July 28, 2025
I woke up this morning without knowing what time it was, but opened by eyes to the sun rising over the fjord in Odda. When I checked my phone, I saw that it was only 4:30am so I snapped a quick picture and hoped I’d be able to sleep for a few more hours and that the boys would be able to do the same. Kyle and Len were up first, close to 8am, and I soon followed but Ollie managed to sleep another hour or so despite our coffee making, game playing and the sun rising.
We said farewell to the treehouse and started our descent back to our car midmorning knowing we’d be cutting it close to make it back to Bergen in time for the boys’ dentist appointments. Further complicating our drive back to the city was the fact that we had failed to charge our car and would be arriving back to the city with just a few percentage points to spare if all went to plan.
We repeated the 3 hour drive from yesterday but in reverse by taking the ferry across the fjord between Tørvikbygd and Jondal and driving through 29 tunnels back to Bergen. We failed to count the tunnels yesterday so our guess was that we had gone through 20— we were pretty far off! The longest tunnel was 7 miles long and shortest was just 100 meters and all were through or under mountains.
Somehow we made it to Bergen and parked the car to arrive with 2 minutes (and 2%) to spare at the dental office. Lenny was given a clean bill of dental health and Ollie had one problem spot that was fixed. Both were given goodie bags filled with dental goodies and a small plastic top that they kept calling a beyblade, one of their favorite toys back home. Len was especially jacked up about these goodies and asked me multiple times if I wanted to look through his goodie bag. Other than a few lego sets along the way, they haven’t received any new toys or really had access to many kids’ toys in over 4 months, so the plastic tops kept their attention much longer than they otherwise would have. They’ve had plenty of time with their iPads, though.
I then navigated us to the wrong hotel. Maybe it was my subconscious or wishful thinking that we were staying at the Thon Bristol hotel, but we were actually at the Thon Rosenkrantz a few minutes away.
As we got settled at the correct hotel, we finished the Jungle Cruise movie from last night. Kyle and I thought it was terrible but it kept the boys’ attention. Between the 3 hour drive and the kids’ dental appointments, we had essentially skipped lunch so left the hotel in search of an early dinner.
After checking out the fish market, we had dinner at waterside restaurant in downtown Bergen. Ollie was reluctant to eat his mussels early on in the meal until we found a tiny one and told him he should eat the newborn baby mussel. For some reason he loved that we had named it and scarfed it down. Then we found a toddler, kid, big kid, teenager, etc and before we knew it he had eaten ~20 more. Len wasn’t having any of it though he did try a piece of salmon and say, “Not for me!” For dessert, we kept up with our tradition and grabbed ice cream at a convenience store while walking home. Kyle tested out a Moroccan pistachio titan competitor but found that the Norwegian version didn’t top the original.
We had an early night at the hotel and watched the Shark Whisperer documentary on Netflix together. Len only made it 30 minutes into the movie before passing out despite his 2 hour car nap. Seemingly, the string of late nights thanks to the Norwegian midnight sun had finally caught up to Len. After our late night and early morning at the Woodnest, we’re especially grateful this hotel has black out shades so we can all recharge before we head to Croatia tomorrow!
