Europe’s ‘wild west,’ Norway has a ruggedly beautiful frontier character, with easy access to wild outdoor country and forested green belts circling even the largest cities. lts mountains, fjords and glaciers are highly prized, along with its cultured cities, unspoiled fishing villages and rich historic sites, from Viking ships to medieval churches. North of the Arctic Circle, the population thins, the horizons grow wiger, and seals, walruses and polar bears sun themselves on ice floes.

May to September (late spring to summer)

Being overawed by the grand fjords of Arctic Norway, which dwarf anything in the south Wandering the streets of colourful, historic Bergen Visiting the virtually in tact 9 the-century Oseberg Viking ship and museum in Oslo Touring the stave churches at Borgund, Heddal and Urnes Viewing thye midnight sun from Nordland Spotting walruses, polar bears and whales in the high Arctic

Read A Doll’s House by quintessential Norwegian dramatist Henrik lbsen, or Jostein Gaarder’s bestseller Sophie’s World

Listen to composer Edvard Grieg or indigenous Sami artist Ailu Gaup Language, or Anja Breien’s Jostedalsrypa, about a 14 th – century girl who survived the Black Death

Eat lapskaus (a hearty meat stew with vegetables )or lutefisk (dried cod soaked in potash lye)

Drink the national spirit, aquavit ( or akevitt )- a potent potato and caraway liqor The standard Norwegian beer is pils lager.

Vaer sa god ( an all-purpose expression of goodwill )

Viking; fjords; the aurora borealis; stave churches; skiing; the midnight sun; whaling

Lemmings don’t throw themselves off cliffs in mass suicide; the legal drinking age is 18 years for beer and wine, but 20 for spirits

Trolls come in all shapes and sizes, some small, but nearly all have four fingers and toes on each hand foot, well as long, crooked noses and bushy tails. lt’s believed that can live for several hundred years and are credited with having produced both por’s hammer and Ooinn’s spear. They also have a penchant for harassing billy goats and despising the sound of church bells. They’re known to get irritable and may anger easily but they’re generally kind to humans.