Wednesday, July 16, 2014

Trondheim - The Monastery, Tautra, and Frosta

After over 8 hours on the road (and getting lost for the last 30 minutes of that time after my GPS became confused), I was thrilled to finally see the sign for "Tautra Mariakloster," the tiny monastery where I was spending the week.  Cistercian monasteries usually receive guests--I had stayed at a monastery on a Washington island before and had a wonderful experience.  This part of Norway is beautiful, but the monastery was even more remote and lonely than I had expected.  There are very few people featured in my photos because there were very few people to be found!  After making sure I had time to visit Trondheim, I cut my visit short by a day, eager to get back to the bustle of "big city" Oslo.

The monastery

My adorable, very Scandinavian room

The incredible fjord view from my window

Wandering the island

Tautra is a famous bird sanctuary (I was dive-bombed right after taking this photo by seagulls protective of their eggs)

A picture-perfect picnic area at the house up the road

The chilly, windy fjord beach

Looking south toward Trondheim

Sun streaming into the beautiful new monastery chapel

The chapel, with its perfect view of the water

New monastery this way, old monastery ruins that way

Gift shop cookbook

Gift shop cheese, perfectly named

The old monastery ruins (from the 13th century)

Bed & Breakfast sign by the ruins


Cafe patio
Site-seeing on Frosta, the neighboring peninsula
The site of one of Norway's oldest courts (from around 900 to 1030 AD)


Logtun church sign

The church (thought to be from the 1500s)

A peek inside

Angel weathervane (from the modern church down the road)

The causeway between Frosta and Tautra

Beautiful view

The causeway gate (put in place to prevent predators from reaching the bird sanctuary)

My first midnight sun!!! (taken at 12:30 am)


Homemade ice cream from the nuns (they prepared lunch for the visitors each day; breakfast and dinner we ate on our own)

A foggy morning

Hard to focus on driving with this view

Red barn

Tourist center

Farms stretching down toward the fjord

"Frosta Path"

One final panoramic

Pink and purple flowers

Tiny rainbow

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