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Archive for October 24th, 2009

A travel through Norway – in 1857! Oct 24

Maybe you think that travel guides are a new invention – well, think again. Books describing journeys have been around for centuries but I guess they have changed a bit as more and more people have the chance to travel. I came to think of this the other day when I heard on the news that the book “Northern Travel” by Bayard Taylor has finally been translated into Norwegian. I guess it was about time as it was written in 1857! The book is a tale of Bayard Taylor’s trip to Sweden and Norway and on his trip he gets to visit Bergen, Oslo, the fjords, see the midnight sun etc. Norway has changed a lot over the last 150 years – we have gained full independent once again, we have gone from being one of the poorest countries in Europe to one of the richest nation in the world etc etc. In that respect I think all Norwegians should read this book to get a glimpse of Norway anno 1857. Taylor describes food in Bergen as being horrible, he talks to the lepers and the lack of hygiene, he describes Norwegian jealousy towards the Swedes etc. If you want to read the book you can actually do it online. Thanks to Google Books you can find it here.

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