Today I am participating in Where in the World Wednesdays, Classy in Philadelphia‘s awesome weekly series. I’ve been a little slow to participate, but you can see the two posts I did a few months back. Now here’s a description from the Classy Jessica herself: The idea of WITWW is to post a picture of you in someplace in the world…it doesn’t have to be somewhere foreign or tropical. Just a picture of you somewhere that you consider traveling.
That is me celebrating the fact that I had successfully climbed to the very top of Preikestolen, aka Pulpit’s Rock right outside Stavanger, Norway. It was definitely worthy of a celebration–Wait, wait, wait a minute. What the hell is Preikestolen, you may ask. Let me tell you about it.
See that rock up there? The one with all the people, with the fantastic views of a fjord, with the incredibly tiny path to get to it? That is Preikestolen, or Pulpit’s Rock. That is what I climbed two hours to see. It was absulutely breathtaking and beautiful but getting there was painful. See, my brother told me that I HAD to take this hike, that it was one of the most beautiful things I would ever see. Like all of my brother’s advice, you should never take it. One time he told me there was a green ski slope open half way up Whiteface mountain. There wasn’t. I had to walk down that mountain, CRYING. Yet I forgot about this when he said YOU MUST GO TO PREIKESTOLEN !!! and signed right up.
I had no idea what I was in store for.
I had arrived the night before after taking an all night train to the north of Denmark from Copenhagen. I had been harrassed by an eighteen year old and a 60+ year old man at 5am, had spent eleven or more hours on a ferry and had arrived to find out I was not in Stavanger, but outside of Stavanger, with no way of getting there. I was quickly introduced to how amazingly friendly the Norwegians were. A girl who I had been talking to the entire boat ride mentioned to her friend that I needed a ride and these two strangers who I had just briefly met, offered to give me a ride to the place I was staying at (a fellow blogger, in fact!). I was beyond indebted to these two strangers and instantly knew I would love this place.
And love it I did. Stavanger was gorgeous and my host was very gracious and helpful (I didn’t get to meet Lisa, the blogger who helped me out, but I did get to meet her nice husband!).
When I wandered into town, I found out that the hike to Preikestolen took about eight hours total, which kind of surprised me. I wasn’t expecting anything lengthy so I immediately set out to catch the ferry to catch the bus to get to the base of this hike. On the bus ride up into the mountains, I met Zsofia, a Hungarian architect and we instantly bonded over stories of travel and our shared profession. I still hadn’t a clue what I was getting into but luckily Zsofia was there.
At the base of the hike.
It was painful. It was lots of steep hills covered in boulders that lead to amazing vista points that took my breathe away. It was rivers cascading down the walkways, slips and a fall or two. It was spectacularly beautiful.
This all lead up to the this rock that juts out over this fjord. You could see for miles from up here and it was terrifying and fabulous at the same time. Unfortunately to get to this rock you had to cross over this little ledge no wider than the width of my small foot. One false step and you would end up falling down 15 feet to a small ledge and beyond that–the fjord. I’m terrified of heights. I mean TERRIFIED. This is where Zsofia really came in handy–she had to coach me across this little divide. It took a lot of convincing; I literally said something along the lines of ok I can see it from here! That’s good enough for me! I’ll start going back down….
She wasn’t hearing it. She got me across it (and back across too–which was harder!) and it was worth it to be on that rock.
For the record I don’t understand how people can just hang off the ledge or lie that close. I am trembling just looking at them. It looks like I photoshopped them in right? I did not. That is the edge of this rock, that is how high up we were.
I highly recommend this to anyone who ends up in that area of the world–but just be prepared. I saw girls scrambling over rocks in high heels. I don’t know how they didn’t break all their bones. I managed to hurt my knee and my legs hurt for days afterwards. The hike back down was a race for time. We wanted to catch one of the last buses out of there but being that it was so steep and I was being extremely cautious, we almost didn’t make it. But we did, somehow. And it was one of the most memorable moments of my trip through Europe.
I was looking all sorts of hot but I needed proof that I made it back down alive. (I was pretty convinced I was dead)
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Holy crap, the base of the rock picture is incredible. I honestly hate hiking but getting to the top always feels like a huge accomplishment. You need to join in more because I know you have a TON of amazing photos!
Those are some AMAZING views. And I would have been terrified too. Probably would have peed myself. But wow would that have been worth it!!
Those pics are absolutely breathtaking, Ashley.
For the record I’m also a bit dodgy with heights and I think I would have been right there with you scared to go over the ledge. And as for the idea of people hanging over the edge . . . are they INSANE???
I have not been to Norway, but really want to go! When I lived in Poland, I wrote my Master’s thesis on Norway and Iceland. I was hoping to go there to do some “research,” but it was just too expensive at the time! Oh well!
Gorgeous photos!
those pictures are amazing, love them all and seriously so awesome.
That is amazing. I am terrified of heights too. I’m glad that you made it to the top and have this wonderful story to share.
awesome! i saw this in your facebook pictures.
as musch as i love hiking, i have never gone on a hike past 3-4 hrs, which is considerably “short”! i would LOVE to go on a day hike or backpacking though. what an amazing view!
Holy god. I, too, am unreasonably terrified of heights. I don’t envy you that little ledge. I went hiking up Big Mountain (Whitefish, MT) with my brother, and at one point there was a smaller trail next to a steep drop, and I swear I almost fainted. I practically had to ride on his back to get across.
Absolutely breath-taking photos, though.
You can bet I would have been on my brother’s back if he had been there.
Wait, are those people sitting on the edge? Scary!
Oh yes. A LOT of people were just hanging off the ledge. I wanted to yell at all of them.