Watch out for the Trolls!

June 21, 2010
After saying goodbye to our friends in Bardu, we packed up the van and hit the road for our hour drive to the small port town of Finnsnes. With a population of 5,000, Finnsnes is slightly larger than Bardu but more of a working city. Since it was freezing cold at about 0 degrees Celcius today, we did a driving tour of the town including a stop at the local harbor to watch a ship come into port bringing iron ore from Sweden and the surrounding industrial park including a company that makes tombstones. From Finnsnes, we drove out to the aptly described fairytale island of Senja. The hour long drive into Senja is somewhat desolute, with tundra like landscape including barren trees and overbearing mountains. However, once you make it into the interior of the island, it is like a hidden paradise and a big tourist draw during the summer months. The island has sandy beaches, though the water is too cold to actually dip into, boats to rent for fishing trips and just beautiful landscape and scenery... when the skies are clear and the weather is warm, unlike our visit today! Our lunch was at a local resort and then we headed back toward Finnsnes but not without a stop to the famed troll museum.

Envisioned and created by Leif Rubach in 1993, the Senjatrollet is the largest troll museum in the world and showcases troll scenarios all located inside a building shaped like a troll head. Trolls are characters in Norwegian mythology and are often feared by children. The trolls in Northern Norway are large, brutish and feature big noses and stringy hair. They are said to live in the mountains, although there are the occasional trolls that live in the sea. Mostly, the trolls kept to themselves and stayed invisible but could travel with the wind and sneak into human homes. Sometimes you can hear them whisper or make noise. If you were in the forest and smelled food, you knew you were near a troll dwelling. Trolls have also been known to be shapeshifters, so they can take the form of a log or an animal. Trolls sometimes took humans or cattle as their prisoners. The women who recently gave birth but hadn't been to church yet were the easiest prey. Trolls could steal a new born baby, but would have to leave their own offspring in return. Christianity could be used as a defense from trolls or the hammer of Thor could be seen as a protective talisman.

One example of a troll story are the mitten trolls. These were trolls that lived in the fishermen's mittens on the docks and would come out and eat children who played by the water. At the troll museum was a wall of pacifiers and letters from children. Parents would often bring their children to the museum to leave behind their pacifiers, a necessary step so as to not grow a large nose like the trolls.

From trolls to the MS Fjordkongen, the hour long speedboat that will take us to our last stop in Northern Norway in the city of Tromsø.