 minutes on our walk today.

2020-09-18

Local food

I made a decision a while ago to buy locally produced food when it was conveniently available at a competitive price. I don’t buy everything that might be available as it must be things that we use.

Two of the products that are produced on local farms in our neighbourhood are eggs and milk.

I started buying eggs quite a while ago now. It is a short walk up to the neighbouring farm. We get 30 eggs at a time and we can also buy double-yoked eggs or cracked eggs at differing prices. I buy just the regular eggs.

In addition to eggs, I can also get cucumbers at the egg farm, though the cucumbers are produced at another farm in Inderøy. Though I don’t purchase it, I can also buy honey here, produced by the farmer’s wife. I find their price a bit high, so have only purchased it once.

I also buy my whole milk in a bottle at a farm that is just a little bit farther away, but still within walking distance. I usually get two liters of milk at a time. One pays a deposit on the bottle on the first purchase and after that one returns the empty bottle and only pays for the milk itself.

In both cases I use a small backpack to carry home the food. Eggs are put into 12-egg cartons which nicely fit in the backpack. Two or three liters of milk also fit nicely into the backpack, though not both eggs and milk at the same time.

To pay for what I purchase, I can use my telephone to send the money while I am at the farm. No invoices or delayed payment. I pay when I take the food. I often meet the farmers and it is nice to chat to them for a few minutes.

This is one way that I can contribute to farmers trying out new marketing ideas.

2020-06-11

Inderøy Walk – Utøy trail

The nature trail that starts in Vangshylla goes all the way to Straumen. What can be driven in a car in 12 km, will be 19 km if you decide to walk along the trail. I have never done the whole trail all at once, but I have done most of the trail, in easier portions.

Vangshylla used to have a ferry in order to cross to Mosvik. Now it is mostly a small boat harbor and there is a building where you can rent accomodation or a small fishing boat. There are about 30 cabins in the area and about 10 houses with full-time residents.

In 1991, the ferry was replaced by a bridge that spans Skarnsund. The bridge is just over one kilometer long. We moved to Vangshylla in 1988, just as they were starting to build the bridge.

As usual, there is an information board, with a map and some information about things along the trail.

The information board at Vangshylla about the culture trail from Vangshylla to Straumen.

The term “culture trail” (kultursti) indicates that there will be information along the trail, either about the animals or plants that are there, or human buildings that are still there or used to be there. There can be information about how the place got its name. The idea is that you are supposed to learn something as you walk along the trail.

This sign is at the beginning of the trail and you can just see a cabin behind the sign. The main part of the trail is 13 km, but since this sign was made an additional 6 km have been added at the Straumen end of the trail.

When starting at Vangshylla, the trail first follows a road that goes both to full-time dwellings and cabins that are only occasionally lived in. The trail is considered to be of medium difficulty.

This picture was taken a while ago, after a rain shower, and before the trees had their leaves out.

Much of the trail goes through the woods and is pleasantly shady on a warm June day. Notice that the trail is well-used and the tree roots make the surface very uneven.

This shows a close-up of the map showing the section from Vangshylla to Forr. I usually walk to Bjønnbrøttet which this year is a check-in point for Inderøy walks. The red dotted line is the trail and the small black squares are the houses or cabins. There are quite a few cabins in this area, in the woods and overlooking the fjord.

The trail can be quite steep at times. Here it goes quite steeply down into a ravine.

The goal for today’s walk was a shelter that has been there for many years. I have been taking this walk for most of the thirty years that we have lived here. Things have changed during this time, but I continue to enjoy the walk that is partially through these shady woods.

The shelter for post 25, the goal of today’s walk.

This sign inside the little shelter explains how the place got it’s name. The story is in both Norwegian and English.

The view from the shelter, looking across Trondheim Fjord, towards Ytterøy, which is in Levanger municipality.

The sign indicates which post one can check-in to here, and the dark box has a book in which you can write your name. The book is out all year and some people like to count how many times they visit this location.

2020-02-16

Surprise at Vangshylla

While walking across Skarnsund Bridge yesterday, this ship came into view.

Ships from the company, Hurtigruten AS do not usually sail up Trondheimsfjord as far as Vangshylla, though Trondheim is one of the regular stops on the coastal route between Bergen and Kirkenes. The name on the ship is Fridtjof Nansen.

MS Fridtjof Nansen, owned by Hurtigruten AS having sailed under Skarnsund Bridge

The ship sailed under the bridge and continued towards Steinkjer. At home I looked up information about the new ship which didn’t seem to have any passengers on board. It soon sailed back under Skarnsund Bridge and headed towards Verdal.

MS Fridtjof Nansen, having just sailed south under Skarnsund Bridge

Looking up the ship on www.marinetraffic.com, I found out that the ship was on a “sea trial”. The ship was built at Kleven Yard, located in Ulsteinvik, Norway and it had been delivered to Hurtigruten AS on 2019.12.20. The ship is scheduled to have its inaugural voyage in March 2020.

The ship uses hybrid battery powered propulsion to reduce fuel use and CO2 emissions. It appears that the ship will be used for Antarctic cruises. Its sister ship, MS Roald Amundsen, is currently cruising between Chile and Antarctica.

More information about the company, Hurtigruten AS, can be found at: https://global.hurtigruten.com/ including the cruises that they offer.

More information about their newest ship, MS Fridtjof Nansen, can be found at: https://global.hurtigruten.com/ships/ms-fridtjof-nansen/